"Common European heritage" (16th - 18th cent.). Microfilm catalog

Prints from XVI to XVII century from collections of Wroclaw University Library, National Library in Warsaw, Pomeranian Repository in Szczecin and Gdańsk Library of the Polish Academy of Sciences.

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Database has been merged and unified in Wroclaw University Library

Prints have been cataloged and microfilmed with financial support from Polish-German Cooperation Foundation from funds of Federal Republic of Germany as well as Robert Bosch Foundation in the framework of “Common European heritage” project.

Catalog is result of Common European heritage – protection and increasing accessibility to antiques of writing from Polish-German cultural border in Polish libraries project, that was initiated by Robert Bosch Foundation in 1992 and financially supported mostly from funds of Polish-German Cooperation Foundation.

Aim of that project, was to microfilm and catalog in form of electronic databases prints from 16^th to 18^th century, that were published in Silesia, Pomeranian and East Prussia regions. In limited scale, project included prints published in Poland’s central region: in these cases, decisive indicator was language and thematic content of print. In case of bookbinding blocks, cataloging and microfilming include all co-binded prints, regardless of their place of publication. Catalog includes collections from four libraries: National Library in Warsaw, Wroclaw University Library, Pomeranian Repository in Szczecin and Gdańsk Library of the Polish Academy of Sciences. Merged database contains almost 35 thousand unified microfilms’ descriptions (circa 39 thousand items). Largest representation of prints in database is from Silesian printing offices: only from Wroclaw alone came almost 10 thousand print’s descriptions, from Legnica – 1.5 thousand, over one thousand prints were published in Brzeg, same number in Oleśnica. Rich collection came from Królewiec – 3.5 thousand prints. Pomeranian prints were mostly published in Szczecin (3 thousand) and Gdańsk (2.5 thousand).

Catalog description consists of basic bibliographical information about microfilmed print, such as: author, title, publication address and place of holding of microfilm as well as its physical description (library, type of film, number of rolls and stills). Search in database is based on nine indexes of: persons, corporate, titles, place of publication/print, words in title, chronological, signatures of microfilmed items, number of microfilms and libraries. Personal index includes authors and any person, who participated in creation of book: author, printer, copier, translator etc. Library index allows search by one, specific library and displays microfilms, that are hold within its collections.