| Book Sales Catalogues |
| of the Dutch Republic, 1599-1800 |
| Catalogue numbers 1-3748 (Instalments 1-21) |
| The project Book Sales Catalogues of the Dutch Republic was conceived and planned by the late
Professor Bert van Selm (Universities of Leiden and Amsterdam) in the 1980's. It was inspired by his
discovery of large collections of Dutch catalogues in Wolfenbüttel and elsewhere. Many data were
derived from the Registration of Dutch auction catalogues, a cardindex compiled by Professor W.G.
Hellinga (University of Amsterdam) and his students between 1961 and 1966. This socalled 'Apparaat
Hellinga' is preserved at present in the Library of the Royal Dutch Book Trade Association
('Bibliotheek van de Koninklijke Vereniging voor het Boekenvak'), in Amsterdam University Library. In the execution of his work Van Selm was assisted by two staff members of the Department of Dutch Language and Literature of Leiden University, namely H.W. de Kooker and E. Hofland. Hofland kept the database and compiled the Guides to the first nine instalments of Book Sales Catalogues (published 1990 and 1992. Before his premature death (1991), Van Selm entrusted the supervision of the project to J.A. Gruys (Royal Library, The Hague). Some years later, the Dutch Department allotted other tasks to Hofland, and subsequently, Gruys and De Kooker decided to adjust themselves to the new situation by styling themselves joint editors of the project. Instalment 21 is published under the editorship of K.J.S. Bostoen and H.W. de Kooker. From the start, all published microfiche instalments were accompanied by a printed Guide. The first provisional volume appeared in 1990 as a companion to instalments 1-5 of Book Sales Catalogues; the second volume (1992) was published with instalments 6-9 in 1992. From the tenth instalment onwards, it was decided to use a radically new cataloguing technique, which was implemented experimentally in the Guides to instalments 10 (1994), 10-11 (1995) and 10-12 (1996), and adopted definitively in the Cumulative Guide to instalments 1-13 published in 1997. The Repertory on CD-ROM to the instalments 1-13 appeared in 1998. The Cumulative Guide to instalments 14-16 was published in 1999. The Guides to instalments 17 and 18 were respectively published in the Spring of 2000 and in May 2001. The Guides to instalments 19 (catalogues 2472-2575 and 3263-3369) and 20 (catalogues 3370-3581) appeared in June 2003 and February 2004. A project of this kind can never be completed without the cooperation of a great many libraries, museums and archives. The major Dutch collection in this field is in the library of the Dutch Book Trade Association (more than 850 catalogues filmed). The filming of this collection was followed by some twenty other Dutch collections, among them the Royal Library and the Museum Meermanno/Westreenianum in The Hague, and the University Libraries of Amsterdam, Utrecht, Leiden and Groningen (together, more than 550 catalogues). The most important collections outside the Netherlands are in Paris (Bibliothèque Nationale), Wolfenbüttel (Herzog August Bibliothek), and St. Petersburg (National Public Library of Russia). Almost 1600 catalogues have been filmed in these libraries. In addition, material will be made available from many other European and American libraries. It was anticipated, and has since been proved, that in the course of the project many catalogues hitherto unknown would come to light. The most striking examples are the discoveries by Dr. O.S. Lankhorst of a large additional collection in the Bibliothèque Nationale de France (shelfmark Delta, more than 550 copies) and of the entire St. Petersburg holdings of Dutch catalogues (more than 830 copies). |