Ephemera

The National Collection keeps all printed material published in Iceland. Besides books, journals and newspapers, it also keeps what is known as ephemera.

Ephemera can be anything from a single sheet to a thick brochure from a car dealer or a complete guide to laying paving stones. It includes, for example, promotional brochures, travel brochures, timetables, guides, advertisements, product descriptions, sales catalogues, price lists, poems, funeral programmes, leaflets, theatre programmes, exhibition catalogues, concert programmes, postcards, Christmas cards, playing cards, diaries, pocket books, bookmarks, calendars and posters.

Ephemera are used by a wide range of people, but mostly by authors and biographers writing the history of a trade, a society or company, or a district, who study them and get pictures of advertisements, news-sheets, concert programmes, price lists or posters for books about to be published.

Like all other works in the National Collection, ephemera can only be borrowed for use in the National Collection Reading Room.