[Summary] Gabriel -- an acronym for "Gateway and Bridge to Europe's National Libraries" -- was launched as a common portal giving access to the internet services of participating libraries. The Gabriel project was conceived during the 1994 CENL (Conference of European National Librarians) meeting in Oslo, Norway, as an common electronic board with updates about ongoing internet projects. Another meeting took place in March 1995 with representatives from the national libraries in the Netherlands, United Kingdom and Finland, who launched a pilot project and were joined then by the national libraries in Germany, France and Poland. A first Gabriel website was launched in September 1995. During the 1996 CENL meeting in Lisbon, Portugal, Gabriel became an official CENL website, with a new trilingual (English, French, German) portal launched in January 1997. *** Gabriel -- an acronym for "Gateway and Bridge to Europe's National Libraries -- was launched in January 1997 as a common portal giving access to the internet services of the participating libraries. As stated on its website: "Gabriel also recalls Gabriel Naudé, whose 'Advis pour dresser une bibliothèque' (Paris, 1627) is one of the earliest theoretical works about libraries in any European language and provides a blueprint for the great modern research library. The name Gabriel is common to many European languages and is derived from the Old Testament, where Gabriel appears as one of the archangels or heavenly messengers. He also appears in a similar role in the New Testament and the Qu'ran." In 1998, Gabriel offered links to the internet services of 38 participating national libraries (Albania, Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Macedonia, Malta, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Russia, San Marino, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, United Kingdom, Vatican City). These links led to OPACs (Open Public Access Catalogs), national bibliographies, national union catalogs, indexes for periodicals, web servers and gophers, with a section for common European projects. How did Gabriel begin? During the 1994 CENL annual meeting in Oslo, Norway, it was suggested that national libraries should set up a common electronic board with updates about their ongoing internet projects. Representatives from the national libraries in the Netherlands (Koninklijke Bibliotheek), United Kingdom (British Library) and Finland (Helsinki University Library) met in March 1995 in The Hague, Netherlands, to launch the pilot Gabriel project. They were joined then by the national libraries in Germany (Deutsche Bibliothek), France (Bibliothèque Nationale de France) and Poland (Biblioteka Narodowa). Gabriel would describe their services and collections, while seeking to attract other national libraries into the project.