The article is devoted to the analysis of the «Ministry of Education Journal» as a historical source on the history of libraries and librarianship. The magazine was published in 1834–1917. During the journal activities it published about 45 thousand articles, over 300 of which were devoted to librarianship. This is an average 3.42 publications per year. They are normative acts in the field of librarianship, articles devoted foreign librarianship, history of domestic libraries. A large number of notes were reprinted from local editions and dedicated to the provincial public libraries and libraries of educational institutions.

For the first time in the national librarianship the author analyzes the editorial policy of the journal related to library construction. The first stage was based on the concept of official nationality of the Minister of Education S. Uvarov, which was focused on publishing articles on the library system organization and familiarizing readers with the world librarianship development. The editorial policy second stage, began in 1860, was based on N. Ushinsky views about education nationality and upbringing through the book. The special attention was paid to activities of the Imperial Public Library, Rumyantsev Public Museum and Vilen Public Library. For the first time the journal publishes articles devoted to the problem of academic libraries acquisition, cataloging, etc.