Manual of Library Cataloguing

by John Henry Quinn

Epictetus. Discourses; transl. by George Long.

Green fairy book; ed. by Andrew Lang.

It is necessary to point out that in cataloguing it must not be left to the printer to supply the punctuation, as is customary with other books, and therefore the cataloguer must carefully supply it as he proceeds, and not when the time comes to prepare the work for the press.

19.—The same rule holds good with respect to the use of capital letters. Until recently it was the general fashion in printing book-titles to give every word, or almost every word, an initial capital, but the custom has fallen into disuse. Like other old-fashioned customs it dies hard, and if not advised that the “copy” must be closely followed in this respect, the printer will as likely as not put in the capitals all the same, and this in spite of the fact that he may have to wait until he has one sheet printed off before he can set another, on account of the run on the capitals. All that is now expected is that capital letters should be used in catalogue entries as they would be in any ordinary book, viz., to proper names; to words coming after a full stop; and to words derived from proper names. In the last-named a lower-case (i.e. small) initial letter is sometimes used in catalogues, but such words as “christian,” “pauline,” “lutheran,” “darwinism,” “ibsenism,” have not a good appearance and should be avoided. In foreign titles the usage of the language should be followed, so that there will be fewer capitals used in Latin, French, or Italian than in English, and more in German.

20.—All dates and numbers should be transcribed in Arabic figures, even if they are in Roman numerals upon the title-page. Thus, “from the XVIIth Century to the Present Time” becomes “from the 17th century to the present time;” “MDCCCXCIX” becomes “1899;” and “Volume xliv.” is simply “v. 44.” The only reasonable exception to this rule is that numbers to the names of potentates be always in Roman, though in American catalogues these also are put into Arabic. We on this side of the Atlantic are not yet well enough accustomed to “Charles 2,” or even “Edward 6th,” to adopt it.

21.—Sometimes figures form part of the title of a book, when it is desirable for the sake of appearance to write them out in words: the transcript, of course, being kept in the language of the title-page, though “50 études pour le piano” has been seen entered in a catalogue as “Fifty études pour le piano.”

22.—So far as languages printed in Roman are concerned, it is the invariable rule to adhere to the language of the title-page, and not to make a translation. In ordinary libraries Greek is usually transliterated into Latin; if a Greek classic has both Greek and Latin titles, as is commonly the case, then the Latin title is taken rather than the Greek.

23.—Upon this point of the translation of title-pages the question of utility, in popular libraries especially, might very well be considered. It does not often happen, but it is possible, that a person may be a capable musician and not know a word of French, German, or Italian, and it is likely therefore that many of the lesser-known compositions would be made acceptable if a translation of the title-page were given as well as the original. It is very certain that in the public libraries there are many valuable foreign books upon ornament and the decorative arts, consisting almost exclusively of illustrations, that are not used as they should be. The catalogue entries of such books convey no meaning whatever to many an artisan or craftsman, and a free translation might very well be given for their benefit. If such a translation is not given, a note descriptive of the nature of the book should be added.

24.—It is a safe rule that the date of publication should be given in every case and in every entry, as it serves in some measure to show the particular edition of the book, and more important still in scientific and technical works, to show if the editions in a library are of recent date or obsolete. It will, however, be found quite useless in popular libraries to give the dates of publication in the entries of works of fiction, for the simple reason that many of the books in this class of literature are so often worn out and then replaced with new copies, which are very seldom of the same dates as those printed in the catalogue, and it soon becomes incorrect in this respect. Happily it is a matter of no importance, as very few fiction readers are concerned about the date of publication, and therefore it may be safely omitted from all entries. This statement does not apply to first or other editions of novels of special value, such as the first edition of “David Copperfield,” as these would be fully described as well as carefully preserved.