Congratulations to Sharon Corrigan from Dublin City University Library, whose blog post was highly commended in the CONUL Training and Development Library Assistant Blog Awards 2025.
There tends to be a smattering of surprises each week working in special collections, unexpected connections between the past and present that pop up and elicit a quiet ooh from me along my journey as a library assistant currently working with early printed books (EPBs) at DCU. In these collections each book has been on its own individual saga and it is the uniqueness of both items, (a handwritten dedication inside), and manifestation (the printer’s chosen dedicatee for that edition) that I am endeavouring to capture when cataloguing, together with the usual publication information and descriptions that will lead researchers to find the records in the first place.
Unanticipated considerations have included how long one can spend finding the apt term for a quirky binding or stamp, and how differently cities in Latin sound compared to their modern Anglicised names. Luckily RBMS have an invaluable table of Latin place names providing that all important consistency.
Local history hidden amid foreign texts.
Latin is not my first language, I have picked up a little on the job. I do, however, feel confident in saying that 800+ page tomes on ecclesiastical theory are not ‘light reading’. Inevitably even the most committed cleric needed study breaks. So, secreted in the pages of some EPBs are bookmarks, beautifully preserved, forgotten pages, that give a glimpse of 19th century Dublin. A Dublin, where you might have correspondence with shopkeepers on personalised stationery. These include a linen order from Webb’s wholesalers, Upper Bridge-Street, on the back of which are listed the necessities of the day, a grocery list, including mustard and beer. Hopefully used after ‘the messages’ had been fetched. A receipt for two baskets showcases the wares of the weavers of the Richmond Institution for Instruction of the Blind, on O’Connell Street. Finally a letter of reply to a query about a flute was found bearing a letterhead from M. Gunn & Sons at 61 Grafton Street; now home to the Disney store.
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| A receipt from James Webb, wholesale & retail linen draper and importer of English flannels, 15 and 16, Upper-Bridge Street, (Joining Corn-Market) dated 21st April 1826. |
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| The reverse of the same receipt on which is a hand written list of groceries signed by a John Taylor. |
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| An order slip for two baskets from the Richmond Institution for Instruction of Industrious Blind, located at 41, Upper Sackville Street,Dublin [Now O’Connell St] dated July 1855. |
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| The letter head from a response to an enquiry for the costing of the repair of a flute showing the letterhead of M. Gunn & Sons, Music & Musical Instrument Warehouse. 61 Grafton Street, Dublin, dated January 2nd [18]71. |
Folios don’t fool around, or do they?
What lies within the covers of an EPB? Even the wisest cannot know; at least from the binding alone. Occasionally it has been a desiccated spider leering up at me. When noting books’ heights in the physical description (300) field I also add their format, useful when differentiating books from other printings during the hand press period. Upon checking a suspected folio one day I looked towards the light through a page and could see what Gaskin (1995, p.82) describes as the “chain lines in the paper running up and down the leaves (vertically)... and that the watermark was in the middle of one of the leaves”. These are left imprinted in paper from when it was dried on molds during its making. This particular watermark was very clearly a jester wearing his hat. Having grown up with British art and craft TV shows, an old term they - and therefore I - often used, sprang immediately to mind… that’s a foolscap!
The ‘foolscap sheet’ is still sometimes used in the art and law fields, being the Imperial size of paper in the UK, or folio in Europe, and was once the term for a standard sheet of paper, though it has been replaced mostly by the slightly shorter A4 size now (Pearce-Moses, 2005, p.174). There is a quick guide to identifying formats available from the STCV if you’re interested in checking what format a book in your collection is using the watermark.
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| Two leaves showing the white outline of the foolscap watermark, a jester in his hat with beads. Both taken from the book whose title page appears on the left Historical collections : of private passages of state, of weighty matters in law, of remarkable proceedings in five parliaments. Beginning the sixteenth year of King James, anno 1618. And ending the fifth year of the King Charls, anno 1629. Published 1659. |
The Human Touch in the Sphere of Don’t Touch
EPBs are generally stored in climate controlled, dark places, to preserve them until they are requested so that they can appear heroically on a glowing cushion, or so I tell them as I tuck them away to wait. EPBs can seem remote and intangible. Handling them, performing light cleaning, and basic preservation, enclosing detached material in acid free paper and using a human touch to flatten, straighten, and secure what isn’t too brittle. Gloves are used only rarely, and for specific tasks, as the LOC (2025) recommends clean dry hands except for “photographs and film, metals, ivory”. The dexterity of my fingertips, so far, are giving me an edge over AI. The surprising durability of handmade paper composed from cotton or linen fibres leaves me constantly astonished, even inside bindings that seem battered and bruised there often sits a perfectly sewn text block of bright white paper waiting to impart the words it’s held stable for nearly 500 years.
While there have been many more unexpected surprises during the cataloguing of EPBs at DCU they may have to wait to be shared a little longer in their fuller glory.
Bibliography
Boydell, B. (2021). Gunn, M. (& Sons). Dublin Music Trade. https://dublinmusictrade.ie/node/186
Gaskell, P. (1995). A new introduction to bibliography. St. Paul's Bibliographies, Winchester
Library of Congress. (2025). Frequently Asked Questions: Preservation. Ask a Librarian. https://ask.loc.gov/preservation/faq/337286
Maxwell, R.L. (1997). RBMS/BSC Latin Place Names File. Rare Books and Manuscripts Section Association of College and Research Libraries A Division of the American Library Association. https://rbms.info/lpn/
Rushworth, J. (1629). Historical collections : of private passages of state, of weighty matters in law, of remarkable proceedings in five parliaments. Beginning the sixteenth year of King James, anno 1618. And ending the fifth year of the King Charls. Thomason, G.
National Built Heritage Service. (2013). MRCB, 10-13 Cornmarket, Bridge Street Upper, Dublin 8, DUBLIN. https://www.buildingsofireland.ie/buildings-search/building/50080556/mrcb-10-13-cornmarket-bridge-street- upper-dublin-8-dublin
Pearce-Moses, R. (2005). A Glossary of Archival and Records Terminology . The Society of American Archivists. https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5a1c710fbce17620f861bf47/t/5a35fffe41920241eb892a75/15134883 87901/SAA-Glossary-2005
Vlaamse Erfgoed Bibliotheken. (n.d.). List of Bibliographical Formats. STCV Bibliography of the Hand Press Book. https://manual.stcv.be/p/List_of_Bibliographical_Formats
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