Add MS 78631

EVELYN PAPERS. Vol. CCCCLXIV. Library catalogue of John Evelyn; [1686] (date in heading of section 2 below). Autograph, with columns and some headings and decoration in red ink. Imperfect, disbound and consisting only of the sections described below. In G. de la Bédoyère, `John Evelyn’s Library Catalogue’, Book Collector, 43 (1994), this catalogue is identified as a partial fair copy of Add. MS 78632 below. There is no other volume now in the archive which can be identified with the `faire Catalogue’ mentioned in Evelyn’s pencilled note on Add. MS 78632, f. 15; however the dates of the two manuscripts and the differences in order and content of the theological works listed in each mean that the identification is not straightforward; see also Theodore Hofmann, et al, `John Evelyn’s Archive at the British Library’, Book Collector, 44 (1995), pp. 170-171. Formerly Evelyn MSS 19, 20 and 259.

ff. 32. 300 x 205mm.

1. f. 1. `Method for a Library according to the Intellectual Powers', a single sheet setting out different methods of classification. Beal EvJ 36. Formerly Evelyn MS 19.

2. ff. 2-13. Catalogue, disbound and incomplete, listing 603 numbered works of `Libri Theologici', dated in the heading 1686. Preceded by an `advertisement' (f. 2v): `This Catalogue digested after the respective Faculties may serve as an Index Materiarum, for which reason the several Title-pages are frequently transcrib'd at large: There being at the End thereof a particular Table of the authors sur-names Alphabetically dispos'd for their easier finding out'; this `table' is evidently now section 3 of the present manuscript. The right-hand margin has been left for press-marks, but very few have been entered. Formerly Evelyn MS 259.

3. ff. 14-32. Index or summary list of books in columns, alphabetically arranged by author’s name and numbered sequentially under each letter. [italics]Imperfect[/italics]; the sequences for A, N and O are missing and three leaves covering D, E and V/W were found with section 2 above. The columns list author, `argumentum’ (i.e. subject category), format, place and date of publication and shelf-mark. Endorsed by Evelyn on the last leaf, `Method of/ My old Catalog at Says-Court’. Formerly Evelyn MS 20.