Books
The library holds a collection of more than 15,000 book volumes, focusing on the polar areas.
A major part of the collection consists of documents about Arctic and Antarctic expeditions and the exploration history of these regions. The second main focus is on modern scientific literature that pertains to the polar areas.
The Norwegian Polar Institute Library is open to the public and you are welcome to visit and use the collections.
Photos
Maps
Polar map archive
The archice holds old maps from Norges Svalbard- og Ishavs-undersøkelse around the time of the naming of Svalbard as well as maps from Greenland and early Antarctic maps.
Original maps
A collection of original maps, mostly Dutch from the 16th century. The library has had good-quality facsimile versions of five maps from the collection reproduced. These can be purchased from the library for NOK 100 each, or NOK 400 for the whole set.
Overview of Norwegian Polar Institute historical maps
Ice limit archive
This archive contains large parts of the basic data for the report, ACSYS Historical Ice Chart Archive (1553-2002).
Overview of the Norwegian Polar Institute historical ice limit archive (PDF, 0,6MB)
Nobile collection
This collection consists of nearly 800 letters, newspaper cuttings, manuscripts and other material connected with Umberto Nobile.
The Dane Ove Hermansen (1933–) corresponded for many years with Nobile and other people connected with the disastrous crash of Nobile’s airship Italia in 1928. In 2004, Hermansen donated the entire collection to the Polar Museum in Tromsø and the Norwegian Polar Institute. It is now kept in the Polar Institute library.
Catalogue of Ove Hermansen’s Nobile collection (norsk, PDF, 0.1MB)
- Excerpt: Diary 26 May «Day 2 on the ice» (PDF, 0,7 MB)
- Excerpt: Exchange of letters July – November 1970 (PDF, 1,2 MB)
- Information about the archive (PDF, 0,4 MB)
- About Umberto Nobile on Norsk Polarhistorie
- English introduction to the catalogue (English, PDF, 0.1MB)
- Italian introduction to the catatalogue (italiano, PDF, 0.1MB)
- Italian information about the archive (italiano, PDF, 04 MB)
Aerial images
The aerial image archive consists of about 57 000 images from Spitzbergen, Greenland and The Antarctic, dating back to 1932. Aerial images after 2008 are taken with digital cameras.
Images may be orded through sales@npolar.no.
Newspaper cuttings
Biography archive
Two large archive cupboards filled with biographical material about people connected with the polar regions.
Overview of people represented in the biography archive (PDF, 0.1MB)
Newspaper cutting archive
Catalogue of newspaper cuttings collected by Norges Svalbard- og Ishavs-undersøkelser and the Norwegian Polar Institute from the end of the 1920s until shortly after 2000.
Catalogue of Norwegian Polar Institute newspaper cuttings (PDF, 0.1MB)
Gustav Smedal’s newspaper cutting archive
Five shelf metres of folders containing newspaper clippings collected by Gustav Smedal, who was a central person in polar circles in Norway before the last war. He was particularly engaged in the Greenland issue in the 1920s and 1930s.
Overview of Gustav Smedal’s newspaper cutting archive (PDF, 0.1MB)