Library of Lost Books

The Leo Baeck Institute London is delighted to announce a new addition to our library: Displaced at Home: Ein Ort, den man zuhause nennt, the catalogue accompanying the Sara Nussbaum Zentrum für Jüdisches Leben’s acclaimed exhibition on 20th-century Jewish life in …

Yesterday, Wednesday 4 February, former Deputy Director of the Leo Baeck Institute London, Kinga Bloch, led a Library of Lost Books Search Day as part of this year’s Holocaust Memorial Day event at the University of Sussex.

The session, titled ‘Forensics at the…

A new article in the EVZ Foundation’s Magazine of the Education Agenda NS-Injustice features reflections by former LBI London Deputy Director Kinga Bloch, along with LBI Jerusalem colleagues Irene Aue-Ben David and Bettina Farack, on the possibilities and limits of Holocaust education…

On BBC World Service’s Weekend programme, Kinga Bloch spoke about the Library of Lost Books – a project by the Leo Baeck Institutes in London and Jerusalem to trace the fate of books taken from the Higher Institute for Jewish Studies in Berlin after its closure in 1942.

The Leo Baeck Institute’s Library of Lost Books project – developed jointly by LBI London and LBI Jerusalem – was recently featured at the Connective Holocaust Commemoration Expo 2025, hosted by the Landecker Digital Memory Lab at the University of Sussex.

The…

A new travelling exhibition featuring the LBI’s Library of Lost Books project has arrived in Dortmund, shining a spotlight on football’s entanglement with the National Socialist regime and inviting visitors to reflect on the importance of remembrance 80 years after the end of…

The international project Library of Lost Books, spearheaded by the Leo Baeck Institutes in Jerusalem and London, has been awarded the Bronze Prize in the category Activation and Mobilisation at the prestigious German PR Awards 2025. The accolade recognises the project’s innovative…

The Leo Baeck Institute’s Library of Lost Books project continues to uncover fascinating historical insights through its various research initiatives. Recently, a workshop was held at the Martin-Buber-Institute for Jewish Studies in Cologne, organised in collaboration with…

Exciting news! The Library of Lost Books website is now optimised for mobile devices.

Explore the history of Nazi book looting in English, German, Czech, and Hebrew, all from your smartphone.

Discover stories of stolen books, their owners,…

We are thrilled to announce that the Leo Baeck Institute’s Library of Lost Books project has been awarded the prestigious Grimme Online Award in the category of Kultur und Unterhaltung. This recognition highlights the dedication and hard work behind the project, which…

We’re thrilled to announce that our innovative project, Library of Lost Books, has been shortlisted for the prestigious PR Report Award 2024 in two categories: Politics & Society/Non-Profit and Content Communication/Integrated Communication and Content Strategy.

We are excited to share the news that the Library of Lost Books has been nominated for this year’s Grimme Online Award, a prestigious German media prize.

Votes are now open so please help us by voting and sharing with others. Your support will make all the…

Samuel David Luzzatto’s Synonymia Hebraica (Mavdil Nirdafim) (c. 1815–1820) is a remarkable manuscript smuggled out of Germany by Alexander Guttmann in 1940. 

This beautifully bound notebook contains 25 essays in Hebrew, each exploring groups of words in the…

In 1909, the Berlin-based Jüdische Turnzeitung (Jewish Gymnastics Newspaper) published a commemorative pamphlet titled ‘Physical Renaissance of the Jews’ to celebrate the 10th anniversary of the Bar Kochba gymnasts’ club and the 4th Sports Day of Jewish Gymnasts. This illustrated…

One of the pioneering members of the Library of Lost Books team is the LBI London’s volunteer Jonathan, who is on a year-long placement with the ARSP (Action Reconciliation Service for Peace). 

Jonathan’s support in the preparation of the project’s two London-based exhibitions…

Don’t miss our new exhibition, The Library of Lost Books, running till 10 July 2024, at the Wiener Holocaust Library, London. 

Prof. David Rechter, Chair of the Leo Baeck Institute London said: “The Hochschule was one of the most significant institutes of liberal German Jewry in…

The Library of Lost Books Team in Britain have kicked off the project’s launch in the UK with an exciting session run by Kinga Bloch (LBI London) and Cassy Sachar (Leo Baeck College) with pupils at JCOSS. The students were introduced to provenance research and we were…

The Leo Baeck Institute London, in collaboration with the Leo Baeck Institute Jerusalem and the Friends and Sponsors of the Leo Baeck Institute, is pleased to announce the launch of The Library of Lost Books in Britain. It is part of the broader project The Library of Lost…

The Library of Lost Books team has reached another milestone! We are proud to announce that the Czech version of the exhibition is now live!

We would like to thank the Jewish Museum in Prague for the warm and enthusiastic welcome of the Library of Lost Books in the Czech Republic.…

We are excited to announce that the Leo Baeck Institutes in Jerusalem and London celebrated the launch of their international collaboration on 28 November 2023 in a grand opening ceremony at the German National Library (Staatsbibliothek Unter den Linden) in Berlin. On this occasion, the…