Inside The Soviet Secret Erotica Collection

The ninth floor of the Lenin Library is home to a pornographic treasure trove that was gathered over decades of Soviet rule. Even today, it remains off-limits to the public but The Moscow Times' Joy Neumeyer gained access to the repository of the once-forbidden collection. Read the full story: Inside the Soviet Union's Secret Erotica Collection

The collection was created not long after the Bolsheviks came to power as a department to house materials found in confiscated aristocratic libraries.

There are 12,000 items in the collection, from Japanese engravings to 1970s romance novels.

A nude drawing from the collection. Other materials shown to our reporter are too explicit to show on our website.

One of the treasures of the ninth floor is series of drawings and watercolors by Mikhail Larionov, one of the leaders of the Russian avant-garde.

Legend has it that Soviet henchmen used to come to the archive to peruse the pornographic collection.

Confiscated items were marked with special numbers but no one at the library knows what exactly they stand for.

The most recent additions to the collection date from the 1960s to 1980s, when material was confiscated at customs. This photo shows a shelf of books that were taken from their owners, including "Crash" by J. G. Ballard and Gore Vidal's "The City and the Pillar."