It contains thousands of literary texts, secondary literature and additional information, like biographies, portrayals etcetera, and hyperlinks.

The DBNL is an initiative by the DBNL foundation that was founded in 1999 by the Society of Dutch Literature (Dutch: Maatschappij der Nederlandse Letterkunde).

[1] Building of the DNBL was made possible by donations, among others, from the Dutch Organization for Scientific Research (Dutch: Nederlandse Organisatie voor Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek or NWO) and the Nederlandse Taalunie.

[2] The chairperson of the committee that selected the 1,000 key texts was Paul Schnabel.

[2] Questions have been raised as to the reliability of the information contained in this database by both authors and testators alike.