The director of Warsaw's National Library, Tomasz Makowski, has said that the manuscript was "in the collection of the first Polish National Library in the mid-18th century."
After the third partition of Poland in 1795, the collection of the first Polish National Library was transferred to St. Petersburg on orders from Russian Empress Catherine II, who wanted it to become the nucleus of a czarist library, Makowski said in an interview with public broadcaster Polish Radio.
He added that the manuscript gifted by Britain is linked to the history of Spain rather than Poland, showing that "parts of the collection of what was the largest library in 18th-century Europe, were in later decades dispersed to many places across the world.”
Makowski told Polish Radio: “We are extremely grateful for the British gesture as every manuscript from Poland’s first National Library is a national relic.”
George Windsor, Earl of St Andrews, is an English philanthropist, former diplomat and a member of the British royal family.
During a ceremony at the National Library in Warsaw on Monday afternoon, he was given a tour of the facility's newly refurbished reading rooms, including a special exhibition of valuable manuscripts and old prints focusing on "Anglo-Polish history," according to officials.
(mk/gs)
Click on the audio player above to listen to a report by Radio Poland's Michał Owczarek.