National Library of Scotland

History

Originally, Scotland's national deposit library was the Advocates Library belonging to the Faculty of Advocates. It was opened in 1689 and gained national library status in the Copyright Act 1710 (8 Ann. c. 21), giving it the legal right to a copy of every book published in Great Britain. In the following centuries, the library added books and manuscripts to the collections by purchase as well as legal deposit, creating a privately funded national library in all but name.

By the 1920s, the upkeep of collection was too much for the Advocates Library and, with the aid of a £100,000 endowment from Alexander Grant, managing director of McVitie & Price, the library's contents were presented to the nation. The National Library of Scotland was formally constituted by the National Library of Scotland Act 1925 (15 & 16 Geo. 5. c. 73).

Grant's support was recognised with a baronetcy, and in June 1924 he became Sir Alexander Grant of Forres. In 1928 he donated a further £100,000 – making his combined donations the equivalent of around £6 million today – for a new library building to be constructed on George IV Bridge, replacing the Victorian-period Sheriff Court, which moved to the Royal Mile. Government funding was secured which matched Grant's donation. Work on the new building was started in 1938, interrupted by World War II, and completed in 1956. The architect was Reginald Fairlie; the architectural sculptor was Hew Lorimer. The coat of arms above the entrance was sculpted by Scott Sutherland and the roundels above the muses on the front facade by Elizabeth Dempster.

By the 1970s, room for the growing collections was running out, and other premises were required. The Causewayside Building opened in the south-side of Edinburgh in two phases, in 1989 and in 1995, at a total cost of almost £50 million, providing additional working space and storage facilities.

Since 1999, the library has been funded by the Scottish Parliament. It remains one of six legal deposit libraries in the United Kingdom and Ireland, and is overseen by a board of trustees.

The library also holds many ancient family manuscripts including those of the Clan Sinclair, which date back to 1488.

On 26 February 2009, areas of the building were flooded after a water main burst on the 12th floor. Firefighters were called and the leaking water was stopped within ten minutes. A number of items were lightly damaged.

The last letter written by Mary Queen of Scots made a rare public appearance to mark the opening of a new library visitor centre in September 2009.

The Graham Brown Research Fellowship was initiated in 2018 and supports a three-month period of research for fellows to explore any aspect of mountaineering, including literature, history, and environment. The first National Library of Scotland Graham Brown Research Fellow was Alex Boyd FRSA, an artist, photographer, and curator. He focussed on the cultural and literary significance of mountains in Scotland.

The National Library of Scotland holds materials related to (primarily) Scottish theatre, though many of the individual notable items are found across different collections. It has a wide range of theatre materials, including scripts and manuscripts, business papers, sets, theatre programmes, and photographs.

20th and 21st century theatre

Many of the theatre-related items from the 20th and 21st century are held by the Library. These include plays and unpublished manuscripts; music hall and pantomime material; posters, playbills and programmes; reviews and news cuttings; theatre company archives; and material from the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. The general public are able (and encouraged) to view these items at the Special Collections Reading Room in the library's main building, a space where people can consult rare books, manuscripts, and music. Theatre of the 20th century is also well represented on film and can be viewed by the public at the library's Moving Image Archive.

The Set of The Cheviot, the Stag, and the Black, Black Oil

The Cheviot, the Stag, and the Black, Black Oil is a Scottish play by playwright John McGrath. The play tells the history of economic change and exploitation in the Scottish Highlands, from the Highland Clearances all the way through to the contemporary oil boom at the time of its initial production. The stage set for the play, designed and painted by Scottish artist John Byrne, was made in 1973 and is in the form of a giant-sized pop-up book. The Library acquired the set in 2009, although it is currently on loan to V&A Dundee and is on display at the museum until 2043 as part of a 25-year loan agreement with the NLS.

Measuring over 4 metres in length when opened and over 2 metres tall, the Cheviot set is the largest book at the National Library of Scotland. It consists of 5 different scenes painted by Byrne, including: a Highland landscape, a croft house, a poppy-covered war memorial, and a Native American Tipi. The physical set is made from cardboard, however it has been digitised in 3D by the NLS, meaning it can be viewed online via the Cheviot 3D section on the NLS website while it is on loan.