A History of Bibliographies of BibliographiesTaylor, Archer
History
A History of Bibliographies of Bibliographies
Taylor, Archer
Bibliography of bibliographies -- History
Unger's account of forty-one theological bibliographies and
collections of texts entitled _bibliotheca_ is not altogether bad.
He often quotes the titles of chapters from these books or says
that a book is a collection of texts and not a bibliography. Much
of this information was even then available in well-organized
reference works, and Unger's only contribution is the selecting of
the books entitled _bibliotheca_. His account of legal bibliographies
begins with Martin Lipenius, _Bibliotheca juridica_, "which was
published at Frankfurt in 1607 as a folio and was enlarged by F.
G. Struve in 1720." This is not a good start, for the first date
is wrong (it should be 1679) and he would have found five more
legal bibliographies entitled _bibliotheca_ by opening Lipenius. In
this category he cites nine more titles, counting three works by
Caspar Thurmann as one book. This combination is not particularly
objectionable. Thurmann had made a classified legal bibliography and
finding no publisher, had printed portions as small bibliographies.
Unger then proceeds to historical, medical, and philosophical
categories, but we need follow him no further. He finally resigns
himself to naming titles in a confused order. His disappointing
performance has the merit of naming books called _bibliotheca_,
but it does not suggest, as Labbé and the anonymous author of
_Die neu-eröffnete Bibliothec_ had done, that they were primarily
interesting as bibliographies.
The sixty folio pages (double columns) filled with entries beginning
with the word _bibliotheca_ in Michael a San José, _Bibliographia
critica_ (1740-1742) have the appearance of a list of books, but on
closer examination many titles prove to be made up. In other words,
San José offers what amounts to a general survey of bibliography.
Since his book is almost unknown and the entries are often curious, a
brief description will not be out of place. The articles are arranged
alphabetically according to the adjective that follows the word
_bibliotheca_. Thus, the list begins with J. F. Reimann, _Bibliotheca
acroamatica_ (Hannover, 1712), a condensation of Peter Lambeck's
catalogue of manuscripts in the Imperial Library at Vienna. The next
entry consists of two columns headed "Bibliotheca Adriani Baillet"
and is a brief discussion of the _Jugemens des savans_ (1685-1686)
and a long summary of a prospectus of a philosophical dictionary
that Baillet planned but never published. More entries follow in an
alphabetical order according to proper names or adjectives derived
from proper names or the subject matter. Laurentius de Cremona,
_Bibliotheca aethiopica_ is entered under "Aethiopica," and Albert
Bartholin, _Liber de scriptis Danorum_ under "Alberti." It is
difficult to discover the plan of arrangement, and equally difficult
to see the reasons for choosing the books. The presence of more than
twenty entries entitled "Bibliotheca Biblica" is not surprising, but
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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