An Early Catalogue of Incunabula at the University of Salamanca (1862). With News about Three Missing Copies

Abstract

In 1862, José Bonilla Ruiz, the librarian of the University of Salamanca, developed a catalogue of the incunabula held by the University Library, but that work was never published. Although he had done this work partially on his own initiative, it was linked to other tasks he was carrying out in the Library, like quantifying collections, writing new bibliographic descriptions and working out new indexes. His work reveals an early attempt to describe the incunabula included in a collection, with innovative features, like copy details. On the other hand, this catalogue does not take into account the bibliographical tradition on incunabula which had developed since the Repertorium by Ludwig Hain. Likewise, the study of this catalogue and the comparison with the incunabula currently held by the University show that three of the copies described by Bonilla disappeared on an unknown date.