ROME, Oct. 29, 2002 -- HP (NYSE:HPQ) and the Holy See today announced a joint project designed to give millions of people online access to the vast artistic and cultural heritage of the Vatican's Apostolic Library, one of the most prestigious collections of manuscripts, documents and antique texts in the world. The new part of the Holy See Web site (www.vatican.va/) will include images of manuscripts which, until now, have only been accessible to professional scholars and professors.
The Apostolic Vatican Library, founded by Pope Nicholas V (1447-1455), specializes in humanistic disciplines (paleography, history, art history, classical literature, philology) and contains 1,600,000 printed volumes (antique and modern editions); 8,300 incunabula (of which 65 printed on vellum), 150,000 manuscript and records volumes, 300,000 coins and medals and more than 100,000 prints.
"For almost a decade HP has enabled the world to reach the Vatican through the Internet," said HP President, Michael Capellas. "This latest project will extend our partnership by giving millions of people the unique opportunity to access online the vast collection of prestigious antique manuscripts and texts housed within the Vatican's Apostolic Library."
"The partnership between the Holy See and HP will offer the highest level of cultural service by joining technology leadership with the experience of a cultural organisation," said Rev. Raffaele Farina, S.D.B., Prefect of the Vatican Library.
"The project brings together the technology leadership of HP with the Vatican Library's treasures of science, wisdom, religion and spirituality for humankind. Added to this is the grace and beauty of the numerous works of art which will be made available on the internet through the web site being announced today."
Under the partnership, HP will provide the Holy See with HP systems to maximize service availability, processing and response speeds. The high reliability, scalability and robustness of HP infrastructure will ensure faster access to the Vatican Library site and facilitate navigation of the bibliographic database.
HP will also supply imaging and printing devices for the Library's Photographic Laboratory, which is responsible for reproducing manuscripts and publications. Researchers will thus have access to high-resolution images of very rare and precious volumes that will be preserved for the benefit of future generations.
About the Vatican Library
The Vatican Library dates back to Pope Nicholas V (1447-1455), whose notable private collection came to form the first nucleus of the present library. Sixtus IV later gave juridical form to the library conceived by his predecessor with the bull Ad decorem militantis ecclesiae (July 15th, 1475). The humanistic character of the library was enriched over the centuries by many important acquisitions of prestigious libraries and manuscripts that have amplified this immense cultural patrimony.
The catalogue of modern printed volumes has been available online since 1985. This print catalogue, which contains about 10,000 records, with accompanying images, can also be accessed via the Web. At the same time, the online catalogue of medals and coins, and the catalogue of manuscripts is being prepared.
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HP is toonaangevend wereldwijd leverancier van IT producten, technologieën, oplossingen en diensten voor consumenten en organisaties. Het aanbod van HP omvat IT-infrastructuur, global services, personal computing, internet access devices, imaging en printing. Op 3 mei 2002 werd de fusie met Compaq Computer Corporation een feit.