Lodge "Zu den drei Schwertern und Asträa zur grünenden Raute" / Library Schwerterheim Dresden

Since 2016, two books from the library of the Masonic Lodge ‘Zu den drei Schwertern und Asträa zur grünenden Raute’ in Dresden and one book from the associated library of the Schwerterheim co-operative have been returned to the Dresden Masonic Foundation.

The lodge was formed in 1831 from the union of the two Dresden lodges Zu den drei Schwertern (founded in 1738) and Asträa zur Grünenden Raute (founded in 1815). It was banned on 31 July 1935.

It has not been possible to clearly trace the path taken by the books. One copy was incorporated into the holdings of the Berlin City Library as a gift in 1947; only the library's own book storage is listed as the supplier in the acquisition journal. A stamp in this book from the ‘Institut für Aussenpolitik und Auslandskunde’, a department of the German Institute for Foreign Studies (‘Deutsches Auslandswissenschaftliches Institut’, DAWI), suggests access via the salvage office, specifically salvage order 153 (library of the Seminar for Oriental Languages). However, this route of access has not yet been clearly proven. The two other books are from the Berlin City Library's unprocessed stock and both contain stamps from the Ratsbibliothek from the 1950s. So far, there is no further information on the books' accession as well.