Collectors: Max Nettlau

Max Nettlau (Neuwaldegg, Austria 1865 - Amsterdam 1944) was an anarchist historian, a collector and a scholar. He studied studied philology and Celtic and wrote a dissertation on Beiträge zur cymrischen Grammatik (1887).

Nettlau lived partly in Vienna, partly in London and travelled all over Europe to collect and to save historical documents on anarchism and socialism and to write his scholarly works. In England he was member of the English Socialist League 1885-1890 and was active in the Torch and Freedom group. He wrote historical works on anarchism with invaluable information and theoretical studies. He published the Bibliographie de l'anarchie in 1897 and a privately printed biography of Michail Bakunin in 3 volumes (1896-1900).

During the inflation after the First World War he lost the money he had inherited and lived in poverty in Vienna. He continued to collect and to publish e.g. biographies of Errico Malatesta and Elisée Reclus, and a history of anarchism in 7 vols. He sold his immense collection (books, periodicals, archives, documents) to IISH in 1935 and lived in Amsterdam after the 'Anschluss'.

His archives contains personal documents; correspondence with his fiancée Thérèse Bognar 1901-1907, after her death in 1907 continued in the form of letters to her with the character of a diary 1907-1921; diaries, handwritten memoirs and notes until 1944; correspondence with many persons and organizations in the anarchist movement, documentation on anarchist and socialist persons and organizations in Great Britain (Socialist League, Freedom, Fabians), France, Russia, Germany, Belgium, the Netherlands, International Socialist Congresses 1889-1907 etc.; manuscripts of his books and many articles, and of unpublished studies; bibliographical and other notes of his studies; press clippings, leaflets etc.

The archive measures 42 metres and is indexed.
Finding Aid: Inventory.