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Jaarboek voor Nederlandse Boekgeschiedenis. Jaargang 20 (2013)

Jaarboek voor Nederlandse Boekgeschiedenis. Jaargang 20

(2013)– [tijdschrift] Jaarboek voor Nederlandse Boekgeschiedenis–rechtenstatus Auteursrechtelijk beschermd

Vorige Volgende

Benito Rial Costas
Bibliography and the history of the printed book in Spain
Some insights into an old and new field of study
In memory of professor José Simón Díaz (1920-2012)

Writing about the progress of bibliography and the history of the book in Spain is not an easy task. Only bibliography as a discipline or field of study has been frequently used and defined to any degree by Spanish scholars. The ‘history of the book’ as an expression denoting a discipline (hereafter book history) is still today, in international forums, far from having a coherent and unanimously accepted definition. Indeed, in Spain, the term is not even used to denote a discipline. Condensing in a few pages the complex history, internally interacting forces and current situation of both bibliography and the elusive field of book history in Spain is impossible without over-simplifying matters, deploying unacceptable generalisations, and overlooking important factors and events.1

In trying to avoid, or perhaps in spite of, these risks, I will concentrate in this paper on bibliography in Spain, showing its history, goals and approach to the history of the printed book - bibliography being the only discipline that, arbitrarily or not, has traditionally considered it. Bibliography, in Spain, has been the only discipline that, from its

origins, has made the history of printed books one of its main interests. Bibliography's approach to the history of the printed book, however, is today facing important challenges from several scholarly initiatives that could be labeled as book history.

Bibliography, librarianship and literary studies: a little bit of history

From 1821 throughout the whole nineteenth century a bibliography course was part of the curricula of several studies. A Chair of Bibliography, as an auxiliary science, was created in studies such as medicine, pharmacy and law. Bibliography was mainly taught by librarians, but the meaning of the word was still far from the modern definition because the function of its practitioners was to teach the history and literature of those respective subjects.2

In 1856, the Escuela Superior de Diplomática was founded in Madrid for teaching and training future librarians, archivists and antiquarians. Its curricula included ‘Bibliography: Classification and Arrangement of Archives and Libraries.’ This course included the study of both the history of printing and the theoretical and practical notions for classifying and arranging archival and library holdings.3 In 1900, the School was closed, and the Chair of Bibliography and its teachers joined the Department of Literary Studies of the Faculty of Filosofía y Letras at the University of Madrid where they continued their activities.4

In 1953, the Escuela de Formación Técnica de Archiveros, Bibliotecarios y Arqueólogos, inheritor of the Escuela Superior de Diplomática's objectives and curricula, opened in Madrid. In 1964, it was transformed into the Escuela de Documentalistas. In 1981, it was renamed Centro de Estudios Bibliográficos y Documentarios (cebid), ceasing its activities when university schools of library and information science started to be opened a few years later.

None of the reforms that the Faculty of Filosofía y Letras made after the Escuela Superior de Diplomática was closed affected the Chair of Bibliography, but the Chair's work, for various reasons, did not achieve great importance within the Faculty until 1971. Because of the poor activity of the Chair, the only one in Spain, the Faculty of Filosofía y Letras decided, in 1956, to establish a Bibliography of Spanish literature course within the Department of Romance Philology. José Simón Díaz taught this course from 1956 to 1970, when he became head of the Chair of Bibliography. At the same time, in the faculties of philosophy and arts of several Spanish provinces, the basic principles and applications of this new discipline started to be taught, albeit under dif-

ferent names, almost always by librarians.5 The connection between bibliography and the Department of Literary Studies of the Faculty of Filosofía y Letras at the University of Madrid resulted in the introduction and application in Spain (by Jaime Moll in 1979) of the bibliographic principles of Fredson Bowers and the contributions of Wallace Kirsop and Roger Laufer. These provided a new tool for literary studies and expanded the significance of bibliography.6

In 1857, one year after the Escuela Superior de Diplomática was created in Madrid, the National Library of Spain established an annual bibliographical award. This was another fundamental milestone in the history of Spanish bibliography, especially, in one of its most important tasks: collecting and cataloguing the printed production of a given place. This municipally or regionally-oriented approach would be later called, by Spanish bibliographers, ‘tipobibliografía’ (hereafter, typobibliography).7 In 1863, the award was given to Francisco Escudero y Perosso for his work on Seville (Tipografía hispalense) and, three years later, to Bonifacio María Riano for his work on Granada (Bibliografía granadina).8

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Figure 1. Francisco Escudero y Perosso, Tipografía hispalense. Anales bibliográficos de la ciudad de Sevilla desde el establecimiento de la imprenta hasta fines del siglo XVIII. Madrid 1894


The enthusiasm produced by Riano's work led the National Library to establish a special award for typobibliographies. Although this initiative did not get immediate results, these kinds of works remained a constant factor in all National Library's annual bibliographical awards for nearly a century. The bibliographical award of the National Library of Spain was last granted in 1953, but the relation between bibliography and typobibliographies would be inherited by the project Tipobibliografía Española thirty years later.9

The project Tipobibliografía Española was born in the years 1983 and 1984. The first and second Reunión de Especialistas en Bibliografía Local were respectively held in 1983 and 1984, convened by the Confederación Española de Centros de Estudios Locales of the Centro Superior de Investigaciones Científicas (csic) and by the Department of Bibliography of the Faculty of Filosofía y Letras of the University Complutense of Madrid. The initiative and ideas of Simón Díaz, the twentieth-century's most respected theorist of bibliography in Spain, were instrumental. In both of those years, a decision was made to undertake the project of creating typobibliographies of the whole Spanish territory following a rigorous and systematic plan and a common methodology. It was made with an awareness of the enormous value that this information would have for several disciplines.10

The Asociación Española de Bibliografía was created few years later - in 1987 - on the initiative of a group of specialists of the National Library of Spain and the members of the project Tipobibliografía Española. Its creation was intended to remedy the lack of a society which brought together the experts in a field with more than two centuries of history and which, through Simón Díaz's work and teaching, as head of the Chair of Bibliography at the Faculty of Filosofía y Letras of the University Complutense of Madrid, was the center of great interest among Spanish librarians and literary scholars. The Asociación Española de Bibliografía condensed and summarised the history of bibliography in Spain and its close relations with librarianship, literary studies and especially typobibliographies. In 1988, the society was formally constituted with a clear objective. Its main purpose would be promoting and studying Spanish hand-press printed production by finding, describing and analyzing libraries' holdings and by creating catalogues, inventories and monographs on the subject.11

The Asociación Española de Bibliografía tried to promote the membership of the society among those national and foreign specialists, mainly librarians and literary scholars, who were willing to collaborate with it in accordance with its objective. This objective of finding, describing and analysing Spanish hand-press printed production, however, did not reflect the aims of many scholars interested in the history of the print-

ed book. With this aim, many different interests and research lines which, in those years, were beginning to develop around the study of the book and print and written culture were explicitly excluded.

The long relations between bibliography, librarianship and literary studies and their developments and exclusions have also been reflected in the publishing market.12 During the nineteenth century, the National Library of Spain's bibliographic award and the work of the Escuela Superior de Diplomática had, especially from the second half of the century, a strong influence on the publishing development of these types of works. The works of Fermín Caballero on the printing press in Cuenca, Cristóbal Pérez Pastor on Toledo and Medina del Campo, Francisco Escudero on Seville, and José María Valdenebro on Córdoba are just a few examples.13

During the following century, the tendency of publishing typobibliographies continued. Two of the most representative works of Spanish bibliography were published, namely Konrad Haebler's Bibliografía ibérica del siglo XV and Frederick J. Norton's A descriptive catalogue of printing in Spain and Portugal.14 A number of scholarly journals started to appear sporadically: Papyrus in 1936, Revista de biblíografía nacional from 1940 to 1946, Bibliofilia from 1949 to 1957, Cuadernos de bibliofilia from 1979 to 1987, Esopo from 1990 to 1992, and Pliegos de bibliofilia from 1998 to 2004.15

In addition, iconic international works such as Ronald B. McKerrow's An introduction to bibliography of 1928 and Philip Gaskell's A new introduction to bibliography of 1972 were translated into Spanish, albeit only at the very end of the century.16 Fredson Bower's Principles of bibliographical description of 1949 had to wait until 2001 to be published in Spanish.17

In the first half of the century, Juan Manuel Sánchez published a typobibliography of Aragon (1913), Ángel del Arco y Molinero one of Tarragona (1916), Mariano Alcocer y Martínez one of Valladolid (1926), Antonio Rodríguez Moñino one of Jerez (1942) and one

of Extremadura (1945), and Atanasio López one of Galicia (1953).18



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Figure 2. Pliegos de biblioflia 23 (2003)


At the end of the century, the project Tipobibliografía Española and the work and teaching of José Simón Díaz began to produce their first published results in works such as Julián Martín Abad's La imprenta en Alcalá de Henares (1991), Lorenzo Ruiz Fidalgo's La imprenta en Salamanca (1994) and Fermín de los Reyes' La imprenta en Segovia (1996).19 However, many works published during the second half of the twentieth century, and especially at its end, started to be very challenging for bibliography's objective since many different scholarly interests and research lines were beginning to develop around the study of the printed book beyond librarianship, literary studies and typobibliographies. For example, Juan Delgado Casado studied bookplates, José Bonifacio Martín Bermejo bookbindings, and authors such as Antonio Klaus Wagner, Clive Griffin and José Antonio

Armendáriz studied the work of single printers.20 In the last decades of the century, works on the printing press, book selling and private libraries based on documental sources were frequently published, and the terms ‘culture’, ‘writing’, ‘reading’ and ‘readers’ began to be used.21 In 1976, Maxime Chevalier published his Lectura y lectores en la España de los siglos XVI y XVII; in 1980, the conference Livre et lecture en Espagne et en France sous l'Ancien Régime was held in Madrid and in 1986 El libro antiguo español; in 1987, Philippe Berger published his Libro y lectura en la Valencia del Renacimiento; in 1992 Fernando Bouza Álvarez published his Del escribano a la biblioteca; and in 1997 Antonio Castillo Gómez shared his Escrituras y escribientes with the scholarly world.22



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Figure 3. Livre et lecture en Epagne et en Trance sous l'Ancien Régime. Paris 1981


Some of these works had their genesis in bibliography's interest in the history of the printed book among librarians and literary scholars. Others, however, were not related to this discipline, but were instead written by historians who viewed the printed (and written) book as an important element for the analysis of certain social, political, economic and cultural environments.

An old (and new) field of study

The current situation of Spanish bibliography and its interests are logical consequences of its history. The university faculties of library and information science are, today, the centers devoted to professional training and research in the field of librarianship and, therefore, the latest inheritors of the Escuela Superior de Diplomática and the close relation between bibliography and librarianship. The faculties of library and information sciences as well as university departments of literary studies remain two of bibliography's major strongholds. The project of Tipobibliografía Española continues to add new works, although at a slower pace than in its early years, filling the lacunas in bibliography that François López pointed out in 1984.23 Francisco Rico is one of the main figures studying the relation between bibliography and textual criticism in literary studies.24 The Asociación Española de Bibliografía continues its activities and its annual conferences.25 The bibliographical award of the National Library of Spain has been re-established and the Asociación Española de Bibliografía plays an important role in it.26 Publishing houses such as Arco Libros, Calambur, Ollero y Ramos and Trea, among others, invest in works on the history of the book.

But bibliography, today, is facing an important challenge. The lines of research and interests which were born at the end of the twentieth century continually offer new contributions to the study of printing, writing, reading and bookselling.27 Some contri-

butions on the printed book are presented as part of bibliography as a discipline when their authors are library science and literary scholars. Papers presented at the Asociación Española de Bibliografía conferences provide evidence of this.28 Many others, however, often written by historians, do not, even though their authors are also interested in the history of the printed book. One might note, for example, the works of García Oro, Fernando Bouza, Alberto González and Natalia Maillard.29

Two are the main causes of this phenomenon: bibliography's tradition and the lack of a contemporary theoretical formulation of the discipline. As Simón Díaz noted in La bibliografía of 1971, the origins of bibliography have transmitted the message that the only function of the discipline is the training of future librarians, while its relation with the Faculty of Filosofía y Letras has shaped its development towards that of literary studies.30 Today it can be added that the bibliographical awards of the National Library of Spain, Simón Díaz's work, the project of Tipobibliografía Española and the Asociación Española de Bibliografía's objective have conveyed the idea that the main function of the discipline is to describe and catalogue printed books.

Despite the fact that a myriad of new different interests and research trends have made inroads into the history of the printed book in recent years, bibliography has not given a theoretical response to the challenges the field is facing, nor has it clearly stated what the responsibilities of the discipline are and what they are not. Simón Díaz's La bibliografía remains the most important reference for the definition of the term and its boundaries in Spain despite the fact that Simón Diaz's interests and visions about the history of the printed book in 1971 were very different from those bibliography is facing today.31

As a consequence, on the one hand, bibliography and its practitioners increasingly show signs of being interested in many different aspects of the printed book, independently of the perspective that is used. In this sense, the boundaries between an old librarianship-literary studies paradigm and new interests about the printed book among librarians and literary scholars are, at least in practice, gradually fading within the discipline as the papers presented at the Asociación Española de Bibliografía conferences demonstrate.32 On the other hand, many historians see bibliography as a library and literary discipline where the printed book is only a tool to reach largely nineteenth-century goals, and they see the inroads of a historical nature that bibliographers have made as a kind of intrusion into their area of expertise.

Bibliography stands, at this point, at a crossroads. Avoiding a choice of direction will enable bibliography to be open to many new interests about the history of the printed book far beyond collecting and cataloging printed books, but it will also lead most historians interested in those books to still perceive the discipline as a stronghold of librar-

ian and literary principles and objectives which they do not share. If bibliography chooses, instead, the theoretical clarity akin in strength to that of Simón Díaz, its boundaries will be clearly defined, but many recent works on the history of the printed book written by librarians and literary scholars would not be considered part of the discipline as they are today. Being clearly open to new interests and coherently redefining what the new responsibilities of the discipline are concerning the history of the printed book and what they are not will also not be an easy path. Unity can be attractive, but the distance between bibliography and, for example, the current research conducted by some historians in reading and written culture is big, despite both the fact that those historians also consider the printed book part of their interests and the fact that their innovative work would be perceived in international forums as part of book history.33 Research in reading and written culture also has its own and independent history. In the last twenty years, historians interested in reading and written culture have had their own initiatives. In 1993, a series of international conferences about reading and written culture began to be organised, the journal Signo was born around the same time, and, in 2004, the Seminario Interdisciplinar de Estudios sobre Cultura Escrita of the University of Alcalá de Henares began its activities.34



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Figure 4. El libro antiguo español. Actas del primer coloquio internacional. Salamanca/Madrid 1988


The lack of unity and interrelations between different interests in the history of the book seemed to have been solved in 1987 with the creation of the Sociedad Española de Historia del Libro. In 1986, the National Library of Spain held an international confer-

ence titled El libro antiguo español at which prominent historians, librarians and literary scholars took part.

This conference led to the creation, one year later, of the Sociedad Española de Historia del Libro, which, with the turn of the century, became the Instituto de Historia del Libro y de la Lectura, directed by María Luisa López-Vidriero and Pedro M. Cátedra.35 In 2002, its first international conference was organised, the first issue of its annual journal, Syntagma, was published and a collection of publications centered on the history of the book, reading and writing was initiated.36 In spite of its ambitions, the Instituto de Historia del Libro y de la Lectura could never fully accomplish its plans.37 In 2006, it was absorbed into the Instituto Biblioteca Hispánica of the Centro Internacional de Investigación para la Lengua Española and the cohesion between scholars interested in the history of the book lost one of its most promising features.

Whatever the road bibliography will take - changing or confirming Simón Díaz's definition - it will not be an easy journey. Although bibliography chose the history of the printed book as one of its main interests in its early years, the history of bibliography and the teaching of this discipline have greatly determined both its approach to the topic and how the discipline has been perceived (as librarian and literary). Until a decision is made, the history of the printed book will continue to be an old and central field of study for bibliography, but a new history of the printed book will continue to circulate within and around the discipline.


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