[DCRM-L] Latin street address. Capitalize via?

[William Hale]

I’ve been cataloguing rare books for more than twenty years and have never thought of that. I suppose it should according to current rules, but I’m inclined to go with the effective majority verdict and continue to put the v in lower case. A quick look at EEBO suggests it was customary to put a lower case v in English-speaking countries as well, which gives some support to the practice.

I must admit that I have always been reluctant to capitalize words which are in lower case in the source, irrespective of what the rules say.

Will.
--
William Hale
Treasurer, Cambridge Bibliographical Society

Rare Books and Early Manuscripts Department
Cambridge University Library
West Road, Cambridge, UK, CB3 9DR

Telephone: (+44) (0)1223 333122
Email: William.Hale at lib.cam.ac.uk

From: DCRM-L <dcrm-l-bounces at lib.byu.edu> On Behalf Of Noah Sheola
Sent: 24 September 2021 16:34
To: DCRM Users' Group <dcrm-l at lib.byu.edu>
Subject: [DCRM-L] Latin street address. Capitalize via?

When transcribing Latin, and therefore applying English capitalization rules, should the word "via" in an imprint like "Parisiis :  Apud Simonem Benard, viâ Jacobaeâ ..." be capitalized? Trawling through oclc for examples, it seems like most, or certainly many, dcrm:b catalogers, leave it lowercase. But wouldn't the English convention of capitalizing street names would require Via to be uppercase? Or is the noun "via" in some obscure semantic sense, not really part of the name of the locale?


--
Noah Sheola
Special Collections Cataloging Librarian
John J. Burns Library
Boston College
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