The community of the International Image Interoperability Framework™ 
has developed two standardized Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) to open up the access for research to high-resolution images via the internet and the data sharing between worldwide image repositories. Work in progress: this site offers access to the digitized objects via the IIIF-APIs and Mirador, an image viewer and a research workspace. It is the objective of the Bavarian State Library (BSB) to provide access to all of our 1.5 million retrodigitized works (public domain) in a IIIF compliant way - initially the images and later on it is planned to provide also full texts, if available. Here you can find i.a. digitized medieval manuscripts (approx. 4,000) and incunabula (8,000), more than 1,000,000 newspaper issues and approx. 3,100 East Asian books and manuscripts.
- Read here how to work with Mirador.
- Information for developers about the usage of our APIs.
- Examples of third party IIIF services see here.
Türkischer Portolan (Küsten des Mittelmeeres) - BSB Cod.turc. 431
Bayerische Staatsbibliothek
Dourado, Fernando Vaz: Portulanatlas (Alte Welt und Terra Nova) - BSB Cod.icon. 137
This atlas of portolan charts of the old and the new worlds consists of 16 double leaves made from fine white parchment, bound in costly red morocco leather (made from fine goatskin) with gold ornaments in oriental style. The important Portuguese mariner, cartographer, and painter Fernão Vaz Dourado is thought to have made the atlas in 1580, near the end of his life. It belongs to a class of late-16th-century cartographic masterpieces, which reflect the period's rising demand for cartographic works that were both visually impressive and useful for practical navigation. The atlas was commissioned by the Portuguese crown and produced in Goa, western India, where Dourado spent his last years. The geographical scope of the atlas extends from South America to the Persian Empire, to China (where Canton is named), to Java and New Guinea, and to North America. The charts are remarkable for their narrative wealth. In the regions displayed, natives are portrayed wearing no clothes, with attributes thought to be typical, while busy hunting, gathering food, or carrying out other activities representative of their respective countries as portrayed in Western literary works. The conquerors, in contrast, appear on horseback, wearing hats and suits. The map of Africa contains what most likely is a pictorial allusion to the battle between the Portuguese and Moors near Ksar el-Kebir (Alcazarquivir, Morocco) in 1578. The two riders clad in characteristic costumes and carrying banners may represent the main protagonists in the battle, King Sebastião I of Portugal and Sultan Abd Al-Malik of Morocco (shown wearing a turban). The atlas was transferred from Polling Abbey (Upper Bavaria), when it was dissolved in 1803, to the Munich Court Library, which became the Bavarian State Library, where it has remained ever since. // Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, Department of Manuscripts and Rare Books, 2019
Bayerische Staatsbibliothek
Agnese, Battista: Seeatlas (Alte Welt und Terra Nova) - BSB Cod.icon. 136
Battista Agnese (1514-64) was a masterful geographer and mapmaker. Born in Genoa, he worked in Venice from 1536 to 1564 and became one of the most important figures in Renaissance cartography. Researchers differ on the total number of manuscript atlases created by Agnese; he produced at least 39 portolan, or maritime, atlases, ten of them signed and dated. All are distinguished by their neat calligraphy and are esteemed for their high quality and beauty. None was intended for use on board ship; they served as ceremonial gifts and as adornments to the libraries of the well-to-do. This atlas contains 20 pages of maps. A heraldic bookplate of the court library in Munich appears at the front of the book, followed by declination tables and the zodiac. On the oval world map, the continents appear in green, with somewhat speculative outlines of North and South America. Cherubs, or wind heads, representing the classical twelve-point winds from which modern compass directions evolved surround the map. Other maps show the Pacific, Atlantic, and Indian Oceans, and the Baltic, Mediterranean, and Black Seas. Characteristic of all Agnese atlases are the routes of travels recorded on the map of the world. The Munich copy presented here shows, in blue, Magellan's voyage from Lisbon, through the straits named after him, to the Moluccas, and the return voyage of the one surviving ship around the Cape of Good Hope (1519-22). A second line—faintly discernible, originally inscribed in silver-traces Pizarro's voyage of 1521, which started from Cadiz, Spain, and crossed the Isthmus of Panama to reach the west coast of South America, thus inaugurating the Spanish conquest of Peru. // Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, Department of Manuscripts and Rare Books, 2019
Bayerische Staatsbibliothek
Portulan (Weltkarte) - BSB Cod.icon. 133
The first maritime charts were produced at the turn of the 13th and 14th centuries. Their main purpose was to represent with the greatest possible accuracy coastlines and ports, for which reason they were called portolanos. When seafarers ventured out into the open sea, they entered their new discoveries on the charts. A Portuguese law stipulated that every ship had to carry two serviceable charts on board. The portolan chart shown here was copied by an Italian cartographer from a Portuguese original. It is an important document in the history of the discovery of America and is known as the Kunstmann II or Four Finger Map. Dating from the period circa 1502-6, it already records the discoveries resulting from the voyages in 1501 of the Portuguese explorer Miguel Corte-Real (circa 1448-circa 1502) and the Italian explorer and navigator Amerigo Vespucci (circa 1451/54-1512). Corte-Real charted, in North America, Terra de Lavorador (parts of present-day Greenland) and Terra Corte Real (Newfoundland and Labrador). Vespucci's discoveries in South America included the northern coast from De Lisleo (San Lorenzo, Lake Maracaibo) to the Rio de le Aues (the Orinoco River), and, after a gap between Cabo de São Roque and the Rio de Cananor, the eastern seaboard of the continent. On this map the southern coastal strip is designated "Terra Sanctae Crucis." An inscription and an image at lower left report the prevalence of cannibalism in this region. Africa is shown foreshortened from north to south, and in the north as conspicuously broad from east to west. Madagascar, the island off the east coast of Africa discovered in 1506, is missing from the map, so it is certain that the chart was made before that date. Different names on the map appear in Latin, Portuguese, and Italian. // Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, Department of Manuscripts and Rare Books, 2019
Bayerische Staatsbibliothek
Portulan (Alte Welt) - BSB Cod.icon. 131
Among the geographic manuscripts in the Bavarian State Library is a series of the most important portolan charts that have come down to the present. These charts consist of a single piece of sheepskin with part of the sheep's neck, showing the outlines of the continents and the names of coastal settlements. The maps include several rose compasses and show landmarks, the distances between which could be determined using a pair of dividers. The maps were an important navigational aid to mariners. The holes in the parchment reveal the points where the chart was fastened to a mast or desk. This precious portolan chart of the Old World from around 1505 was made in Italy, which produced, in Genoa and Venice, two important schools of 16th-century geographers. The map was transferred to the Bavarian State Library from the Cistercian monastery of Aldersbach. It is extraordinary for the precise and detailed knowledge of the mountain chain from Spain to the Urals that it reflects, and for its portrayal of the regions of Africa and Asia, whose exotic masters are depicted along with their surnames. The texts accompanying the chart begin with capital letters and underline the importance of the pilgrimage cities of Jerusalem and Mecca.
Bayerische Staatsbibliothek
Kolorierte Darstellungen von 193 Personen (Männern) des bayrischen Fürstenhauses von Bavarus bis Albrecht 1546, mit historischen Reimsprüchen - BSB Cgm 2799
Bayerische Staatsbibliothek
Kolorierte Darstellungen von 193 Personen (Männern) des bayrischen Fürstenhauses von Bavarus bis Albrecht 1546, mit historischen Reimsprüchen - BSB Cgm 2799
Bayerische Staatsbibliothek
Tabulae coniunctionis solis et lunae annorum 1340-1365 - BSB Clm 588
Bayerische Staatsbibliothek
Commentarius in VII tractatus summularum logicarum Petri Hispani [u.a.] - BSB Clm 14647
Bayerische Staatsbibliothek
Johannes, Bondi Aquileiensis: Theorica sive ars dictatoria [u.a.] - BSB Clm 9683
Bayerische Staatsbibliothek
