Istituto Centrale per il Catalogo Unico facts for kids

The Istituto Centrale per il Catalogo Unico (ICCU) is an important Italian government agency. Its full name in English means the Central Institute for the Union Catalogue of Italian Libraries and for Bibliographic Information.

The ICCU helps manage a huge online catalog for libraries across Italy. This catalog is part of the Italian National Library Service (called Servizio bibliotecario nazionale or SBN). Think of it like a giant search engine for all the books and materials in Italy's main libraries.

The agency also runs a cool website called Internet Culturale. This site is like an online museum. It has many old documents and pictures from Italian libraries that have been turned into digital files. This way, people can see them easily from anywhere.

The ICCU also publishes books and reports about how libraries work. They organize meetings and conferences to share new ideas about library science. They also use special numbers, called ICCU numbers, to help organize information about people and topics. This makes it easier to find what you are looking for. In 2012, they had over 43,000 names organized this way!

How the ICCU Started

The ICCU was officially created in 1975. Its first leader was a woman named Angela Vinay. She was a director from 1922 to 1990.

Before the ICCU, there was an organization called the Centro nazionale per il catalogo unico. This older group started in 1951. Its main goal was to begin building a single, combined catalog for all of Italy's libraries. The ICCU took over this important job and made it even better.

Images for kids

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  A friendly robot, representing technology and information.