The State Archives of Turin has a library complex divided into the following sections: The Biblioteca Antica ("Old Library"), which contains manuscripts and printed volumes from the Middle Ages to the 19th century and has a nucleus coming directly from the ancient collections of the Dukes of Savoy; the Biblioteca Nuova ("New Library"), which includes volumes printed between the 19th century and the 1930s; and the Biblioteca Corrente ("Contemporary Library"), which consists of volumes printed from 1945 to the present. The Biblioteca Antica and Nuova, as well as part of the Biblioteca Corrente, are housed in a palace built in 1731 and designed by Filippo Juvarra. The building, included in the "Command Zone" of the Savoy sovereigns and today protected by Unesco, was built to preserve the Court Archives and the documentation of the State Secretariats. The Library was set up primarily to assist the work and support the study of the archival documents consulted in the palace by the ministers; however, there is no lack of other kinds of book holdings, including precious illuminated manuscripts.
