The essays in Private Libraries and their Documentation revolve around the users and contents of early modern private book collections, and around the sources used to document and study these collections. They take the reader from large-scale projects on historical book ownership to micro-level research conducted on individual libraries, and from analyses of specific types of primary sources to general typologies and overviews by period and by region. As a result of its comparative approach and active engagement with questions regarding the nature, selection and accessibility of sources, the volume serves as a guide to sources and resources in different regions as well as to state-of the-art methods and interpretational approaches.
Publication of this volume in open access was made possible by the Ammodo KNAW Award 2017 for Humanities.
Rindert Jagersma (PhD, University of Amsterdam) is a book historian and bibliographer, specialised in the quantitative approach of the book trade of the Dutch Republic around 1700. In the ERC-funded MEDIATE project, he focuses on Dutch auction catalogues and their owners.
Helwi Blom (PhD, Utrecht University) lectures in French (Radboud University) and Comparative Literature (Utrecht University). Her scholarly interests include chivalric romance, popular print, and book and library history. In the MEDIATE project, she studies early modern French private library catalogues.
Evelien Chayes (PhD, University of Amsterdam) is a researcher at the CNRS Institut de recherche et d'histoire des textes, Paris. She has published monographs and articles on the circulation of texts and book ownership during the Renaissance up to circa 1700.
Ann-Marie Hansen (PhD, McGill University) is Project Manager of âUnlocking the Fagel Collectionâ at the Library of Trinity College. Her research interests include early modern readersâ interactions with print, book collecting, and cataloguing practices, particularly with regards to Sammelbände.
Acknowledgements List of Illustrations Notes on Contributors
Goldmines or Minefields? Private Libraries and Their Documentation (1665â1830)
âRindert Jagersma, Helwi Blom and Ann-Marie Hansen
Part 1: Private Libraries in Use
1 The Leufstabruk Catalogues: Life Narrative, Collectorâs Rationale and Network of Charles de Geer
âAlex Alsemgeest
2 A Private Library as a Material History of the Book. Otto Thottâs Encyclopedic Library in Copenhagen
âAnders Toftgaard
3 A Collegiant Library in Rijnsburg at the Beginning of the Eighteenth Century: The Books of Jan Matthijsz van Drieborn (d. 1715)
âPaul G. Hoftijzer
5 Private Libraries and the Second-Hand Book Trade in Early Modern Academia
The Case of Leuven University 1425â1797
âPierre Delsaerdt
6 Book Auctions at the Reformed College of Debrecen (1743â1842)
âRóbert Oláh
Part 2: Uncovering Private Libraries in Archival Sources
7 Some Notes on Sixteenth- and Seventeenth-Century Library Archives as a Source for the Reconstruction of Private Libraries in Italy and the Vatican City
âGiliola Barbero
8 Book Ownership in Parma, Italy (1665â1830)
âFederica Dallasta
9 âFor Don Antonio Meave I Leave the Three Folios of My Dear and Venerable Father Louis of Granadaâ: Tracing Books in the Archivo General de NotarÃas of Mexico City
âAndrea Reyes Elizondo
Part 3: Private Library Research in Regional Contexts
11 Mercury in the Republic of Letters: Private Libraries in Spanish Book Sales Catalogues (1660â1800)
âPedro Rueda RamÃrez and LluÃs AgustÃ
12 Lists of Private Book Collections in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and Royal Prussia, 1680â1830
âMichaÅ Bajer
13 Surviving Records of Private Book Collections in the Kingdom of Hungary and the Transylvanian Principality between 1665 and 1830
âIstván Monok
14 From Extensive Learned Libraries to Modest Book Collections: Research on Danish Private Book Collections of the Long Eighteenth Century
âJonas Thorup Thomsen
15 âThe Cornerstone of Scholarshipâ: Library Catalogues in Late Imperial China
âFan Wang
Part 4: Building a Field of Study
16 The Private Libraries in Renaissance England (PLRE) Project: An Overview
âJoseph L. Black
All interested in the early modern book world, book history, private libraries, book lists, cataloguing, book auctions, book sales, the history of collecting, book ownership, and readership.
Keywords: library history, book ownership, book history, bibliography, catalogues, book lists, inventories, cataloguing, provenance, readership, bibliophilia, book auctions, collecting, 17thâ18th centuries, 18th century.