The Wijchers Collection

Nature and scope

The Wijchers Collection amounts to around 15,000 bindings and comprises a very diverse collection of religious songbooks from various countries dating from the seventeenth to twentieth centuries, as well as a theological reference library. The Collection has an international and interdenominational character. Over half of the books appear not to be held by any other Dutch libraries.

By now, the University of Groningen Library (UB) has catalogued over 75% of the Wijchers Collection and included it in its SmartCat catalogue [1]. The physical books can only be consulted in the Special Collections reading room of the UB. Around 700 books in the Collection can be consulted digitally via Google Books or Delpher. For these titles, a link to the digitized versions in Google Books can be found in SmartCat. A link to the digitized versions in Delpher will be added in future (by the National Library).

An important part of the Collection is described in the Bibliography of hymns and Gregorian chant from the sixteenth century to 1991 by Jos de Hoon, Simeon Bodden and Peter Becker (Nederlands Instituut voor Kerkmuziek [Dutch Institute for Church Music], Hogeschool voor de Kunsten [HKU], Utrecht 1996).

Academic significance

Besides its scope, composition, character, and uniqueness, the Wijchers Collection is important for other reasons as well. The presence of special book covers and numerous annotations in the books written by their international readers and owners make the study of religious reading culture possible.

Moreover, the Collection is a valuable addition to the four other religious research collections held by the UB. These collections comprise religious songbooks and liturgy books from the former library collection of the Faculty of Religion, Culture and Society and its Documentation Centre for Material Culture and Musical Tradition of Christianity in the Netherlands; the Bibliotheca Unitariana (Unitarian Library); the Mennonitica Collection (1926) of theologist Karel Vos; and the Kerkelijke Bibliotheek (Ecclesiastical Library) that was established in 1878 for professors in Groningen who were appointed by the Dutch Reformed Church.

Thanks to the great diversity of hymnals from a wide range of traditions, the Wijchers Collection is interesting for a variety of academic disciplines, such as hymnology, literature, folklore, the history of mentality, genealogy, the history of the Church, and book history.

The Wijchers Collection also offers good opportunities for researching literary and poetic texts. One question could be how language and image use in songbooks bear the traces of religious reading culture from the time in which they were published. The content of the books can shed light on former religious mentalities and systems. The format, execution, and content contain further indications of the use of religious songs, both within and outside worship services — in particular, in family life. Such use would have been related to the denominations from which the books stemmed. In this way, a range of user contexts could be researched: use in weekdays, holidays, and on Sundays, as well as in life events such as birth, christening, marriage, and death.

On the other hand, the songbooks may themselves have functioned as a source of inspiration for new literature, such as psalms, prayers, and poems, and especially for occasional verse, to be used during the aforementioned life events.

Historical background

Rev. Jurriaan J.W.A. Wijchers (1914–1997), a pastor in the Dutch Reformed Church, established the Collection. In 1998, the Wijchers family gave the Collection on permanent loan to the University of Groningen, where it was held in the library of the Faculty of Religion, Culture and Society. Together with the Faculty’s library, the Wijchers Collection was transferred to the UB in 2014.

Images

• 1: An impression of the Wijchers Collection.
• 2–4 and 6: Books printed in the eighteenth century.
• 5: One of the many theological treatises
• 7–8: Hymnals and songbooks in all sorts of languages, e.g. Frisian and Esperanto.
• 9: Ex Libris of J.J.W.A. Wijchers.

Photos: Dirk Fennema

[1]. Catalogue manual, see here