Antecedents Preservation as a formal profession in libraries and archives dates from the twentieth century, but its philosophy and practice has roots in many earlier traditions. In many ancient societies, appeals to heavenly protectors were used to preserve books, scrolls and manuscripts from insects, fire and decay. • To the ancient Egyptians, the scarab or dung beetle (see:
Scarab (artifact)) was a protector of written products. • In ancient
Babylon,
Nabu is the heavenly patron of books and protector of clay tablets. Nabu is the Babylonian god of wisdom and writing, and is the patron of the scribes, librarians and archivists. • In Arabic and other eastern societies, sometimes a traditional method to protect books and scrolls was a metaphysical appeal to "Kabi:Kaj", the "King of the Cockroaches". • There are three saints in the Christian church that are closely associated with libraries as patrons:
Saint Lawrence,
Saint Jerome, and
Catherine of Alexandria. • In some Christian monasteries, prayers and curses were placed at the end of books to prevent theft, or to damn the thieves. Frequently called a "
book curse", these were placed in the book to deter theft. • Sri Lankan symbols or images of the Sinhalese "Fire Demons" are hung in the corners of libraries and other buildings to appease the incendiary demons and to avert fire, lightning and cataclysm, according to Sinhalese mythology. Since fire and acid decomposition (also known as "slow fires") are a special problem for libraries because of the concentration of paper products, the "Fire Demons" are also included when used to assuage these destroyers of libraries and books. • The Aztec and Mayan Indians of Latin America also had deities concerned with libraries. The major god,
Quetzalcoatl, is credited with the discoveries of the arts, the calendar, and of writing. A single feather or plume at the beginning or at the end of a document or stone carving would indicate a dedication to the "Feathered Serpent". This symbol degenerated over time to a single fringed line. Human record-keeping arguably dates back to the
cave painting boom of the
Upper Paleolithic, some 32,000–40,000 years ago. More direct antecedents are the
writing systems that developed in the 4th millennium BC. Written record keeping and information sharing practices, along with
oral tradition, sustain and transmit information from one group to another. This level of preservation has been supplemented over the last century with the professional practice of preservation and conservation in the cultural heritage community. •
Oral tradition or
oral culture, the transmission of information from one generation to the next without a writing system. • Antiquarian practices, including
scribal practice,
burial practice, the libraries at
Pergamum,
Alexandria and other ancient archives. • Medieval practices, including the
scriptorium and
relic collection •
Renaissance and the changing conception of artists and works of art •
Enlightenment and the
Encyclopedists •
Romantic movement's imperative to preserve
Significant events • 1933:
William Barrow introduces the field of conservation to paper deacidification when he publishes a paper on the
acid paper problem. In later studies, Barrow tested paper from American books made between 1900 and 1949, and learned that after forty years the books had lost on average 96 percent of their original strength; after less than ten years, they had already lost 64 percent. Barrow determined that this rapid deterioration was not the direct result of using wood-pulp fibers, since rag papers of this period were also aging rapidly, but rather due to the residual
sulfuric acid produced in both
rag and wood pulp papers. Earlier papermaking methods left the final product only mildly alkaline or even neutral and such paper has maintained its strength for 300 to 800 years, despite
sulfur dioxide and other air pollutants. The manufacturing methods used after 1870, however, employed sulfuric acid for
sizing and bleaching the paper, which would eventually lead to yellowing, brittle paper. Barrow's 1933 article on the fragile state of wood pulp paper predicted the life expectancy, or "LE", of this paper was approximately 40–50 years. At that point the paper would begin to show signs of natural decay, and he concluded that research for a new media on which to write and print was needed. • 1966:
The Flood of the River Arno in Florence, Italy, damaged or destroyed millions of rare books and led to the development of restoration laboratories and new methods in conservation. Instrumental in this process was conservationist
Peter Waters, who led a group of volunteers, called "mud angels", in restoring thousands of books and papers. This event awakened many historians, librarians, and other professionals to the importance of having a preservation plan. Many consider this flood to be one of the worst disasters since the
burning of the Library of Alexandria. It spurred a resurgence in the profession of preservation and conservation worldwide, including the addition of a Preservation Office at the Library of Congress. • 1987: Terry Saunders releases the film
Slow Fires: On the Preservation of the Human Record which examines paper embrittlement resulting from acid decay • 1989: March 7 ["
Commitment Day"] Major US print publishers convene at NYPL to endorse a community-wide commitment to utilizing
ISO 9706 certified permanent durable paper in order to combat the acid paper epidemic.
Significant people •
William Barrow (1904–1967) was an American chemist and paper conservator, and a pioneer of library and archives conservation. He introduced the field of conservation to paper deacidification through alkalization. •
Paul N. Banks (1934–2000) was Conservator and Head of the Conservation Department at the
Newberry Library from 1964 to 1981, and published regularly on
bookbinding,
book and paper conservation, and problems related to conservation. He designed and implemented a curriculum for the
Columbia University School of Library Service that dealt directly with preservation training. •
Pamela Darling, author and historian, was Preservation Specialist for the
Association of Research Libraries. Her works include materials to aid libraries in establishing their own comprehensive preservation programs. •
Carolyn Harris worked as head of Columbia University Libraries' Preservation Division from 1981 until 1987, where she worked closely with Paul Banks. She published extensive research throughout her career, especially dealing with
mass deacidification of wood-pulp paper. •
Carolyn Price Horton (1909–2001), American conservator-restorer of books at the American Philosophical Society and Yale University. Helped museums and libraries in Florence recover books damaged from the
1966 flood of the Arno and the 1972 flood of the
Corning Museum of Glass •
Peter Waters, former Conservation Officer at the Library of Congress in Washington, DC, worked in the areas of disaster recovery and preparedness, and the salvaging of water-damaged paper goods. •
Nicholson Baker is a contemporary American novelist and author of
Double Fold, a criticism of libraries' destruction of paper-based media. •
Patricia Battin, as the first president of the Commission on Preservation and Access, worked to organize a national campaign both for the use of alkaline paper in publishing companies and for a national program of preservation
microfilming. • John F. Dean, Preservation and Conservation Librarian at Cornell University, has made contributions towards improving
preservation efforts in developing countries. Specifically, Dean has created online tutorials for library conservation and preservation in Southeast Asia and Iraq and the Middle East. The
Paul Banks and Carolyn Harris Preservation Award for outstanding preservation specialists in library and archival science, is given annually by the Association for Library Collections & Technical Services, a subdivision of the
American Library Association. It is awarded in recognition of professional preservation specialists who have made significant contributions to the field. ==Legal and ethical issues==