Short History of Modern Cataloguing.
The British Museum Rules. Jewett's Rules. Crestadoro's
Catalogues. Huggins' Liverpool Catalogue. Cutter's Rules.
The Anglo-American Code. Dziatzko's _Instruction_. Dewey's
Classification. The British Museum and other Catalogues.
Before proceeding to consider the practical side of the subject, we
may take a brief glance at the history of _modern_ cataloguing of
public libraries in this country. The earlier catalogues were limited
either to author-entries or were classified according to the whims of
the compiler, sometimes according to the rooms or shelves in which the
books were placed.
The subject of cataloguing received the most serious attention in the
year 1850, and, roundly, we may date its history from then. "The Rules
for the Compilation of the Catalogue of Printed Books in the Library of
the British Museum" had been adopted in 1839, and were printed in 1841.
In a great measure they may be regarded as the basis of all cataloguing
rules since that time, at any rate for author-entry or its equivalent.
In 1850 a Royal Commission on the management of the British Museum
had sat and issued its report, and rate-supported public libraries
were coming into existence. There had been much discussion on the need
for an adequate and promptly-produced catalogue of the books in the
Museum, and many views upon the subject were set forth, especially
by literary experts. Their criticism was in the main directed against
the existing rules known as Panizzi's. Anthony Panizzi, then Principal
Librarian, with others of the Museum staff, including Thomas Watts,
Winter Jones, and Edward Edwards, had each separately prepared a set of
rules according to his own ideas for the compilation of the projected
catalogue, and these were afterwards discussed by the compilers
collectively, and differences of opinion decided by vote.
The Secretary of this Royal Commission was J. Payne Collier, and he was
one of the opposers of Panizzi's rules, especially taking exception
to the fulness of entry because of the delay it entailed. To show
practically how he would catalogue he tried his hand on twenty-five
books in his own library and submitted the results. Mr. Winter
Jones reported upon it, and said it contained almost every possible
error which can be committed in cataloguing books. Payne Collier's
attempt and his justification of it appear in the first part of the
_Gentleman's Magazine_ for 1850, where it will be seen that a German
edition of Shakespeare is entered under the editor alone, and a play
of Aristophanes is also so treated, besides other mistakes of a very
amateurish nature.
In this same year (1850) attention was being directed in America to
library cataloguing. The Smithsonian Institution sent out a circular to
the effect that, being desirous of facilitating research in literature
and science, and of thus aiding in the increase and diffusion of
knowledge, it had resolved to form a general catalogue of the various
libraries in the United States. The librarian of the institution,
Prof. Charles C. Jewett, had prepared plans for the accomplishment of
this object. The first part related to the stereotyping of catalogues
by separate titles in a uniform style. This stereotyping was proposed
to save time, labour, and expense in the preparation of new editions
of such a general catalogue. Only as many copies as were needed for
present use were to be struck off, and then new editions were to be
printed from time to time with later additions also in stereotype. This
idea, though it crops up from time to time, has now no novelty about
it, though recent inventions in type-setting machines have certainly
given cause for its reconsideration. No plan of this kind, particularly
if it were to be co-operative among the libraries, could be of the
least value unless there were uniformity of compilation according to
fixed rules, and so the second part consists of a set of general rules
to be recommended for adoption by the different libraries of the United
States in the preparation of their catalogues. Jewett's code was based
upon Panizzi's "Rules for the British Museum," with modifications
and additions to suit them to general use, and more especially in
connection with his proposed co-operative catalogue. Upon this point
he says, "The rules for cataloguing must be stringent, and should meet
as far as possible all difficulties of detail. Nothing, so far as can
be avoided, should be left to the individual taste or judgment of the
cataloguer. He should be a man of sufficient learning, accuracy, and
fidelity, to apply the rules." In order to emphasise further the need
for uniformity, he proceeds to say that "if the one adopted were
that of the worst of our catalogues, if it were strictly followed in
all alike, their uniformity would render catalogues thus made far
more useful than the present chaos of irregularities." From his point
of view of a national catalogue, he was perfectly right, though for
general cataloguing the argument is not convincing. Probably there is
room for a greater degree of uniformity in the catalogues of public
libraries than exists at present, and a better understanding upon this
point might be of some advantage to readers and workers generally. The
fact that catalogue rules of a standard kind exist does not seem to
have exercised any great influence in this respect.
The full title of Jewett's work is "On the Construction of Catalogues
of Libraries and their Publication by means of separate Stereotyped
Titles, with Rules and Examples, by Chas. C. Jewett, Librarian of the
Smithsonian Institution, Washington." The first edition was issued
in 1852, and another in the following year. The number of rules is
thirty-nine, and they are furnished with a series of examples and a
specimen subject-index. This may be regarded as the first code of rules
which contains subject-entries as well as author-entries.
In 1856, some two years before Jewett put his rules into practice in a
catalogue of the Boston Public Library, Mr. A. Crestadoro published a
pamphlet on "The Art of Making Catalogues of Libraries." The system he
recommended was to compile the catalogue with the titles of the books
given fully, leading off with the author's names, but arranged in no
particular order. These entries were to be consecutively numbered. To
this list of books there was to be an index of authors and subjects
in a brief form with the number referring to the entry in the main
catalogue. The subject-words were to be taken from the titles of the
books themselves and accordingly books with synonymous titles were
entered under those titles with such cross-references as were needed.
This method was put into force by Crestadoro when librarian of the
Manchester Public Library, and the catalogue still remains in use for
the older books in the Reference Library there. The first volume was
published in 1864, the entries being numbered from 1 to 26,534, though
they are arranged more or less alphabetically under authors' names, or
the principal subject-words if anonymous. To this volume is attached a
brief subject-matter index. Two later volumes were published in 1879,
and in these the books are apparently entered very much as they were
received into the Library. A separate volume, however, serves as an
index, both of authors and subjects, to all three volumes, and this
volume is still the real finding catalogue, the volumes with the full
particulars being little used in comparison.
This index-form of brief entries of authors and subjects in one
alphabet was utilised for catalogues of lending libraries in
Manchester; the following example of later date being taken from one of
these:--
Glacial Period, Man and the. By Wright
Glaciers of the Alps: a Lecture. By Molloy
Gladiators. By Melville
Gladman (F. J.) School Method
Gladstone (Catherine) Life of. By Pratt
Gladstone (J. H.) Michael Faraday.
Gladstone (W. E.) Biography of. By Russell
-- Biography of. By Smith
-- Character of.
-- England under. By McCarthy
-- Essay on. By Brown
-- Gladstone's House of Commons. By O'Connor
-- Gleanings of Past Years
-- Government. By Kent
-- Homer
-- Impregnable Rock of Holy Scripture
A similar arrangement was also adopted for the Birmingham Public
Library by the late J. D. Mullins in 1869.
At this time, or a little earlier, Samuel Huggins, a retired architect,
was engaged by the Liverpool Corporation to compile a catalogue of
the Public Reference Library there. He took Jewett's Catalogue of the
Boston Public Library as his model, but with certain modifications. He
says "in the shaping out of all its chief features--Poetry, Painting,
Music, Architecture, the Drama, Novels, and the Bible group, it has
been so treated as to constitute it an original and unique catalogue,
which in regard both to form and detail of these great departments of
the field of knowledge is superior, so far as I know, to any other work
of the kind. The subjects generally are more concentrated, brought
into fewer and larger groups than in the excellent catalogue just
named"--that is Jewett's Boston one. One of the principles that he lays
down is that a book of science or art with a geographical limitation
will be found not under the scientific subject of which it treats,
but under the name of the country or place to which the scientific
research is confined, and so a book on the conchology of France does
not appear under Conchology but under France--subject division "Natural
History." Mr. Huggins apparently was not satisfied that this idea met
all needs as he printed an appendix to his volume "wherein for the
greater convenience of the student, those works in the catalogue which,
by the geographical principle of distribution, are classed under the
places to which their subjects respectively are confined, and so,
wide scattered, are brought together, and grouped according to their
subject." The work was published in 1872, its main principles being
more distinctly those we now understand by the form "a dictionary
catalogue" and it was probably the first of the kind in this country.
Under the older index catalogues a book upon Palestine might be under
such headings as Palestine, Holy Land, Land of Promise, Lands of the
Bible, Bible Lands, or any other title adopted by the authors on their
title-pages, whereas these were all concentrated under a single heading
with such reasonable references and cross-references as were needed
to bind the whole together or "syndetic" as Cutter terms it. This
catalogue is still in use in the Liverpool Reference Library, but has
been improved in detail in the later supplementary volumes, including
the elimination of the form-headings, of which Mr. Huggins made so much.
Other developments in library cataloguing about this period lay more
in the direction of attempts to combine the hitherto almost general
classified catalogues with subject and author catalogues in the
unsatisfactory alphabetico-classed form.
Up to this time, however, there was no adequate code of rules suited to
all requirements. As we have seen, the British Museum rules were for
author-entry, and Jewett's were by no means complete enough for the
purpose. In 1876, Mr. C. A. Cutter published his "Rules for a Printed
Dictionary Catalogue," this work forming the second volume or part of
the "Special Report of the U.S. Bureau of Education on the History,
Condition, and Management of Public Libraries in the United States of
America." These rules numbered 205 as compared with Jewett's 39, and
Mr. Cutter put them into use in, if they were not actually based upon,
his large _Catalogue of the Library of the Boston Athenæum_. A second
edition of these rules, with corrections and additions, was issued as a
separate work in 1889, a third in 1891, and a fourth in 1904. This last
edition contained Mr. Cutter's latest corrections and additions (he
died in September, 1903), the number of rules being increased thereby
to 369. It is at present the standard and most exhaustive work of the
kind, and is unlikely to be soon superseded, though it will be improved
upon from time to time as library practice requires and its essential
principles become embodied in other codes. Librarians of all ranks are
indebted to the American Government for the generosity with which they
distributed it freely to applicants.
Both the American and British Library Associations formulated
rules--the former in 1878 and the latter in 1883--though neither can be
said to have been of much service, the American being a condensation
of Cutter with some unimportant variations, and the British getting
no further than author and title entries. The two Associations have
now combined in a series of rules known as the "Anglo-American
code" and entitled "Cataloguing Rules, Author and Title Entries,
compiled by Committees of the American Library Association and of the
Library Association." This was published in 1908, and the history
of its production forms a preface to the work. A fuller history and
description of it by the Secretary of the British Committee, Mr.
John Minto, is contained in the _Library Association Record_, volume
11, 1909. A noteworthy statement he makes is "I do not think that it
was supposed to be the business of the Committee to provide for the
needs of very small libraries, which, on account of the inadequacy of
their funds, are unable to provide full catalogues, and are obliged
to be content with mere title-a-line lists. The requirements of such
libraries are already well served with existing codes--for example
Cutter's Rules which provide alternative forms, short, medium, and
full, for various grades of libraries." For this very reason the
Anglo-American code will never find much favour for practical use
in this country, though it is at present the basis for the Library
Association examinations in this subject.
In 1886 Prof. Dziatzko published his "Instruction für die Ordnung
der Titel im alphabetischen Zettelkatalog der Königlichen und
Universitäts-Bibliothek zu Breslau" which Mr. K. A. Linderfelt of
Milwaukee translated and adapted in 1890, with the other standard
rules, under the title "Eclectic Card Catalog Rules, Author and Title
Entries, based on Dziatzko's 'Instruction' compared with the Rules of
the British Museum, Cutter, Dewey, Perkins, and other Authorities."
It is so ample in its details that it covers all possible forms of
authors' names and is therefore most valuable for reference or for
compiling any catalogues, though it may contain a great deal that is
rarely required in average library practice. The appendix, containing a
list of oriental titles and occupations with their significance, is a
useful feature of the work.
So many classified catalogues have appeared of late years arranged
according to the Dewey Decimal System that no notes upon the history of
cataloguing would be complete without some reference to that system.
There is no doubt that it is mainly responsible for the revival of this
form of catalogue. The system was planned or invented by Mr. Melvil
Dewey, when librarian of Amherst College, U.S.A., and was in the first
instance intended for cataloguing and indexing purposes, though it is
now more commonly used for classifying and numbering the books upon the
shelves. It was the result of a good deal of careful study of library
needs and, on the face of it, is simple and practical. As to this Dewey
says "in all the work philosophical theory and accuracy have been
made to yield to practical usefulness. The impossibility of making a
satisfactory classification of all knowledge, as preserved in books,
has been appreciated from the first, and nothing of the kind attempted.
Theoretical harmony and exactness have been repeatedly sacrificed to
the practical requirements of the library."
In spite of this statement it is astonishing how few defects it has
as a system of classification, especially when it is remembered
that every class and every subject is divided into ten heads. This
limitation has the tendency to congest some subjects while others do
not admit of the use of so many as ten numbers. Withal it is very
elastic and useful, though, as may be expected, things American get
preferential and fuller treatment. The first edition was published
from Amherst College Library in 1876, the second from Columbia College
Library in 1885, the third in 1888, the fourth from the New York State
Library in 1891; the last ("edition 7") being that of 1911, each being
a revision and enlargement of the earlier edition. The very full index
attached to the scheme makes it comparatively easy to use, but, in the
process of using, it is astonishing how many books have to be specially
considered as to their correct place, a comparison of catalogues
compiled under the system showing that different minds have interpreted
the scheme quite differently.
There are other schemes of classification applicable to cataloguing,
as for instance that known as the "Expansive," the compilation of the
late C. A. Cutter, and the "Adjustable" of Mr. J. D. Brown. This last
is used in several public libraries worked upon what is termed the
"open access" system. The earlier history of classified cataloguing is
treated fully enough for most purposes in Mr. J. D. Brown's books on
library classification.
Even this mere sketch in outline of cataloguing history would be
incomplete without some allusion to the printing of the "British
Museum Catalogue of Printed Books." The printing of the first portion,
containing the books to the end of 1881, was the work of twenty years,
and consists of 393 parts, which superseded more than 2,000 folio
volumes of the manuscript catalogue. The supplement containing the
books added to the Museum during the years 1882-1899 was completed in
1905, and those who have the opportunity of constant reference to the
pages of the complete work know how valuable--even indispensable--it
is, and look forward to the appearance of the next supplement.
Decennial supplements would be none too frequent.
When to-day so many excellent catalogues of libraries are produced
it would be invidious to single out any for special praise, but no
excuse is needed for naming that of the London Library published in
1903 with its subject volume of 1909, both volumes being remarkable
for condensation and accuracy. At this time (1913) a new revised and
enlarged edition is announced for publication.
Mr. H. B. Wheatley's interesting little book, "How to Catalogue a
Library," must not be overlooked in connection with the history of
modern library cataloguing, particularly the chapter on "The Battle of
the Rules."