John Willis Clark

INTRODUCTION. ASSYRIAN RECORD-ROOMS. LIBRARIES IN GREECE, ALEXANDRIA, PERGAMON, ROME. THEIR SIZE, USE, CONTEXTS, AND FITTINGS. ARMARIA OR PRESSES. THE VATICAN LIBRARY OF SIXTUS V. A TYPE OF AN ANCIENT ROMAN LIBRARY.

I propose, in the following Essay, to trace the methods adopted by man in different ages and countries to preserve, to use, and to make accessible to others, those objects, of whatever material, on which he has recorded his thoughts. In this investigation I shall include the position, the size, and the arrangement, of the rooms in which these treasures were deposited, with the progressive development of fittings, catalogues, and other appliances, whether defensive, or to facilitate use. But, though I shall have to trace out these matters in some detail, I shall try to eschew mere antiquarianism, and to impart human interest, so far as possible, to a research which might otherwise exhaust the patience of my readers. Bibliography, it must be understood, will be wholly excluded. From my special point of view books are simply things to be taken care of: even their external features concern me only so far as they modify the methods adopted for arrangement and preservation. I must dismiss the subject-matter of the volumes which filled the libraries of former days with a brevity of which I deeply regret the necessity. I shall point out the pains taken to sort the books under various comprehensive heads; but I shall not enumerate the authors which fall under this or that division.

The earliest repositories of books were connected with temples or palaces, either because priests under all civilisations have been par excellence the learned class, while despots have patronised art and literature; or because such a position was thought to offer greater security.

Fig. 1. Plan of the Record-Rooms in the Palace of Assur-bani-pal, King of Nineveh. Fig. 1. Plan of the Record-Rooms in the Palace of Assur-bani-pal, King of Nineveh.

I will begin with Assyria, where the record-rooms, or we might almost say the library, in the palace of Assur-bani-pal, King of Nineveh, were discovered by Mr Layard in 1850 at Kouyunjik, on the Tigris, opposite Mosul. The plan (fig. 1), taken from Mr Layard's work[1], will shew, better than a long description, the position of these rooms, and their relation to the rest of the building—which is believed to date from about 700 b.c. The long passage (No. xlix) is one of the entrances to the palace. Passing thence along the narrower passage (No. xlii) the explorers soon reached a doorway (E), which led them into a large hall (No. xxix), whence a second doorway (F) brought them into a chamber (No. xxxviii). On the north side of this room were two doorways (G. G), each "formed by two colossal bas-reliefs of Dagon, the fish-god." "The first doorway," says Mr Layard, "guarded by the fish-gods, led into two small chambers opening into each other, and once panelled with bas-reliefs, the greater part of which had been destroyed. I shall call these chambers 'the chambers of records,' for, like 'the house of the rolls' or records, which Darius ordered to be searched for the decree of Cyrus concerning the building of the Temple of Jerusalem[2], they appear to have contained the decrees of the Assyrian kings, as well as the archives of the empire."

Mr Layard was led to this conclusion by finding, in these rooms, enormous quantities of inscribed tablets and cylinders of baked clay. "To a height of a foot or more from the floor they were entirely filled with them; some entire, but the greater part broken into many fragments, probably by the falling in of the upper part of the building.... These documents appear to be of various kinds. Many are historical records of wars, and distant expeditions undertaken by the Assyrians; some seem to be royal decrees, and are stamped with the name of a king, the son of Esarhaddon; others again ... contain lists of the gods, and probably a register of offerings made in their temples[3]."

So far Mr Layard. Subsequent researches have shewn that these two small rooms—they were 27 feet and 23 feet long respectively, with a uniform breadth of 20 feet—contained the literature as well as the official documents of Assyria. The tablets have been sorted under the following heads: History; Law; Science; Magic; Dogma; Legends: and it has been shewn (1) that there was a special functionary to take charge of them; (2) that they were arranged in series, with special precautions for keeping the tablets forming a particular series in their proper sequence; (3) that there was a general catalogue, and probably a class-catalogue as well[4].

Excavations in other parts of Assyria have added valuable information to Layard's first discovery. Dr Wallis Budge, of the British Museum, whom I have to thank for much kind assistance, tells me that "Kouyunjik is hardly a good example of a Mesopotamian library, for it is certain that the tablets were thrown about out of their proper places when the city was captured by the Medes about b.c. 609. The tablets were kept on shelves.... When I was digging at Derr some years ago we found the what I call 'Record Chamber,' and we saw the tablets lying in situ on slate shelves. There were, however, not many literary tablets there, for the chamber was meant to hold the commercial documents relating to the local temple...." Dr Budge concludes his letter with this very important sentence: "We have no definite proof of what I am going to say now, but I believe that the bilingual[5] lists, which Assur-bani-pal had drawn up for his library at Nineveh, were intended 'for the use of students.'"

To this suggestion I would add the following. Does not the position of these two rooms, easily accessible from the entrance to the palace, shew that their contents might be consulted by persons who were denied admission to the more private apartments? And further, does not the presence of the god Dagon at the entrance indicate that the library was under the protection of the deity as well as of the sovereign?

As a pendant to these Assyrian discoveries I may mention the vague rumour echoed by AthenÆus of extensive libraries collected in the sixth century before our era by Polycrates[6], tyrant of Samos, and Peisistratus, tyrant of Athens, the latter collection, according to Aulus Gellius[7], having been accessible to all who cared to use it. It must be admitted that these stories are of doubtful authenticity; and further, that we have no details of the way in which books were cared for in Greece during the golden age of her literature. This dearth of information is the more tantalizing as it is obvious that private libraries must have existed in a city so cultivated as Athens; and we do, in fact, find a few notices which tell us that such was the case. Xenophon[8], for instance, speaks of the number of volumes in the possession of Euthydemus, a follower of Socrates; and AthenÆus records, in the passage to which I have already alluded, the names of several book-collectors, among whom are Euripides and Aristotle.

An allusion to the poet's bibliographical tastes has been detected in the scene of The Frogs of Aristophanes, where Æschylus and Euripides are weighing verses against each other in the presence of Dionysus. Æschylus exclaims:

?a? ??et' e???e ?at' ep??, a??' e? t?? sta???
a?t?? ta pa?d?', ? ????, ??f?s?f??,
ea? ?a??s?? s???a?? ta ???a,
e?? de d?' ep? t?? e?? e?? ????.

Come, no more single lines—let him bring all,
His wife, his children, his Cephisophon,
His books and everything, himself to boot—
I'll counterpoise them with a couple of lines[9].

With regard to Aristotle Strabo has preserved a tradition that he "was the first who made a collection of books, and taught the kings of Egypt how to arrange a library[10]"—words which may be taken to mean that Aristotle was the first to work out the arrangement of books on a definite system which was afterwards adopted by the Ptolemies at Alexandria.

These notices are extremely disappointing. They merely serve to shew that collections of books did exist in Greece; but they give us no indication of either their extent or their arrangement. It was left to the Emperor Hadrian to build the first public library at Athens, to which, as it was naturally constructed on a Roman design, I shall return after I have described those from which it was in all probability imitated.

But, if what may be termed Greece in Europe declines to give us information, that other Greece which extended itself to Asia Minor and to Egypt—Greater Greece it would be called in modern times—supplies us with a type of library-organisation which has been of far-reaching influence.

After the death of Alexander the Great (b.c. 323) a Greek dynasty, that of the Ptolemies, established itself at Alexandria, and another Greek dynasty at Pergamon. Both were distinguished—like Italian despots of the Renaissance—for the splendour and the culture of their courts, and they rivalled one another in the extent and richness of their libraries; but, if we are to believe Strabo, the library at Pergamon was not begun until the reign of Eumenes II. (b.c. 197-159), or 126 years after that at Alexandria[11].

The libraries at Alexandria (for there were two)—though far more celebrated and more extensive than the library at Pergamon—need not, from my point of view, detain us for more than a moment, for we are told very little about their position, and nothing about their arrangement. The site of the earliest, the foundation of which is ascribed to Ptolemy the Second (b.c. 285-247), must undoubtedly be sought for within the circuit of the royal palace, which was in the fashionable quarter of the city called Brucheion. This palace was a vast enceinte, not a separate building, and, as Strabo, who visited Alexandria 24 b.c., says,

Within the precincts of the palace is the Museum. It has a colonnade, a lecture-room, and a vast establishment where the men of letters who share the use of the Museum take their meals together. This College has a common revenue; and is managed by a priest who is over the Museum, an officer formerly appointed by the kings of Egypt, but, at the present time, by the Emperor[12].

That the older of the two libraries must have been in some way connected with these buildings seems to me certain from two considerations. First, a ruler who took so keen an interest in books as Ptolemy, would assuredly have kept his treasures under his own eye; and, secondly, he would hardly have placed them at a distance from the spot where the learned men of Alexandria held their meetings[13].

At some period subsequent to the foundation of Ptolemy's first library, a second, called the daughter of the first[14], was established in connexion with the Temple of Serapis, a magnificent structure in the quarter RhacÔtis, adorned so lavishly with colonnades, statuary, and other architectural enrichments, that the historian Ammianus Marcellinus declares that nothing in the world could equal it, except the Roman Capitol[15].

This brief notice of the libraries of Alexandria shews that the earlier of the two, besides being in a building dedicated to the Muses, was also connected in all probability with a palace, and the second with a temple. If we now turn to Pergamon, we shall find the library associated with the temple and tee??? of Athena.

The founder selected for the site of his city a lofty and precipitous hill, about a thousand feet above the sea-level. The rocky plateau which forms the summit is divided into three gigantic steps or terraces. On the highest, which occupies the northern end of the hill, the royal palace is believed to have been built. On the next terrace, to the south, was the temple of Athena; and on the third, the altar of Zeus. External to those three groups of buildings, partly on the edge of the hill, partly on its sides, were the rest of the public buildings. The lower slopes were probably occupied in ancient times, as at present, by the houses of the citizens.

These magnificent structures, which won for Pergamon the distinction of being "by far the noblest city in Asia minor[16]," were in the main due to Eumenes the Second, who, during his reign of nearly forty years (b.c. 197-159), was enabled, by the wise policy of supporting the Romans, to transform his petty state into a powerful monarchy. The construction of a library is especially referred to him by Strabo[17], and from the statement of Vitruvius that it was built for the delight of the world at large (in communem delectationem), we may infer that it was intended to be public[18]. That he was an energetic book-collector, under whose direction a large staff of scribes was perpetually at work, may be gathered from the well-known story that his bibliographical rival at Alexandria, exasperated by his activity and success, conceived the ingenious device of crippling his endeavours by forbidding the exportation of papyrus. Eumenes, however, says the chronicler, was equal to the occasion, and defeated the scheme by inventing parchment[19]. It is probable that Eumenes not only began but completed the library, for in less than a quarter of a century after his death (b.c. 133) the last of his descendants bequeathed the city and state of Pergamon to the Romans. It is improbable that they would do much to increase the library, though they evidently took care of it, for ninety years later, when Mark Antony is said to have given it to Cleopatra, the number of works in it amounted to two hundred thousand[20].

Fig. 2. Plan of the temple and precinct of Athena, Pergamon; with that of the Library and adjacent buildings. Fig. 2. Plan of the temple and precinct of Athena, Pergamon; with that of the Library and adjacent buildings.

The site of the acropolis of Pergamon was thoroughly explored between 1878 and 1886 at the expense of the German Government; and in the course of their researches the archeologists employed discovered certain rooms which they believe to have been originally appropriated to the library. I have had the accompanying ground-plan (fig. 2) reduced from one of their plates, and have condensed my description of the locality from that given in their work[21]. I have also derived much valuable information from a paper published by Alexander Conze in 1884[22].

Of the temple of Athena only the foundations remain, but its extent and position can be readily ascertained. The enclosure, paved with slabs of marble, was entered at the south-east corner. It was open to the west and to the south, where the ground falls away precipitously, but on the east and north it was bounded by a cloister in two floors. The pillars of this cloister were Doric on the ground-floor, Ionic above. The height of those in the lower range, measured from base to top of capital, was about 16 feet, of those in the upper range about 9 feet.

This enclosure had a mean length of about 240 feet, with a mean breadth of 162 feet[23]. The north cloister was 37 feet broad, and was divided down the centre by a row of columns. The east cloister was of about half this width, and was undivided.

On the north side of the north cloister, the German explorers found four rooms, which they believe to have been assigned to library purposes. The platform of rock on which these chambers stood was nearly 20 feet above the level of the floor of the enclosure, and they could only be entered from the upper cloister. Of these rooms the easternmost is the largest, being 42 feet long, by 49 feet broad. Westward of it are three others, somewhat narrower, having a uniform width of 39 feet. The easternmost of these three rooms is also the smallest, being only 23 feet long; while the two next have a uniform length of about 33 feet.

At the south-west corner of this building, but on a lower level, and not accessible from it, other rooms were found, the use of which is uncertain.

We will now return to the eastern room. The foundations of a narrow platform or bench extended along the eastern, northern, and western sides, and in the centre of the northern side there was a mass of stone-work which had evidently formed the base for a statue (fig. 2, A). The discovery of a torso of a statue of Athena[24] in this very room indicated what statue had occupied this commanding position, and also what had probably been the use of the room.

This theory was confirmed by the discovery in the north wall of two rows of holes in the stone-work, one above the other, which had evidently been made for the reception of brackets, or battens, or other supports for shelves[25], or some piece of furniture. The lower of these two rows was carried along the east wall as well as along the north wall. Further, stones were found bearing the names of Herodotus, AlcÆus, Timotheus of Miletus, and Homer, evidently the designations of portrait-busts or portrait-medallions; and also, two titles of comedies.

Lastly, the very position of these rooms in connexion with the colonnade indicates their use. It will be observed that the colonnade on the north side of the area is twice as wide as that on the east side—a peculiarity which is sufficient of itself to prove that it must have been intended for some other purpose than as a mere covered way. But, if it be remembered that libraries in the ancient world were usually connected with colonnades (as was probably the case at the Serapeum at Alexandria, and was certainly the case at Rome, as I shall proceed to shew) a reason is found for this dignified construction, and a strong confirmation is afforded for the theory that the rooms beyond it once contained the famous library.

When the Romans had taken possession of Pergamon, those who had charge of the city would become familiar with the library; and it seems to me almost certain that, when the necessity for establishing a public library at Rome had been recognised, the splendid structure at Pergamon would be turned to as a model. But, if I mistake not, Roman architecture had received an influence from Pergamon long before this event occurred. What this was I will mention presently.

No public library was established in Rome until the reign of Augustus. Julius CÆsar had intended to build one on the largest possible scale, and had gone so far as to commission Varro to collect books for it[26]; but it was reserved for C. Asinius Pollio, general, lawyer, orator, poet, the friend of Virgil and Horace, to devote to this purpose the spoils he had obtained in his Illyrian campaign, b.c. 39. In the striking words of Pliny "he was the first to make men's talents public property (ingenia hominum rem publicam fecit)" The same writer tells us that he also introduced the fashion of decorating libraries with busts of departed authors, and that Varro was the only living writer whose portrait was admitted[27]. Pollio is further credited, by Suetonius, with having built an atrium libertatis[28], in which Isidore, a writer of the seventh century, probably quoting a lost work of Suetonius, places the library, with the additional information, that the collection contained Greek as well as Latin books[29].

The work of Pollio is recorded among the acts of generosity which Augustus suggested to others. But before long the emperor turned his own attention to libraries, and enriched his capital with two splendid structures which may be taken as types of Roman libraries,—the library of Apollo on the Palatine Hill, and that in the Campus Martius called after Octavia, sister to the emperor. I will take the latter first.

The Porticus OctaviÆ, or, as it was sometimes called, the Opera OctaviÆ, must have been one of the most magnificent structures in Rome (fig. 3). It stood in the Campus Martius, near the Theatre of Marcellus, between the Capitoline Hill and the Tiber. A double colonnade surrounded an area which measured 443 feet by 377 feet, with Jani, or four-faced archways, at the four corners, and on the side next the Tiber a double hexastyle porch, which, with a few fragments of the colonnade, still exists in a fairly good state of preservation[30]. Within this space were two temples, one of Jupiter, the other of Juno, a curia or hall, in which the Senate frequently met, a schola or "Conversation Hall[31]," and two libraries, the one of Greek, the other of Latin books. The area and buildings were crowded with masterpieces in bronze and marble.

Fig. 3. Plan of the Porticus OctaviÆ, Rome. From FormÆ Urbis RomÆ Antiqua, Berlin, 1896. Fig. 3. Plan of the Porticus OctaviÆ, Rome. From FormÆ Urbis RomÆ Antiqua, Berlin, 1896.

This structure was originally built by Quintus Metellus, about 146 b.c.[32]. One of the temples was due to his own liberality, the other had been erected by Domitius Lepidus, b.c. 179. Now twenty years before, Metellus had fought in a successful campaign against Perseus king of Macedonia, in which the Romans had been assisted by Eumenes II.: and in b.c. 148, as PrÆtor, he received Macedonia as his province. Is it not possible that on one or other of these occasions he may have visited Pergamon, and, when designing his buildings in Rome, have copied what he had seen there? Again, in b.c. 157, Crates of Mallus, a distinguished grammarian, was sent from Pergamon as ambassador to Rome, and, being laid up there by an accident, gave lectures on grammar, in the course of which he could hardly have failed to mention the new library[33].

The buildings of Metellus were altered, if not entirely rebuilt, by Augustus, b.c. 33, out of the proceeds of his victorious campaign against the Dalmatians; with the additional structures above enumerated. The schola is believed to have stood behind the temples, and the libraries behind the schola, with the curia between them[34]. Thus the colonnades, which Metellus had restricted to the two temples, came at last to serve the double purpose for which they were originally intended in connexion with a library as well as with a temple.

The temple and area of Apollo on the Palatine Hill, which Augustus began b.c. 36 and dedicated b.c. 28, exhibit an arrangement precisely similar to that of the Porticus OctaviÆ. The size was nearly the same[35], and the structures included in the area were intended to serve the same purposes. The temple stood in the middle of a large open peristyle, connected with which were two libraries, one for Greek, the other for Latin books; and between them, used perhaps as a reading-room or vestibule, was a hall in which Augustus occasionally convened the Senate. It contained a colossal statue of Apollo, made of gilt bronze; and on its walls were portrait-reliefs of celebrated writers, in the form of medallions, in the same material[36].

Of the other public libraries of Rome—of which there are said to have been in all twenty-six—I need mention only three as possessing some peculiarity to which I shall have to draw attention. Of these the first was established by Tiberius in his palace, at no great distance from the library of Apollo; the second and third by Vespasian and Trajan in their Fora, connected in the one with the temple of Peace, and in the other with the temple dedicated in honour of Trajan himself.

Fig. 4. Plan of the Forum of Trajan; after Nibby. Fig. 4. Plan of the Forum of Trajan; after Nibby.

Of the first two of these libraries we have no information; but in the case of the third we are more fortunate. The Forum of Trajan (fig. 4) was excavated by order of Napoleon I., and the extent of its buildings, with their relation to one another, is therefore known with approximate accuracy. The Greek and Latin libraries stood to the right and left of the small court between the Basilica Ulpia and the Templum Divi Trajani, the centre of which was marked by the existing Column. They were entered from this court, each through a portico of five inter-columniations. The rooms, measured internally, were about 60 feet long, by 45 feet broad.

At this point I must mention, parenthetically, the library built by Hadrian at Athens. Pausanias records it in the following passage:

Hadrian also built for the Athenians a temple of Hera and Panhellenian Zeus, and a sanctuary common to all the gods. But most splendid of all are one hundred columns; walls and colonnades alike are made of Phrygian marble. Here, too, is a building adorned with a gilded roof and alabaster and also with statues and paintings: books are stored in it. There is also a gymnasium named after Hadrian; it too has one hundred columns from the quarries of Libya[37].

A building called the Stoa of Hadrian, a ground-plan of which (fig. 5) I borrow from Miss Harrison's Mythology and Monuments of Ancient Athens, has been identified with part at least of that which Pausanias describes in the above passage. A lofty wall, built of large square blocks of Pentelic marble, faced on the west side by a row of Corinthian columns, enclosed a quadrangular court, measuring 328 feet from east to west, by 250 feet from north to south. This court, entered through a sort of propylÆa on the west side (N), was surrounded by a cloister or colonnade 27 feet wide, and containing 100 columns. None of those columns are standing, but their number can be accurately calculated from the marks of the bases still to be seen on the eastern side of the quadrangle.

Within this area are the remains of a building of uncertain use, and at present only partially excavated.

On the east side a row of five chambers, of which that in the centre was the largest, opened off from the colonnade[38].

Fig. 5. Plan of the Stoa of Hadrian, at Athens. Fig. 5. Plan of the Stoa of Hadrian, at Athens.

AE, KI. Pier-arcade of the medieval church of the Panagia.
B. North-east angle of this church, of Roman work.
B, C, D, F. Portions of the Roman building which preceded the church.
L, M. Reservoirs.
N. PropylÆa through which the court was entered.

If the ground plan of this structure (fig. 5) be compared with that of the precinct of Athena and library at Pergamon (fig. 2), a striking similarity between them will at once be recognised; and, whatever may have been the destination of the building within the cloistered area, there can, I think, be little doubt that the library was contained in the five rooms beyond its limits to the east. They must have been entered from the cloister, much as those at Pergamon were. It is possible that Hadrian may himself have visited Pergamon, for Trajan had built an imperial residence there; but, even if he did not do this, he would accept the type from the great libraries built at Rome by Augustus. It should be mentioned that S. Jerome specially commemorates this library among Hadrian's works at Athens, and says that it was of remarkable construction (miri operis)[39].

From this brief digression I return to the public libraries of Rome. In the first place those built by Augustus had a regular organisation. There appears to have been a general director called Procurator Bibliothecarum Augusti[40]; and subordinate officers for each division: that is to say, one for the Greek books, one for the Latin books. These facts are derived from inscriptions found in Columbaria. Secondly, it may be concluded that they were used not merely for reading and reference, but as meeting-places for literary men.

The Palatine libraries evidently contained a large collection of old and new books; and I think it is quite certain that new books, as soon as published, were placed there, unless there was some special reason to the contrary. Otherwise there would be no point in the lines in which Ovid makes his book—sent from Pontus after his banishment—deplore its exclusion. The book is supposed to climb from the Forum to the temple of Apollo:

Signa peregrinis ubi sunt alterna columnis
Belides et stricto barbarus ense pater
QuÆque viri docto veteres coepere novique
Pectore lecturis inspicienda patent.
QuÆrebam fratres exceptis scilicet illis
Quos suus optaret non genuisse parens;
QuÆrentem frustra custos e sedibus illis
PrÆpositus sancto iussit abire loco[41].

Where, set between each pair of columns from some foreign quarry, are statues of the Danaids, and their barbarous father with drawn sword; and where whatever the minds of men of old or men of to-day have imagined, is laid open for a reader's use. I sought my brethren, save those of course whom their father would fain have never begotten; and, while I was seeking for them in vain, he who was set over the room bade me leave that holy ground.

The second couplet can only mean that old books and new books were alike to be found there. The general nature of the collection, and its extent, may be further gathered from the advice which Horace gives to his friend Celsus:

Quid mihi Celsus agit? monitus multumque monendus
Privatas ut quÆrat opes, et tangere vitet
Scripta Palatinus quÆcunque recepit Apollo[42].

What is my friend Celsus about? he who has been reminded, and must still be reminded again and again, that he should draw upon his own resources, and be careful to avoid the multifarious writings which Palatine Apollo has taken under his charge.

A man might say now-a-days, "Trust to your own wits, and don't go so often to the library of the British Museum."

Aulus Gellius, who lived a.d. 117-180, speaks of "sitting with a party of friends in the library of the palace of Tiberius, when a book happened to be taken down with the title M. Catonis Nepotis," and they began asking one another who this M. Cato Nepos might be[43]. This library contained also public records[44].

The same writer tells a story of a grammatical difficulty which was to be settled by reference to a book in templo Pacis, in the forum of Vespasian; and again, when a particular book was wanted, "we hunted for it diligently," he says, "and, when we had found it in the temple of Peace, we read it[45]."

The library in the forum of Trajan, often called Bibliotheca Ulpia, was apparently the Public Record Office of Rome. Aulus Gellius mentions that some decrees of former prÆtors had fallen in his way there when he was looking for something else, and that he had been allowed to read them[46]; and a statement of Vopiscus is still more conclusive as to the nature of its contents. It tells us, moreover, something about the arrangement. In his life of the Emperor Tacitus (Sept. a.d. 275—Apr. 276) Vopiscus says:

And lest anybody should think that I have given too hasty a credence to a Greek or Latin author, the Ulpian Library has in its sixth press (armarium) an ivory volume (librum elephantinum) in which the following decree of the Senate, signed by Tacitus with his own hand, is recorded, etc.[47]

Again, in his life of the Emperor Aurelian, the same writer records how his friend Junius Tiberianus, prefect of the city, had urged him to undertake the task, and had assured him that: "even the linen-books (libri lintei) shall be brought out of the Ulpian library for your use[48]."

Books could occasionally be borrowed from a public library, but whether from one of those in the city of Rome, I cannot say. The scene of the story which proves this is laid by Aulus Gellius at Tibur (Tivoli), where the library was in the temple of Hercules—another instance of the care of a library being entrusted to a temple. Aulus Gellius and some friends of his were assembled in a rich man's villa there at the hottest season of the year. They were drinking melted snow, a proceeding against which one of the party, a peripatetic philosopher, vehemently protested, urging against the practice the authority of numerous physicians and of Aristotle himself. But none the less the party went on drinking snow-water. Whereupon "he fetched a treatise by Aristotle out of the library of Tibur, which was then very conveniently accommodated in the temple of Hercules, and brought it to us, saying——[49]." But I need not finish the quotation, as it has no bearing on my special subject.

It is probable that numerous collections of books had been got together by individuals in Rome, before it occurred to Augustus and his friends to erect public libraries. One such library, that belonging to the rich and luxurious Lucullus, has been noticed as follows by Plutarch[50]:

His procedure in regard to books was interesting and remarkable. He collected fine copies in large numbers; and if he was splendid in their acquisition, he was more so in their use. His libraries were accessible to all, and the adjoining colonnades and reading-rooms were freely open to Greeks, who, gladly escaping from the routine of business, resorted thither for familiar converse, as to a shelter presided over by the Muses.

The Romans were not slow in following the example set by Lucullus; and a library presently became indispensable in every house, whether the owner cared for reading or not. This fashionable craze is denounced by Seneca (writing about a.d. 49) in a vehement outburst of indignation, which contains so many valuable facts about library arrangement, that I will give a free translation of it.

Outlay upon studies, best of all outlays, is reasonable so long only as it is kept within certain limits. What is the use of books and libraries innumerable, if scarce in a lifetime the master reads the titles? A student is burdened by a crowd of authors, not instructed; and it is far better to devote yourself to a few, than to lose your way among a multitude.

Forty thousand books were burnt at Alexandria. I leave others to praise this splendid monument of royal opulence, as for example Livy, who regards it as "a noble work of royal taste and royal thoughtfulness." It was not taste, it was not thoughtfulness, it was learned extravagance—nay not even learned, for they had bought their books for the sake of show, not for the sake of learning—just as with many who are ignorant even of the lowest branches of learning books are not instruments of study, but ornaments of dining-rooms. Procure then as many books as will suffice for use; but not a single one for show. You will reply: "Outlay on such objects is preferable to extravagance on plate or paintings." Excess in all directions is bad. Why should you excuse a man who wishes to possess book-presses inlaid with arbor-vitÆ wood or ivory: who gathers together masses of authors either unknown or discredited; who yawns among his thousands of books; and who derives his chief delight from their edges and their tickets?

You will find then in the libraries of the most arrant idlers all that orators or historians have written—book-cases built up as high as the ceiling. Nowadays a library takes rank with a bathroom as a necessary ornament of a house. I could forgive such ideas, if they were due to extravagant desire for learning. As it is, these productions of men whose genius we revere, paid for at a high price, with their portraits ranged in line above them, are got together to adorn and beautify a wall[51].

A library was discovered in Rome by Signor Lanciani in 1883 while excavating a house of the 4th century on the Esquiline in the modern Via dello Statuto. I will narrate the discovery in his own words.

I was struck, one afternoon, with the appearance of a rather spacious hall [it was about 23 feet long by 15 feet broad], the walls of which were plain and unornamented up to a certain height, but beautifully decorated above in stucco-work. The decoration consisted of fluted pilasters, five feet apart from centre to centre, enclosing a plain square surface, in the middle of which there were medallions, also in stucco-work, two feet in diameter. As always happens in these cases, the frame was the only well-preserved portion of the medallions. Of the images surrounded by the frames, of the medallions themselves, absolutely nothing was left in situ, except a few fragments piled up at the foot of the wall, which, however, could be identified as having been representations of human faces. My hope that, at last, after fifteen years of excavations, I had succeeded in discovering a library, was confirmed beyond any doubt by a legend, written, or rather painted, in bright red colour on one of the frames. There was but one name polonivs thyan ..., but this name told more plainly the purpose of the apartment than if I had discovered there the actual bookshelves and their contents[52].

When I had the pleasure of meeting Signor Lanciani in Rome in April, 1898, he most kindly gave me his own sketch of the pilasters and medallion, taken at the moment of discovery. I am therefore able to reproduce exactly (fig. 6) one compartment of the wall of the library above described. The height of the blank wall below the stucco-work, against which the furniture containing the books stood, has been laid down as about 3 feet 6 inches, on the authority of Professor Middleton[53]. The remains of the medallion are still to be seen in the Museo del Orto Botanico, Rome. The person commemorated is obviously Apollonius Tyaneus, a Pythagorean philosopher and wonderworker, said to have been born about four years before the Christian era.

A similar room was discovered at Herculaneum in 1754. A full account of the discovery was drawn up at once by Signor Paderni, keeper of the Herculaneum Museum, and addressed to Thomas Hollis, Esq., by whom it was submitted to the Royal Society. I will extract, from this and subsequent letters, the passages that bear upon my subject.

Between 1758 and 1763, the place was visited by Winckelmann, who wrote long letters in Italian, describing what he saw, to Consigliere Bianconi, Physician to the King of Saxony. One of these, dated 1762, gives the following account of the library:

The information which these observers have given us amounts to this: the room was about 12 feet long, with a floor of mosaic. Against the walls stood presses, of a man's height, inlaid with different sorts of wood, disposed in rows, with cornices at the top; and there was also a table, or press, in the centre of the room. Most of the rolls were separate, but a bundle of eighteen was found "wrapped about with the bark of a tree, and covered at each end with a piece of wood." A room so small as this could hardly have been intended for study. It must rather have been the place where the books were put away after they had been read elsewhere.

Before I quit this part of my subject, I should like to mention one other building, as its arrangements throw light on the question of fitting up libraries and record-offices. I allude to the structure built by Vespasian, a.d. 78, to contain the documents relating to his restoration of the city of Rome. It stood at the south-west corner of the Forum of Peace, and what now exists of it is known as the Church of SS. Cosma e Damiano.

The general arrangement and relation to adjoining structures will be understood from the plan (fig. 7). The room was about 125 feet long by 65 feet broad, with two entrances, one on the north-west, from the Forum Pacis, through a hexastyle portico (fig. 7. 2), the other on the north-east, through a square-headed doorway of travertine which still exists (ibid. 1) together with a considerable portion of a massive wall of Vespasian's time. After a restoration by Caracalla the building came to be called Templum SacrÆ Urbis. It was first consecrated as a church by pope Felix IV. (526-530), but he did little more than connect it with the Heroon Romuli (ibid. 5), and build the apse (ibid. 4).

The whole building was mercilessly mutilated by pope Urban VIII. in 1632; but fortunately a drawing of the interior had been made by Pirro Ligorio in the second half of the sixteenth century, when the original treatment of the walls was practically intact. I give a reduced copy of a small portion of this drawing (fig. 8). As Lanciani says:

I explained at the beginning of this chapter that my subject is the care of books, not books themselves; but, at the point which we have now reached in regard to Roman libraries, it is necessary to make a few remarks about their contents. It must be remembered, in the first place, that those who fitted them up had to deal with rolls (volumina), probably of papyrus, but possibly of parchment; and that a book, as we understand the word, the Latin equivalent for which was codex, did not come into general use until long after the Christian era. Some points about these rolls require notice.

The length and the width of the roll depended on the taste or convenience of the writer[59]. The contents were written in columns, the lines of which ran parallel to the long dimension[60], and the reader, holding the roll in both hands, rolled up the part he had finished with his left hand, and unrolled the unread portion with his right. This way of dealing with the roll is well shewn in the accompanying illustration (fig. 9) reduced from a fresco at Pompeii[61]. In most examples the two halves of the roll are turned inwards, as for instance in the well-known statue of Demosthenes in the Vatican[62]. The end of the roll was fastened to a stick (usually referred to as umbilicus or umbilici). It is obvious that this word ought properly to denote the ends of the stick only, but it was constantly applied to the whole stick, and not to a part of it, as for instance in the following lines:

These sticks were sometimes painted or gilt, and furnished with projecting knobs (cornua) similarly decorated, intended to serve both as an ornament, and as a contrivance to keep the ends of the roll even, while it was being rolled up. The sides of the long dimension of the roll (frontes) were carefully cut, so as to be perfectly symmetrical, and afterwards smoothed with pumice-stone and coloured. A ticket (index or titulus, in Greek s?????? or s?tt???), made of a piece of papyrus or parchment, was fastened to the edge of the roll in such a way that it hung out over one or other of the ends. As Ovid says:

The roll was kept closed by strings or straps (lora), usually of some bright colour[65]; and if it was specially precious, an envelope which the Greeks called a jacket (d?f?e?a[66]), made of parchment or some other substance, was provided. Says Martial:

Martial has combined in a single epigram most of the ornaments with which rolls could be decorated. This I will quote next, premising that the oil of cedar, or arbor-vitÆ, mentioned in the second line not only imparted an agreeable yellow colour, but was held to be an antiseptic[68].

His book had selected the bibliomaniac Faustinus as a patron. Now, says the poet, you shall be anointed with oil of cedar; you shall revel in the decoration of both your sets of edges; your sticks shall be painted; your covering shall be purple, and your ticket scarlet.

When a number of rolls had to be carried from one place to another, they were put into a box (scrinium or capsa). This receptacle was cylindrical in shape, not unlike a modern hat-box[70]. It was carried by a flexible handle, attached to a ring on each side; and the lid was held down by what looks very like a modern lock. The eighteen rolls, found in a bundle at Herculaneum, had doubtless been kept in a similar receptacle.

My illustration (fig. 10) is from a fresco at Herculaneum. It will be noticed that each roll is furnished with a ticket (titulus). At the feet of the statue of Demosthenes already referred to, and of that of Sophocles, are capsÆ, both of which show the flexible handles.

I will next collect the information available respecting the fittings used in Roman libraries. I admit that it is scattered and imperfect; but legitimate deductions may, I think, be arrived at from it, which will give us tolerably certain ideas of the appearance of one of those collections.

The words used to designate such fittings are: nidus; forulus, or more usually foruli; loculamenta; pluteus; pegmata.

Nidus needs no explanation. It can only mean a pigeon-hole. Martial uses it of a bookseller, at whose shop his own poems may be bought.

In a subsequent epigram the word occurs with reference to a private library, to which the poet is sending a copy of his works.

Forulus or foruli occurs in the following passages. Suetonius, after describing the building of the temple of the Palatine Apollo by Augustus, adds, "he placed the Sibylline books in two gilt receptacles (forulis) under the base of the statue of Palatine Apollo"[73]; and Juvenal, enumerating the gifts that a rich man is sure to receive if burnt out of house and home, says,

The word is of uncertain derivation, but forus, of which it is clearly the diminutive, is used by Virgil for the cells of bees:

The above-quoted passage of Juvenal may therefore be rendered: "Another will give books, and cells to put them in, and a statue of Minerva for the middle of the room."

The word loculamentum is explained in a passage of Columella, in which he gives directions for the making of dovecotes:

In a second passage he uses the same word for a beehive[77]; Vegetius, a writer on veterinary surgery, uses it for the socket of a horse's tooth[78]; and Vitruvius, in a more general way, for a case to contain a small piece of machinery[79]. Generally, the word may be taken to signify a long narrow box, open at one end, and, like nidus and forulus, may be translated "pigeon-hole." Seneca, again, applies the word to books in the passage I have already translated, and in a singularly instructive manner. "You will find," he says, "in the libraries of the most arrant idlers all that orators or historians have written—bookcases (loculamenta) built up as high as the ceiling[80]."

Pegmata, for the word generally occurs in the plural, are, as the name implies, things fixed together, usually planks of wood framed into a platform, and used in theatres to carry pieces of scenery or performers up and down. As applied to books "shelves" are probably meant: an interpretation borne out by the Digest, in which it is stated that "window-frames and pegmata are included in the purchase of a house[81]." They were therefore what we should call "fixtures."

A pluteus was a machine used by infantry for protection in the field: and hence the word is applied to any fence, or boarding to form the limit or edge of anything, as a table or a bed. Plutei were not attached so closely to the walls as pegmata, for in the Digest they are classed with nets to keep out birds, mats, awnings, and the like, and are not to be regarded as part and parcel of a house[82]. Juvenal uses the word for a shelf in his second Satire, where he is denouncing pretenders to knowledge:

This investigation has shewn that three of the words applied to the preservation of books, namely, nidus, forulus, and loculamentum, may be rendered by the English "pigeon-hole"; and that pegma and pluteus mean contrivances of wood which may be rendered by the English "shelving." It is quite clear that pegmata could be run up with great rapidity, from a very graphic account in Cicero's letters of the rearrangement of his library. He begins by writing to his friend Atticus as follows:

In the next letter he says:

When all is completed he writes:

No other words than those I have been discussing are, so far as I know, applied by the best writers to the storage of books; and, after a careful study of the passages in which they occur, I conclude that, so long as rolls only had to be accommodated, private libraries in Rome were fitted with rows of shelves standing against the walls (plutei), or fixed to them (pegmata). The space between these horizontal shelves was subdivided by vertical divisions into pigeon-holes (nidi, foruli, loculamenta), and it may be conjectured that the width of these pigeon-holes would vary in accordance with the number of rolls included in a single work. That such receptacles were the common furniture of a library is proved, I think, by such evidence as the epigram of Martial quoted above, in which he tells his friend that if he will accept his poems, he may "put them even in the lowest pigeon-hole (nido vel imo)," as we should say, "on the bottom shelf"; and by the language of Seneca when he sneers at the "pigeon-holes (loculamenta) carried up to the ceiling."

The height of the woodwork varied, of course, with individual taste. In the library on the Esquiline the height was only three feet six inches; at Herculaneum about six feet.

I can find no hint of any doors, or curtains, in front of the pigeon-holes. That the ends of the rolls (frontes) were visible, is, I think, quite clear from what Cicero says of his own library after the construction of his shelves (pegmata); and the various devices for making rolls attractive seem to me to prove that they were intended to be seen.

A representation of rolls arranged on the system which I have attempted to describe, occurs on a piece of sculpture (fig. 11) found at Neumagen near TrÈves in the seventeenth century, among the ruins of a fortified camp attributed to Constantine the Great[87]. Two divisions, full of rolls, are shewn, from which a man, presumably the librarian, is selecting one. The ends of the rolls are furnished with tickets.

The system of pigeon-holes terminated, in all probability, in a cornice. The explorers of Herculaneum depose to the discovery of such an ornament there.

The wall-space above the book-cases was decorated with the likenesses of celebrated authors—either philosophers, if the owner of the library wished to bring into prominence his adhesion to one of the fashionable systems—or authors, dead and living, or personal friends. This obvious form of decoration was, in all probability, used at Pergamon[88]; Pollio, as we have seen, introduced it into Rome: and Pliny, who calls it a novelty (novitium inventum), deposes to its general adoption[89]. We are not told how these portraits were commonly treated—whether they were busts standing clear of the wall on the book-cases; or bracketed against the wall; or forming part of its decoration, in plaster-work or distemper. A suitable inscription accompanied them. Martial has preserved for us a charming specimen of one of these complimentary stanzas—for such they undoubtedly would be in the case of a contemporary—to be placed beneath his own portrait in a friend's library:

The beautiful alto-relievo in the Lateran Museum, Rome, representing an actor selecting a mask, contains a contrivance for reading a roll (fig. 12) which may have been usual in libraries and elsewhere, though I have not met with another instance of it. A vertical support attached to the table on which two masks and a MS. are lying, carries a desk with a rim along its lower edge and one of its sides. The roll is partially opened, the closed portion lying towards the left side of the desk, next the rim. The roll may be supposed to contain the actor's part[91].

It is much to be regretted that we have no definite information as to the way in which the great public libraries built by Augustus were fitted up; but I see no reason for supposing that their fittings differed from those of private libraries.

When books (codices), of a shape similar to that with which modern librarians have to deal, had to be accommodated as well as rolls, it is manifest that rectangular spaces not more than a few inches wide would be singularly inconvenient. They were therefore discarded in favour of a press (armarium), a piece of furniture which would hold rolls (volumina) as well as books (codices), and was in fact, as I shall shew, used for both purposes. The word (armarium) occurs commonly in Cicero, and other writers of the best period, for a piece of furniture in which valuables of all kinds, and household gear, were stowed away; and Vitruvius[92] uses it for a book-case. A critic, he says, "produced from certain presses an infinite number of rolls." In later Latin writers—that is from the middle of the first century a.d.—no other word, speaking generally, occurs.

The jurist Ulpian, who died a.d. 228, in a discussion as to what is comprised under the term liber, decides in favour of including all rolls (volumina) of whatever material, and then considers the question whether codices come under the same category or not—thereby shewing that in his day both forms of books were in use. Again, when a library (bibliotheca) has been bequeathed, it is questioned whether the bequest includes merely the press or presses (armarium vel armaria), or the books as well[93].

The Ulpian Library, or rather Libraries, in Trajan's Forum, built about 114 a.d.[94], were fitted up with presses, as we learn from the passage in Vopiscus which I have already quoted; and when the ruins of the section of that library which stood next to the Quirinal Hill were excavated by the French, a very interesting trace of one of these presses was discovered. Nibby, the Roman antiquary, thus describes it:

It seems to me that we have here an early instance, perhaps the earliest, of those presses in the thickness of the wall which were so common afterwards in the monasteries and in private libraries also. A similar press, on a smaller scale, is described by the younger Pliny: "My bedroom," he says, "has a press let into the wall which does duty as a library, and holds books not merely to be read, but read over and over again[96]."

It must not, however, be supposed that cupboards were always, or even usually, sunk into the wall in Roman times. They were detached pieces of furniture, not unlike the wardrobes in which ladies hang their dresses at the present day, except that they were fitted with a certain number of horizontal shelves, and were used for various purposes according to the requirements of their owners. For instance, there is a sarcophagus in the Museo Nazionale at Rome, on which is represented a shoemaker at work. In front of him is a cupboard, exactly like those I am about to describe, on the top of which several pairs of shoes are set out.

I can, however, produce three representations of such presses being used by the Romans to contain books.

The first occurs on a marble sarcophagus (fig. 13), now in the garden of the Villa Balestra, Rome, where I had the good fortune to find it in 1898[97]; and Professor Petersen, of the German Archaeological School, was so kind as to have it photographed for me. He assigns the work to about 200 a.d.

In the central portion, 21 in. high, by 15½ in. wide, is a seated figure, reading a roll. In front of him is a cupboard, the doors of which are open. It is fitted with two shelves, on the uppermost of which are eight rolls, the ends of which are turned to the spectator. On the next shelf is something which looks like a dish or shallow cup. The lower part of the press is solid. Perhaps a second cupboard is intended. Above, it is finished off with a cornice, on which rests a very puzzling object. There are a few faint lines on the marble, which Professor Petersen believes are intended to represent surgical instruments, and so to indicate the profession of the seated figure[98]. There is a Greek inscription on the sarcophagus, but it merely warns posterity not to disturb the bones of the deceased[99].

The second representation (fig. 14) is from the tomb of Galla Placidia, at Ravenna. It occurs in a mosaic on the wall of the chapel in which she was buried, a.d. 449[100]; and was presumably executed before that date. The press closely resembles the one on the Roman sarcophagus, but it is evidently intended to indicate a taller piece of furniture, and it terminates in a pediment. There are two shelves, on which lie the four Gospels, each as a separate codex, indicated by the name of the Evangelist above it. This press rests upon a stout frame, the legs of which are kept in position by a cross-piece nearly as thick as themselves.

The third representation of an armarium (fig. 15) occurs in the manuscript of the Vulgate now in the Laurentian Library at Florence, known as the Codex Amiatinus, from the Cistercian convent of Monte Amiata in Tuscany, where it was preserved for several centuries[101]. The thorough investigation to which this manuscript has lately been subjected shews that it was written in England, at Wearmouth or Jarrow, but possibly by an Italian scribe, before a.d. 716, in which year it was taken to Rome, as a present to the Pope. The first quaternion, however, on one of the leaves of which the above representation occurs, is probably older; and it may have belonged to a certain Codex grandior mentioned by Cassiodorus, and possibly written under his direction[102].

The picture (fig. 15), which appears as the frontispiece to this work, shews Ezra writing the law. On the margin of the vellum, in a hand which is considered to be later than that of the MS., are the words:

Behind him is a press (armarium) with open doors. The lower portion, below these doors, is filled in with panels which are either inlaid or painted, so that the frame on which it is supported is not visible, as in the Ravenna example. The bottom of the press proper is used as a shelf, on which lie a volume and two objects, one of which probably represents a case for pens, while the other is certainly an inkhorn. Above this are four shelves, on each of which lie two volumes. These volumes have their titles written on their backs, but they are difficult to make out, and my artist has not cared to risk mistakes by attempting to reproduce them. The words, beginning at the left hand corner of the top-shelf, are:

The frame-work of the press above the doors is ornamented in the same style as the panels below, and the whole is surmounted by a low pyramid, on the side of which facing the spectator is a cross, beneath which are two peacocks drinking from a water-trough.

I regret that I could not place this remarkable drawing before my readers in the rich colouring of the original. The press is of a reddish brown: the books are bound in crimson. Ezra is clad in green, with a crimson robe. The background is gold. The border is blue, between an inner and outer band of silver. The outermost band of all is vermilion.

I formerly thought that this book-press might represent those in use in England at the beginning of the eighth century; but, if the above attribution to Cassiodorus be accurate, it must be accounted another Italian example. It bears a general similarity to the Ravenna book-press, as might be expected, when it is remembered that Cassiodorus held office under Theodoric and his successors, and resided at Ravenna till he was nearly seventy years old.

The foundation of Christianity did not alter what I may call the Roman conception of a library in any essential particular. The philosophers and authors of Greece and Rome may have occasionally found themselves in company with, or even supplanted by, the doctors of the Church; but in other respects, for the first seven centuries, at least, of our era, the learned furnished their libraries according to the old fashion, though with an ever increasing luxury of material. Boethius, whose Consolation of Philosophy was written a.d. 525, makes Philosophy speak of the "walls of a library adorned with ivory and glass[104]"; and Isidore, Bishop of Seville a.d. 600-636, records that "the best architects object to gilded ceilings in libraries, and to any other marble than cipollino for the floor, because the glitter of gold is hurtful to the eyes, while the green of cipollino is restful to them[105]."

A few examples of such libraries may be cited; but, before doing so, I must mention the Record-Office (Archivum), erected by Pope Damasus (366-384). It was connected with the Basilica of S. Lawrence, which Damasus built in the Campus Martius, near the theatre of Pompey. On the front of the Basilica, over the main entrance, was an inscription, which ended with the three following lines:

These enigmatical verses contain all that we know, or are ever likely to know, respecting this building, which is called chartarium ecclesiÆ RomanÆ by S. Jerome[106], and unquestionably held the official documents of the Latin Church until they were removed to the Lateran in the seventh century. The whole building, or group of buildings, was destroyed in 1486 by Cardinal Raphael Riario, the dissolute nephew of Sixtus IV., to make room for his new palace, now called Palazzo della Cancelleria, and the church was rebuilt on a new site. The connexion with Pope Damasus is maintained by the name, S. Lorenzo in Damaso. No plan of the old buildings, or contemporary record of their arrangement, appears to exist. My only reason for drawing attention to a structure which has no real connexion with my subject is that the illustrious De Rossi considers that in the second line of the above quotation the word column signifies colonnades; and that Damasus took as his model one of the great pagan libraries of Rome which, in its turn, had been derived from the typical library at Pergamon[107]. According to this view he began by building, in the centre of the area selected, a basilica, or hall of basilican type, dedicated to S. Lawrence; and then added, on the north and south sides, a colonnade or loggia from which the rooms occupied by the records would be readily accessible. This opinion is also held by Signor Lanciani, who follows De Rossi without hesitation. I am unwilling to accept a theory which seems to me to have no facts to support it; and find it safer to believe that the line in question refers either to the aisles of the basilica, or to such a portico in front of it as may be seen at San Clemente and other early churches.

A letter to Eucherius, Bishop of Lyons in a.d. 441, from a correspondent named Rusticus, gives a charming picture of a library which he had visited in his young days, say about a.d. 400:

Agapetus, who was chosen Pope in 535, and lived for barely a year, had intended, in conjunction with Cassiodorus, to found a college for teachers of Christian doctrine. He selected for this purpose a house on the CÆlian Hill, afterwards occupied by S. Gregory, and by him turned into a monastery. Agapetus had made some progress with the scheme, so far as the library attached to the house was concerned, for the author of the Einsiedlen MS., who visited Rome in the ninth century, saw the following inscription "in the library of S. Gregory"—i.e. in the library attached to the Church of San Gregorio Magno.

These lines undoubtedly imply that there was on the walls a long series of portraits of the Fathers of the Church, including that of Agapetus himself, who had won his right to a place among them by building a sumptuous home for their works[109].

The design of Agapetus, interrupted by death, was carried forward by his friend Cassiodorus, at a place in South Italy called Vivarium, near his own native town Squillace. Shortly after his final retirement from court, a.d. 538, Cassiodorus established there a brotherhood, which, for a time at least, must have been a formidable rival to that of S. Benedict. A library held a prominent place in his conception of what was needed for their common life. He says little about its size or composition, but much rhetoric is expended on the contrivances by which its usefulness and attractiveness were to be increased. A staff of bookbinders was to clothe the manuscripts in decorous attire; self-supplying lamps were to light nocturnal workers; sundials by day, and water-clocks by night, enabled them to regulate their hours. Here also was a scriptorium, and it appears probable that between the exertions of Cassiodorus and his friend Eugippius, South Italy was well supplied with manuscripts[110].

These attempts to snatch from oblivion libraries which, though probably according to our ideas insignificant, were centres of culture in the darkest of dark ages, will be illustrated by the fuller information that has come down to us respecting the library of Isidore, Bishop of Seville 600-636. The "verses composed by himself for his own presses," to quote the oldest manuscript containing them[111], have been preserved, with the names of the writers under whose portraits they were inscribed.

There were fourteen presses, arranged as follows:

These writers are probably those whom Isidore specially admired, or had some particular reason for commemorating. The first seven are obvious types of theologians, and the presses over which they presided were doubtless filled not merely with their own works, but with bibles, commentaries, and works on Divinity in general. Eusebius and Orosius are types of ecclesiastical historians; Theodosius, Paulus, and Gaius, of jurists; Cosmas, Damian, etc. of physicians. But the Christian poets Prudentius to Sedulius could hardly have needed two presses to contain their works; nor Gregory the Great the whole of one. Lastly, Leander, Isidore's elder brother, could only owe his place in the series to fraternal affection. I conjecture that these portraits were simply commemorative; and that the presses beneath them contained the books on subjects not suggested by the rest of the portraits, as for example, secular literature, in which Isidore was a proficient.

The sets of verses[112] begin with three elegiac couplets headed Titulus Bibliothece, probably placed over the door of entrance.

The authors selected are disposed of either in a single couplet, or in several couplets, according to the writer's taste. I will quote the lines on S. Augustine:

The series concludes with some lines "To an Intruder (ad Interventorem)," the last couplet of which is too good to be omitted:

With these three examples I conclude the section of my work which deals with what may be called the pagan conception of a library in the fulness of its later development. Unfortunately, no enthusiast of those distant times has handed down to us a complete description of his library, and we are obliged to take a detail from one account, and a detail from another, and so piece the picture together for ourselves. What I may call "the pigeon-hole system," suitable for rolls only, was replaced by presses which could contain rolls if required, and certainly did (as shewn (fig. 13) on the sarcophagus of the Villa Balestra), but which were specially designed for codices. These presses were sometimes plain, sometimes richly ornamented, according to the taste or the means of the owner. With the same limitations the floor, the walls, and possibly the roof also were decorated. Further, it was evidently intended that the room selected for books should be used for no other purpose; and, as the books were hidden from view in their presses, the library-note, if I may be allowed the expression, was struck by numerous inscriptions, and by portraits in various materials, representing either authors whose works were on the shelves, or men distinguished in other ways, or friends and relations of the owner of the house.

The Roman conception of a library was realised by Pope Sixtus V., in 1587[113], when the present Vatican Library was commenced from the design of the architect Fontana. I am not aware that there is any contemporary record to prove that either the Pope or his advisers contemplated this direct imitation; but it is evident, from the most cursory inspection of the large room (fig. 16), that the main features of a Roman library are before us[114]; and perhaps, having regard to the tendency of the Renaissance, especially in Italy, it would be unreasonable to expect a different design in such a place, and at such a period.

This noble hall—probably the most splendid apartment ever assigned to library-purposes—spans the Cortile del Belvedere from east to west, and is entered at each end from the galleries connecting the Belvedere with the Vatican palace. It is 184 feet long, and 57 feet wide, divided into two by six piers, on which rest simple quadripartite vaults. The north and south walls are each pierced with seven large windows. No books are visible. They are contained in plain wooden presses 7 feet high and 2 feet deep, set round the piers, and against the walls between the windows. The arrangement of these presses will be understood from the general view (fig. 16), and from the view of a single press open (fig. 17).

In the decoration, with which every portion of the walls and vaults is covered, Roman methods are reproduced, but with a difference. The great writers of antiquity are conspicuous by their absence; but the development of the human race is commemorated by the presence of those to whom the invention of letters is traditionally ascribed; the walls are covered with frescoes representing the foundation of the great libraries which instructed the world, and the assemblies of the Councils which established the Church; the vaults record the benefits conferred on Rome by Sixtus V., in a series of historical views, one above each window; and over these again are stately figures, each embodying some sacred abstraction—"Thrones, dominations, princedoms, virtues, powers"—with angels swinging censers, and graceful nymphs, and laughing satyrs—a strange combination of paganism and Christianity—amid wreaths of flowers, and arabesques twining round the groups and over every vacant space, partly framing, partly hiding, the heraldic devices which commemorate Sixtus and his family:—a web of lovely forms and brilliant colours, combined in an intricate and yet orderly confusion.

It may be questioned whether such a room as this was ever intended for study. The marble floor, the gorgeous decoration, the absence of all appliances for work in the shape of desks, tables, chairs, suggest a place for show rather than for use. The great libraries of the Augustan age, on the other hand, seem, so far as we can judge, to have been used as meeting-places and reading-rooms for learned and unlearned alike. In general arrangement and appearance, however, the Vatican Library must closely resemble its imperial predecessors.