These antique rooms are not only a worthy refuge for ancient manuscripts and rare book collections, they are also a time machine into a bygone era of religious institutions and distinguished scholars such as Galileo Galilei. When you walk past the celestial globe of Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei, perhaps Albert Einstein, who was a member of the academy, admired it too. And when you stand in the imposing Biblioteca Vallicelliana, imagine how the Baroque architect Borromini thought out the plans for the beautiful edifice.

Whether the rooms are Renaissance or Baroque, of religious or secular origin, they are all beautiful containers of centuries of wisdom and creativity. Every architect of every one of these libraries had a vision of presenting the books in the most beautiful way possible. And they all succeeded.