[DCRM-L] FW: From Dan R., RE: DCRB revision

[Robert Maxwell]

Dan Rettberg wrote:

4. Keeping in mind that classical Hebrew and Greek do not distinguish 
between upper and lower case, I would give a default form for those
electing 
to use the transliterated forms of letter names, i.e. as to whether to 
capitalize the first letter of the name or not. 

RLM: Thanks, Dan, for your comments on this. What you say is certainly
true for the classical Greek language but it is not true for early
printing practice, which did use upper and lower case letters for Greek,
so I would think we should follow the same practice we do for Roman
alphabet signatures, that is, use upper or lower case as found in the
source. Your suggestion might be useful for Hebrew, however--I don't
know about early printing practice for Hebrew.

 

Bob

 

Robert L. Maxwell
Special Collections and Ancient Languages Catalog Librarian
Genre/Form Authorities Librarian
6728 Harold B. Lee Library
Brigham Young University
Provo, UT 84602
(801)422-5568 

 


________________________________

	From: dcrm-l-admin at lib.byu.edu [mailto:dcrm-l-admin at lib.byu.edu]
On Behalf Of Deborah J. Leslie
	Sent: Thursday, January 06, 2005 10:16 AM
	To: dcrm-l at lib.byu.edu
	Subject: [DCRM-L] FW: From Dan R., RE: DCRB revision
	
	
	Forwarded from Dan Rettberg.  
	 
	-----Original Message-----
	From: Rettberg, Dan [mailto:drettberg at huc.edu] 
	Sent: Wednesday, January 05, 2005 4:30 PM
	To: Deborah J. Leslie
	Subject: FW: From Dan R., RE: DCRB revision 
	
	

	Dear Leslie-- 

	I checked your text for non-Roman signatures for the proposed
revision of 
	DCRB. Just a couple of comments. 

	1. I like the way you have included the language as a part of
the 
	description, i.e. (in Hebrew). My practice has been to make a
separate note, 
	"Gatherings signed in Hebrew characters". 

	2. I would use "alef", rather than "alif", for the first letter
of the 
	Hebrew alphabet. So far as I'm aware, "alif", with a long "i"
and the accent 
	on the second syllable, is a linguistic term, probably derived
from Arabic. 
	The standard English spelling for the first letter of the Hebrew
alphabet is 
	"alef", with the "e" pronounced as a short vowel, and the accent
on the 
	first syllable. 

	3. I find it interesting that you appear to leave it to the
discretion of 
	the cataloger as to whether to use transliterated forms of the
Hebrew 
	character names, or Arabic numerals based on, I assume, the
actual evidence 
	in the piece. By the way, I don't think I mentioned in my last
e-mail on 
	this subject that classical Greek uses the characters of the
alphabet 
	numerically as well. According to the Encyclopedia Britannica,
although the 
	so-called Arabic numerals were first used in India as early as
the third 
	century B.C.E., they did not come to the West until the tenth
century. 

	4. Keeping in mind that classical Hebrew and Greek do not
distinguish 
	between upper and lower case, I would give a default form for
those electing 
	to use the transliterated forms of letter names, i.e. as to
whether to 
	capitalize the first letter of the name or not. 

	I hope these comments are helpful. 

	Dan 
	drettberg at huc.edu 


	7B9. Signatures 

	.. If the volume is signed with nonroman characters, include an
indication 
	of the script used in parentheses before the colon. Ascertain
whether the 
	signing follows a numeric or alphabetic sequence. For a numeric
sequence, 
	represent the characters using arabic numerals. Indicate the
presence of 
	inferred numbers within the sequence using square brackets. 

	Signatures (in Hebrew): 1-114 
	(Editorial comment: Indicates a numeric sequence beginning with
[alif] and 
	ending with [yod alif]) 

	Signatures (in Hebrew): [1]2 2-102 
	(Editorial comment: Indicates a numeric sequence with the first
gathering 
	unsigned and the remaining gatherings signed [beth]-[yod]) 

	For an alphabetic sequence, if the language has conventional
names for the 
	letters, as in Greek or Hebrew, substitute roman-alphabet words
in square 
	brackets. Capitalize the first letter of each word if the
characters in the 
	signatures are uppercase letters; do not capitalize if the
characters are 
	lowercase letters. Do not use double brackets to supply inferred
gatherings; 
	instead, condense the sequence and provide an explanation at the
end of the 
	note. 

	Signatures (in Greek): pi1 [alpha]-[gamma]2 [Alpha]-2[Lambda]2 

	Signatures (in Greek): [alpha]-[delta]4; the [gamma] gathering
is inferred 

	-----Original Message----- 
	From: Deborah J. Leslie [mailto:DJLeslie at FOLGER.edu] 
	Sent: Wednesday, January 05, 2005 12:21 PM 
	To: Multiple recipients of list 
	Subject: 


	Meetings of the Bibliographic Standards Committee are open;
guests are 
	encouraged to attend and participate. 
	  
	http://www.folger.edu/bsc/2005.1agenda.html 
	  

	________________________________ 

	Deborah J. Leslie, M.A., M.L.S. 
	Head of Cataloging 
	Folger Shakespeare Library 
	201 East Capitol St., SE 
	Washington, DC 20003 
	202.675-0369 
	djleslie at folger.edu 
	  

	



	
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