Topic 6: Glossary

[Richard Noble]

At 02:38 PM 1/7/99 -0700, you wrote:
>Please comment to the list on the following proposed revisions by Sandra:
>
>DCRB "GLOSSARY": PROPOSED REVISIONS
>
>(To facilitate distribution via e-mail, new text is set off by percentage
>mark: %)
>
>New terms added:  Figure; Frontispiece.
>
>Should we add the following?-Gathering; Imprint  ???????

RCN: None of the above. We really don't want to get into the
Carter/Bowers/Gaskell/Glaister business--where would we ever stop? The
purpose of the DCRB glossary ought to be, pretty strictly, the definition
or redefinition of terms peculiar to DCRB as a cataloguing standard
vis-a-vis definitions found (or not found) in AACR2. We refer readers at
many points to the basic texts of the discipline. Those who would look to
our appendices for understanding of matters bibliographical would be well
advised to look elsewhere or stick to AACR2.

>______________________________________________________________
>
>Bibliographic description.  [Stet.]
>
>Broadside, broadsheet.  %Cataloguer's term for single-sheet publication,
q.v.%

RCN: Actually, "single-sheet publication" is our rather abstract technical
term which includes the format that the world out there (as well as our
Genre thesaurus) calls "broadside", along with a slew of other flat things.
Further remarks under "single-sheet publication".

>Chief title.  [Omit definition.] % See Title proper. % [Omit "see also."]

RCN: No, I think this is a very useful term--an advance on AACR2. I've
remarked on this separately.

>*Edition. All copies resulting from a single  % printing %  job of
>typographical composition.

RCN: I'm afraid this addition is quite wrong. The definition is correct as
it stands, although the phenomenon itself can be hard to pin down as we
move into the age of platemaking and, God knows, electronic composition.
What's essential is the underlying identity of the base from which marks
have been made on paper, at whatever distance of time or place, allowing
for the variants that distinguish states and issues. A correct account of
this, in cases where it has been published or can be discerned, can often
be given only in the notes.

It is a vexed topic, and best left as we have it, with its surface barely
scratched. We're actually better off leaving the wholly unitiated at a
slight loss, with the hope that they'll follow up the educational resources
we suggest in our references. I think we make it sound too simple as it is,
as if this is all that Tanselle has to say on the matter.

>Figure.  [N.B.: new term.]  An illustration printed on a page of text, or
>printed on a page which is an integral part of a gathering.>

RCN: No. Reasons above.

>Fingerprint. A group of characters taken from the text of the publication,
>which, with the addition of an imprint date and an edition, impression,  %or
>other identifying number%,  may serve to identify the publication uniquely.

RCN: I'd prefer something like: "'The fingerprint [note 8--see below]
consists of a number of characters drawn from a number of uniform places in
the text of the publication, followed by a number indicating the source of
one or more of the characters, and/or a letter indicating the direction of
the chain-lines, and/or the date as it appears in the imprint.' (Definition
from ISBD(A) 8.1.2). The fingerprint serves as a unique identifier of a
publication."

Or something like that. Despite suggestions that the definition is more
open-ended than this, "fingerprint" seems to have a fairly restricted
meaning, at least in European usage. Are any other such identifiers
actually referred to as "fingerprints"? At any rate, it doesn't seem to be
headed for general use.

>Folder. [Stet.]

>Frontispiece.  [N.B.: new term.] An illustrative leaf, excepting an added
>title page, preceding (and usually facing) the title page.  The frontispiece
>may be a plate, or may be an integral part of a gathering. 

RCN: I don't think so, though it does compensate for the wholesale
expulsion of the word from AACR2. But it's not even used in DCRB, is it?
It's not indexed. (That doesn't mean I don't use the word quite freely in
notes, so I could be talked into this. I think it entails an explanatory
expansion of the rule dealing with plates, which may not be a bad idea.)

>Illustration. [Stet.]
>
>Impression.  [Stet.]
>
>*Issue.  [Stet.]

RCN: I don't think this definition is at all adequate--I think one issue
may comprise any number of impressions. I've argued elsewhere (Guy
Davenport : A Bibliography ...) that the definition unduly confounds
separate questions of publication and manufacture, but that's certainly
outside the scope of DCRB. That the definition as it stands is a puzzlement
is all to the good.

>Leaf of plates.  [Stet.]
>
>Plate.  [N.B.: major revision.]  A primarily illustrative leaf that is not an
>integral part of a gathering.  [DELETING: "excepting an illustrated title
>page
"]  Tables,  %scores, and added title pages%  printed on leaves that are
>not an integral part of a gathering are also treated as plates.

RCN: I've argued in a separate message for acceptance of this change in
principle.

>Single-sheet publication. [Stet.]

RCN: Add something at the very beginning, like "A broadside, poster, or
other publication..."

>*State.  [Stet.]
>
>Title page.  The leaf on which the  %title proper%  appears.  [Stet for
>remainder.]

RCN: Quite so. The title proper includes (as its whole or as a part) the
chief title. The use of "chief title" should be restricted to cases where
it needs to be distinguished from the title proper. (Disussed in a separate
message). The rest of the definition is useful as well, and I don't agree
with (Bob's?) suggestion that we should revert to the AACR2 definition,
with its rather irritating addendum about "title leaf".

>Title proper.  [Stet, except omit "See also Chief title."]

RCN: See remarks under "chief title".

>Variant.  [Stet.]

RICHARD NOBLE : RARE BOOK CATALOGUER : JOHN HAY LIBRARY : BROWN UNIVERSITY
PROVIDENCE, RI 02912 : 401-863-1187/FAX 863-2093 : RICHARD_NOBLE at BROWN.EDU