Heythrop Library

Since we made the switch to our new library management system, Koha, the trickiest task I have faced has been cataloguing ‘bound-with’ or ‘multi-tract’ volumes. ‘Bound-with’ refers to separately published works bound together in one or more volumes. Some research tells me that these volumes may also be referred to as Sammelbands in early book-printing and publishing terms.

I immediately recognise a bound-with if it has multiple different title pages and paginations throughout the volume. This is more common in our antiquarian books. I mainly catalogue 19th century bound-withs.

Cataloguing a bound-with involves creating separate bibliographic (bib) records for each section of the volume and then linking them together. There is one record as the ‘parent’ record and then multiple ‘child’ records. The linking process can happen differently across library management systems.

In our set of instructions, the parent bib number, item number and item barcode all link to the child bib numbers through each of the child records’ 773 MARC fields. The way that this displays in the parent record is with a button reading show analytics.

We attach the item record representing the physical volume to the parent record, but it will be visible from the child records. This is made clear by the public-note in the item record that reads ‘Bound-with volume, contains … titles. See “show analytics” in parent record for title list.’ When you click show analytics you can view the child bib records.

In each of the child bib records, there will be a link back to the parent record, which will display as In : (parent record title).

Bound-with volumes are highly unique and can often reflect their former owners’ research interests and methods of scholarship. This is in the case of bound-withs where the component parts are topically similar. Provenance information can be discerned from notes and marginalia throughout the volume. Yet, many of Heythrop’s bound-withs contain completely disparate subjects and likely represent the more economical goal of binding together books of similar sizes.

Though I sometimes get frustrated with the complexity of these bound-with volumes, I am highly motivated to make each of the individual component parts discoverable through our Online Public Access Catalogue (OPAC).

AL