The library is closed August 10-23, 2009 The history of the book patrimony of the Fondazione Casa Buonarroti is both long and complex. When telling the vicissitudes of a library that was born as the book collection of a family descending from the great Michelangelo (and not devoid of other outstanding figures), when tracing the printed books and manuscripts that in the course of almost five centuries passed through the hands of the various inhabitants of the Florentine palazzo in Via Ghibellina, one cannot but also write a history that is in some way parallel to the better known story of Casa Buonarroti and its owners. This project has its roots in the books, but also in the readings (be they documented, codified or merely supposed), the intertwining of relationships, acquaintances, friendships and the learned conversations that took place in these ancient rooms. Just as Casa Buonarroti cannot be defined as the home of Michelangelo, the Casa Buonarroti library clearly cannot be considered to be Michelangelo's personal library, which is still to day a fascinating matter of study even though we know so little about it. In truth, the library today is no longer even a family library. Reconstruction of the age-old physiognomy of this book heritage implied formulating assumptions regarding the seventeenth-century library of the man of letters Michelangelo the Younger; inquiring into the library of the antiquary Filippo, who lived in the mansion in the first half of the eighteenth century; reviewing what remains of the family books, reconstructing the library of the Fondazione Casa Buonarroti as it was at the beginning, when it was founded by the last Grand Duke in 1859; and tracing the successive stages of the enlargements right up to the present. An important episode of this story occurred fifteen years ago, when the Municipality of Florence bought, and shortly afterwards entrusted in commodatum to Casa Buonarroti, a substantial portion (4157 titles) of the personal library of Charles de Tolnay, who had held the post of director of Casa Buonarroti from 1965 to 1981, year of his death. Fondazione Casa Buonarroti thus came at last to possess an important stock of Michelangelesque bibliography, a stock all the more important as it had been collected over the years by a true expert. One should not however disregard the presence of other donations and funds, among them some 150 volumes from the personal library of the erudite Domenico Tordi (1857 - 1933), bearing striking witness to his cult of the figure of Vittoria Colonna; or the papers of Jacques Mesnil (1872 - 1940), a scholar enamoured of Florence and author of important essays on fifteenth-century art as also of revolutionary pamphlets; or the preparatory material for and the manuscript of a classic work of the bibliography of Michelangelo, the study of the portraits of the artist published by Ernst Steinmann in 1913. At present, the Library is made up of about 10.000 volumes, 41 magazines and about 200 rare books, 44 of which date back to the sixteenth century. The Library also hosts the valuable 169 volumes of the Buonarroti Archive, whose consultation is rigorously limited to specialists only. The Library has been open to the public since 1986, and can currently be visited from Monday through Friday, from 9:00 to 13:30. It is necessary to make an appointment, by phone or by email. The catalogue of the Collection of Letters of Michelangelo the Younger is available in electronic format. Students may visit the Library subject to a presentation letter written by their Institute.