The Malatestiana Library in Cesena was commissioned by Malatesta Novello, Lord of Cesena, and designed and directed by Matteo Nuti of Fano, a pupil of Leon Battista Alberti. Building ran from 1447 to 1452, with about two more years to furnish the interior, and it opened on August 15, 1454. The article calls the style early Italian Renaissance and the type humanistic-conventual. Its layout follows Michelozzo's library at San Marco in Florence.
The interior is a basilica with three naves divided by ten rows of white local-stone columns. The central nave is barrel-vaulted. The library has 58 desks and 44 windows, and its pediment shows the Malatesta elephant. Agostino di Duccio made the main doorway.
It holds over 400,000 books and more than 340 codices. It survived the Napoleonic-era suppression, when the building was used as barracks. UNESCO added it to the Memory of the World Register in 2005.
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