Universal Decimal Classification < CONFIRMED → >

Using numbers that any person, regardless of language, could understand.

Otlet and La Fontaine didn't just want a library; they wanted a "city of knowledge". In 1895, they founded the Mundaneum in Mons, Belgium—a pre-digital precursor to Google. universal decimal classification

Their quest to catalog every piece of human thought led to the creation of the , a system built on the bones of the Dewey Decimal Classification but designed for far more than just books. The Vision: The Mundaneum Using numbers that any person, regardless of language,

In the late 19th century, two Belgian visionaries, and Henri La Fontaine , looked at the world’s exploding volume of information and saw a looming "Pit of Despair"—a future where human knowledge would be lost simply because it couldn't be found. Their quest to catalog every piece of human

To make this work, they needed a classification system that was: