Page:Library Administration, 1898.djvu/101

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LIBRARY ADMINISTRATION

(6) Initials are treated as though they were complete words. Where they represent the name of a person, the last letter is to be taken as representing a surname, unless the typography or evidence from the book itself shows that the surname is represented by one of the preceding letters.

(7) Initials of forenames are filled in when possible.[1]

(8) The names of more than one person may only appear in the same heading in the case of a work written by two authors in conjunction, without specification of the parts written by each ; the names in this case are entered in the order in which they are given in the book.

Example.

Beaumont (Francis) and Fletcher (John). The works of Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher.

When more than two authors have collaborated, the name of the first only is to be taken as the heading.

(9) Books, or series of books, made up of separate works

  1. No pains are spared to obtain information of this kind from bibliographies, dictionaries, directories, army, law, and medical lists, and similar publications. The process is of the utmost use in distinguishing different authors of the same surname, especially in the longer headings. It is universally followed in the United States, where the unearthing of a new forename of some retiring author is chronicled each month in the Library Journal. The Centralblatt fur Bibliothekswesen has taken of late to making similar records. In Germany, however, there occurs a vexatious obstacle to the conscientious cataloguer — officers of the army who are good enough to write books will not admit the possibility of another book being written by a namesake, so they leave out their forenames. The Army List is equally unbending, so the case is hopeless. Useful articles on the sources for forenames will be found in the American Library Journal, vol. xiv. Nos. and 2, and in the Centralblatt fur Bibliothekswesen for March 1896.