| Book Sales Catalogues |
| of the Dutch Republic, 1599-1800 |
| Catalogue numbers 1-3748 (Instalments 1-21) |
| The early seventeenth century witnessed the rise of the Dutch Republic as a focal point
of the European book trade. Dutch booksellers had agents and branches in the book centres
of other countries, not only in the stapletowns of books as Frankfort and Leipzig, but also
in Paris, London, Geneva, Berlin, Vienna, Stockholm, Copenhagen, Gdansk, and so on. This
condition lasted until far in the eighteenth century. The printed book auction catalogue is a Dutch innovation. The earliest known one is the catalogue of part of the library of Philip Marnix van Sint Aldegonde. The auction took place in the house of Marnix's widow in Leiden on 6 July 1599. The catalogue was printed by Christopher Guyot. The auctioneer was the Leiden bookseller and university bedel Louis (I) Elzevier. The printed book auction catalogue proved a success. In the years after 1599, more and more book collections were sold by means of printed auction catalogues. Other Dutch towns followed the lead of Leiden: The Hague and Middelburg (1605), Amsterdam (1610), Franeker (1616), Rotterdam (1620), and so on. In the course of time a certain specialisation took place. In the university town of Leiden the libraries of distinguished scholars were auctioned more often than elsewhere. In the centre of government The Hague the books of politicians, jurists, high civil servants and foreign diplomats were brought under the hammer. It seems that collections imported from other countries were auctioned especially in that town as well. During the eighteenth century The Hague developed into a centre of auctioning wholesale and retail stock of eminent booksellers from other Dutch towns. Dutch scholars, divines, members of the professions, merchants and magistrates formed comparatively large libraries. In the Republic of Letters, the auction catalogues of several prominent collections were considered as a standard to conform to when building a library and were used as bibliographic reference tools. Among the bestknown examples are the catalogues of the libraries of Nicolas Heinsius ( 1683) and Jacob Oisel (1688). |