Pope Francis proclaimed the Holy Year 2025 with his bull "Spes non confundit" (Hope does not disappoint). In the Catholic tradition, the Jubilee Year is a significant religious event. In connection with this year of Jubilee, the Archbishop's Library has a temporary exhibition presenting the history of pilgrimages and holy years from biblical times to the 19th century.
The origins of the holy years can be dated back to the Old Testament. The Law of Moses decreed a special year for the Jewish people, a "year of great joy". The so-called Year of "Yovel"("ram's horn") is named after the twisted ram's horn, which was blown as a signal of the beginning of the time of grace. The exhibition opens with 15th-16th century illustrations of scenes from the Old Testament. The blowing of the horn and the wandering of the Jewish people in the Old Testament are shown in hand-colored woodcuts from The Nuremberg Bible (Nuremberg: Anton Koberger, 1483) and in the famous Louvain Bible (Leuven: Cristoph Plantin, 1583).

A special Bible summary in verse, published in 1543, Lyon, in many languages, is also included in the exhibition: "Historia Veteris Testamenti icones" is illustrated with woodcuts created by the famous painter and printmaker Hans Holbein the Younger. Among the volumes on the biblical roots of pilgrimage, the 13th-century parchment codex (Epistolae beati Pauli apostoli cum commentariis, Paris, 1250), which records in initials the life, conversion, and death of St Paul, is a rare specialty.

The illustrated holy scriptures on exhibition are followed by documents relating to the early Christian era. The origins of Roman pilgrimages date back to the post-Christian persecutions. Pope Damasus I (366-384) had the ruined catacombs restored. Paolo Aringhi's book 'Roma subterranae', published in 1659, is one of the first detailed descriptions of underground Rome, the Christian catacombs. From the 4th century onwards, magnificent cathedrals were built for the most sacred relics. Giovanni Giustino Ciampini's 'Vetera monimenta' is a vital source on early Christian basilicas, because the illustrations often show buildings and mosaics that no longer exist.

The exhibition also reminds us of the First Council of Nicaea, the first universal synod held exactly one thousand and seven hundred years ago, in 325 AD, at the initiative of Emperor Constantine the Great. It was a milestone in the history of the Church. In the Mass, we pray theThe Nicene Creed. The text of the Creed, which declares the oneness of the Son with the Father, was the result of the collaboration of the participants in the Council, including Eusebius of Caesarea, the "father of Church history". The history of the first three centuries of Christianity is largely known from his Historia ecclesiastica (Basel: Henricus Petrus, 1549). The text of the Credo can be found on the pages of the decorative missals of the 15th and 16th centuries (Missale Olomucense, 1499; Missale Strigoniense, 1512).

There were three major pilgrimage routes in the Middle Ages, which are still among the most important today: the Holy Land, Rome, and Santiago de Compostela. The pilgrims' reports from Jerusalem have been documented for posterity. In 1483, many European pilgrims visited Jerusalem, many of whom wrote journals. Among the many pilgrims were the canon Bernhard von Breidenbach of Mainz, the author of the first "travel book" illustrated with woodcuts, Konrad Beck of Memmingen, and the Dominican monk Felix Fabri of Ulm. Breidenbach's pilgrim's diary illustrated with woodcuts (Peregrinatio in terram sanctam. Augsburg: Anton Sorg, 1488) and two precious pilgrim's codices from our library: the "Beard Codex" and Felix Fabri's Pilgrim's Book also on display. Konrad Beck, the author of the "Beard Codex", accompanied Count Hans Truchsäss von Waldburg on a pilgrimage to the Holy Land in 1483. In his manuscript diary, he describes his experiences on the journey, reports on the dangers he encountered on the way, and gives the names of his fellow pilgrims. The manuscript was bound in a seventeenth-century binding by one of his late descendants. The most unique feature of the book is the inside of the binding, which shows a strange black "candle wick"-like thing behind a cut "window", covered by muscovy glass. An additional letter is written in German: 'Konrad Beck's beard from Jerusalem, 1483'. Back in the 19th century, librarians gave the volume the name "Bart-Codex", or "Beard-Codex".

Pilgrims were a popular figure in contemporary art, and pious travelers were portrayed in church statues, frescoes, miniatures in codices, and 15th-16th century woodcuts. The iconographic depiction of the Apostle Saint James, the patron saint of pilgrims, is widely known. The typical figure of the pilgrim, wearing a wide-brimmed hat and carrying a scallop shell, a cloak, a leather satchel, and traveling stick, is depicted in the medieval illustrations on display (Johannes Gerson: Opera. Strassburg, 1494). The illustrations of the Books of Hours (Paris, 1510) are printed on animal membranes and decorated with hand-painted illustrations. This precious treasure is a masterpiece of the transitional period when manuscripts were gradually giving way to book printing.

In 1300, a new chapter began in the history of pilgrimages, with the first Holy Year. Pope Boniface VIII (c.1235 - l303) had intended the Jubilee Year to take place every hundred years, but this period seemed too long, so the time between the Holy Years was reduced first to 50, then to 33, and finally to 25 years. From all over Europe, pilgrims flooded into Rome to receive a full pardon for all of their sins in the afterlife. The events of the first Holy Year were also documented by Dante in his Divine Comedy. Our collection's Dante volume on display is the last illustrated 16th-century edition of the Divine Comedy (La Divina commedia. Venice: Giovanni Bernardo Sessa, 1596). Giovanni Villani drew inspiration for the beginning of his Chronicle from the Holy Year proclaimed for the year 1300. His impulsive report (La prima parte delle Historie universali de suoi tempi. Venice: Jacobus Giunta, 1559) vividly illustrates the constant presence in the eternal city of a crowd of people of unusual size for his time. The Roman Holy Year of 1300 marked the beginning of a new phenomenon, the mass pilgrimage of the late Middle Ages. Pope Boniface VIII, the proclaimer of the first Holy Year, was the greatest canon lawyer of his time. He published Liber Sextus, a compilation of many of his works and the decrees of his pontificate. The binding of this edition, published in Lyon in 1554, contained a 12th-century codex fragment.

The great mystic and pilgrim of the age was St Bridget of Sweden. She made a pilgrimage to Compostela and then went to Rome for the Jubilee Year in 1350. As penance, she also made a pilgrimage to the Holy Land with her daughter, St Catherine of Sweden. Her mystical experiences were recorded in eight volumes of her book Revelationes coelestes (Revelationes... Nuremberg: Anton Koberger, 1521.)

Pilgrims to Rome in the Holy Years were guided by several travelbooks. When Bernardo Gamucci's Le Antichitá della cittá di Roma was first published, it was very popular and considered one of the most important guidebooks (Venice, 1588). Published at the time of a major architectural renewal of the city of Rome, contemporary readers of the book were able to discover the city in the second half of the 16th century thanks to the woodcuts in the volume. The Italian painter Giacomo Lauro worked for more than 10 years on Antiquae urbis splendor. The first edition of 1612 is in two parts, showing the monuments of ancient and modern Rome. Pompilio Totti, inspired by the designs of Pope Urban VIII (1623-1644), published a guidebook praising the Pope's achievements in urban development and art. He also worked as a publisher and engraver on the guidebook dedicated to Cardinal Antonio Barberini, who wrote a topography of ancient and modern Rome and is considered the most important book of his career (Ritratto di Roma moderna. Rome, 1652). Among the volumes of pictorial biographies of the popes who proclaimed the Holy Years are the 27 papal portraits by the Augustinian monk and historian Onofrio Panvinio, published in Venice in 1578, and the four-volume monograph Vitae, et res gestae Pontificum Romanorum by the Spanish Dominican monk Alfonso Chacón, published in Rome in 1677.

The exhibition includes many contemporary engravings, cityscapes, and rare maps, including Giuseppe Vasi's vedutas of Rome, great landmarks in the history of cartography such as the Geography of Claudius Ptolemy, Gerardus Mercator's world maps, and the Geographia Sacra of Nicolas Sanson, the "father of French cartography".

The temporary exhibition is housed in one of the most beautiful library rooms in the country, the 18th-century baroque reading room of Archbishop Adam Patachich.