Library classification: Difference between revisions

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After the [[Printing press#The Printing Revolution|printing revolution]] in the sixteenth century, the increase in available printed materials made such broad classification unworkable, and more granular classifications for library materials had to be developed in the nineteenth century.<ref name=shera>{{cite book|last1=Shera|first1=Jesse H|title=Libraries and the organization of knowledge|url=https://archive.org/details/librariesorganiz00sher|url-access=registration|date=1965|publisher=Archon Books|___location=Hamden, Conn.}}</ref>

In 1627 [[Gabriel Naudé]] published a book called ''Advice on Establishing a Library''. At the time, he was working in the private library of President<i>[[Président à mortier]]</i> Henri de Mesmes II. Mesmes had around 8,000 printed books and many more Greek, Latin and French written manuscripts. Although it was a private library, scholars with references could access it. The purpose of ''Advice on Establishing a Library'' was to identify rules for private book collectors to organize their collections in a more orderly way to increase the collection's usefulness and beauty. Naudé developed a classification system based on seven different classes: theology, medicine, jurisprudence, history, philosophy, mathematics, and the humanities. These seven classes would later be increased to twelve.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Clarke|first=Jack A.|date=1969|title=Gabriel Naudé and the Foundations of the Scholarly Library|journal=The Library Quarterly|volume=39|issue=4|pages=331–343|issn=0024-2519|jstor=4306024|doi=10.1086/619792|s2cid=144274371}}</ref> ''Advice on Establishing a Library'' was about a private library, but within the same book, Naudé encouraged the idea of public libraries open to all people regardless of their ability to pay for access to the collection. One of the most famous libraries that Naudé helped improve was the {{lang|fr|[[Bibliothèque Mazarine]]|italic=no}} in Paris. Naudé spent ten years there as a librarian. Because of Naudé's strong belief in free access to libraries to all people, the Bibliothèque Mazarine became the first public library in France around 1644.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Boitano|first=John F.|date=1996-01-01|title=Naudé's ''Advis Pour Dresser Une Bibliothèque'': A Window into the Past|journal=Seventeenth-Century French Studies|volume=18|issue=1|pages=5–19|doi=10.1179/026510696793658584|issn=0265-1068}}</ref>

Although libraries created order within their collections from as early as the fifth century BC,<ref name=shera /> the Paris Bookseller's classification, developed in 1842 by [[Jacques Charles Brunet]], is generally seen as the first of the modern book classifications. Brunet provided five major classes: theology, jurisprudence, sciences and arts, belles-lettres, and history.<ref name=sayers>{{cite book|last1=Sayers|first1=Berwick|title=An introduction to library classification|date=1918|publisher=H. W. Wilson|___location=New York}}</ref> Classification can now be seen as a provider of subject access to information in a networked environment.<ref>{{cite journal|last=Matveyeva|first=Susan|date=2002-06-14|title=A Role for Classification: The Organization of Resources on the Internet|journal=MLA Forum|volume=1|issue=2}}</ref>