According to the Hereford Cathedral website, the Chained Library is a unique and fascinating treasure in Britain's rich heritage of library history. Long before the modern library as we know it was formed, there were already books at Hereford Cathedral dating back as far as 1611. At present, the library contains 1500 books.
Chaining books was the most widespread and effective security system in European libraries from the Middle Ages to the eighteenth century and to date, Hereford Cathedral's seventeenth-century Chained Library is the largest to survive with all its chains, rods and locks intact. The system allows a book to be taken from the shelf and read at the desk but not to be removed from the bookcase to prevent them being stolen.
The library, besides being a research centre, is also a tourist attraction. For booklovers and history aficionados, the world-famous Chained Library at Hereford Cathedral is open all year round and is worth a visit. After the Hereford Cathedral's Chained Library, the Chained Library at Wimborne Minster in Dorset is the second largest chained libraries in England.
For crime enthusiasts, Murder in Advent (1985) is a mystery fiction by British crime writer David Williams (1926-2003) that features a chained library.
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