Harriet Wheelock / Tuesday 28 September 2010 Cataloguing the Catalogues – The Dun’s Library archive One of the first parts of the College's large archival collection I have catalogued are the papers relating to the history of the College Library. The foundation of the College's Library goes back to 1713 when Sir Patrick Dun left his personal library of books to the College, and in doing so gave the Library its name. Unfortunately no catalogue exists of Dun's bequest, and it is now only possible to identify one book, bearing Dun's signature, as part of the original bequest. It is possible that others lie unidentified in the library, but the library's early history was not conducive to stability and it is likely that some of books may have been lost. From 1713 to 1815 the library had no permanent home, and moved between the houses of College Presidents and Fellows. In 1815 when Sir Patrick Dun's Hospital was opened Dun's Library moved there, where it would remain until 1864 when it moved to its current home in the College building in Number 6, Kildare Street. The earliest surviving catalogue of Dun's Library dates to 1794, and is a printed catalogue of 1179 volumes. The catalogue is divided into four sections 'Anatomy, Surgery and the Institutes of Medicine', ''Chymistry, Materia Medica, Botany and Natural History', 'History and Practice of Physic' and 'Miscellaneous Publications'. Within each of these sections the books are further divided by size. As well as this early printed catalogue the archive also hold two very beautifully written manuscript catalogues, one by George Todderick from 1816, which seems to have been for his private use, and one by Edward Hill from 1820. Edward Hill was born in 1741 and educated at Trinity College Dublin. An active member of the College he was Censor, Treasurer and President, before being appointed Librarian from 1819-1826. It was during this period that he produced his manuscript catalogue of the Library, listing the books alphabetically by author. Hill was himself a collector of books, and his library of about 1,800 books sold in 1816 contained eighteen incunabula and well as over one hundred sixteenth century texts. The beauty of Hill's penmanship, seen in his catalogue, had been recognised in 1766 when Trinity College employed him to write the Duke of Bedford's testimonial, for which he was paid five guineas. Hill completed he catalogue just before his 80 birthday, he remained as librarian for another six years and would die in 1830 at the age of 89.[1] The Dun's Library Catalogues preserved in the archive provide an insight into the way library catalogues have changed over time. The manuscript catalogues of the early nineteenth century are replaced by indexed ledgers by the late nineteenth century. As books became more common, libraries were taking in more and more volumes each year, and indexed ledgers allowed the catalogues to be added to, without having to re write the whole list. By the twentieth century books had been abandoned as the format for library catalogues to be replaced by index cards, allowing even more flexibility to deal with ever increasing numbers of incoming books. These index cards are now being replaced by the Library's on-line catalogue, which will, when the cataloguing in completed, hold the records of all the Dun's Libraries holdings of about 30,000 volumes. [1] Andrews, Helen, 'Edward Hill, 1741-1830' in the Dictionary of Irish Biography, online edition. Images: * Portrait of Sir Patrick Dun by Sir Geoffrey Kneller, College Portrait Collection * Front page from 1794 printed catalogue of Dun's Library, RCPI Archive * Portrait of Edward Hill, College Portrait Collection * Front page from Edward Hill's Catalogue of Dun's Library, RCPI Archive