Post 2 A brief library history of ancient Rome

For the first five hundred years of Rome history, there was no library because of oral culture of the first Roman civilization. By the end of Republic in the first century B.C., scholars and writers to simply copy their works themselves, or have it done in the patrons’ house to distribute the manuscripts to friends. So that the writers were able to reach their immediate audience but no further.

Through contact with Hellenic world, Rome had concepts of “library” and “books”. The first libraries in Rome were private collections resulting from the conquest of Greek states. From the conquest of Macedonia in 168 B.C, Rome brought the great library at Pergamum and Sulla captured of Aristotle’s famed collections. These resulting of spoils from war, earliest Roman libraries were largely private collections held by wealthy people as status symbols.

The most outstanding private library in early Rome was Lucius Licinius Lucullus’s library. He was thought one of the richest men in the Roman World at that time and was famous for his luxurious way of life, acquired as part of his war booty an enormous library, which was laid out, a complex of rooms for holding, colonnades where users could work, and lounges where they could meet and chat. Lucullus generously made his collections available not only friends and relatives but to the Greek literati living in Rome.

In this age of private libraries, almost acquisitions were made through a combination of friendship and copying. People acquired books that had been written in earlier ages by borrowing form friends who owned them and having their staff make copies. People acquired current books as gifts or presentation copies from the author. Those who wanted copies but did not know the author and hence were not on his list of donees could borrow a copy from someone who has and reproduced it. Once an author spoke his book in the public domain, anyone could make a copy of it.


I found some interesting facts from EBSCOhost article, Google directory and a book called “Libraries in the Ancient World” written by Lionel Casson.

If anyone needs Libraries in the Ancient World for your researching topic about ancient libraries, check this URL and click “available from”.

My next Blog would be Julies Caesar and early public libraries in Roman Empire.

References:

Casson, Lionel 2001, Libraries in the ancient world, Yale University, New Haven and London.

'Ancient Libraries' 2010, Encyclopaedia Britannica, Encyclopaedia Britannica Online Library Edition, viewed 18 March 2010.

'Pollio, Gaius Asinius' 2010, Britannica Student Encyclopaedia, Encyclopaedia Britannica Online Library Edition, viewed 20 April 2010.