The main body of this contribution to The Radboud Repository is a register of 1198 items, corresponding with the summaries which Rabus, Van der Slaart and Séwel published in the Rotterdam periodical. The following explanation may serve as an introduction for the convenience of the user. The register is an alphabetical catalogue by author, so called because the alphabetical arrangement corresponds with the first letter of the family names of the authors of the summarised works. At the time there were various sorts of catalogues, like today. Besides catalogues by author there were registers by title, or catalogues according to authors’ names as well as titles. Another option is alphabetical arrangement according to subject or theme, with or without regard to a specific field of learning like law. There are further options.

       The age of the rising Enlightenment knew an increasing demand for arranging existing knowledge as well as making knowledge accessible. This led to introduction of sizeable reference works like those of Moreri, Bayle and, in Dutch, of D. van Hoogstraten and J.L. Schuur. An activity aimed at disclosing periodicals and organising libraries was related to this. In turn it induced the forming of theory. So in 1669 Johannes Lomeier published his De bibliothecis liber Singularis, repeatedly reprinted. The Histoire des Ouvrages des Sçavans of March 1698 brought as a piece of news the message that the Dane Rottgard had developed a method of organising libraries ‘selon des matières’, i.e.: by size and format as well as by subject. In 1713 Idée générale des études […]appeared, written by Chevigny (Hénri-Philippe de Limiers). In this book he payed attention to a plan for the proper organisation of a library. At the time many works of that kind appeared. Regarding making periodicals accessible it must be stated that at this stage we are talking about two different activities, the first relating to the measures an editor took to make it easier for readers to use a current periodical, the other making the issues of a discontinued periodical suitable as reference work. Important contemporary literature about the first sort of measures doesn’t exist, apart from indications in the periodicals themselves. That goes too for the other, except for the assurance, often and sometimes extensively repeated, that former periodicals have changed into huge libraries.



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