Swedish Literary Spoils of War from the Czech Lands

The Royal Library in Copenhagen holds 168 incunabula and printed books originating from the Czech literary spoils of war. Some of these volumes reached Copenhagen through a sale auction organised in 1765 by the cathedral chapter in Strängnäs. The books were purchased primarily by private Danish collectors—Otto Thott (1703–1785), Peter Frederik Suhm (1728–1798), and Christian Friedrich Temler (1717–1780)—whose extensive book collections later became part of the holdings of the Royal Library in Copenhagen.

The identification of Czech books within this collection was carried out based on the electronic catalogue of the Copenhagen library and using published and unpublished results gathered during the research of the Swedish historian Otto Walde and the Copenhagen incunabulist Victor Madsen. It was Madsen who, in 1924, published a list of printed books held in Copenhagen that originated from the Strängnäs auction.