Capuchin Monastery Archives and Library, Škofja Loka
History
Ordo Fratrum Minorum Capucinorum came to Slovenia in the 16th century when the order was confirmed by the pope, and by the 17th century they had 10 order houses in Slovene territory.
Church of St. Anna and the adjacent monastery were built in 1709, when the Capuchin library was also funded. Although the youngest of the Slovenian monasteries, Škofja Loka library soon became the largest monastic library in Slovenia. The fund was enlarged after 1786, when the collections of dissolved monasteries in Kranj and partly from Ljubljana and Novo mesto were added. In 1922 the order was organised into a joint Slovene-Croatian province, but in 1967 it was split into separate Slovene and Croat provinces.
Collections
The Capucin Monastery Archives are important for their birth, death and marriage records. They also preserve a range of incunabula and old religious books. The most precious is the manuscript by Friar Romuald from 1721 on which the famous Škofja Loka Passion Play, the oldest preserved drama text in the Slovene language, is based. The Škofja Loka Passion Play was performed again in 1999 for the first time in 200 years in the town of Škofja Loka.
Older documents from the Monastery Archives are preserved at the Archives of the Republic of Slovenia (ARS).