Polonica in the 18th century bibliographies of rare book

Abstract

The text is an attempt to answer the question of whether and how the Polish book was present in a quite specific type of reference works about books, i.e. the 18th-century bibliographies of rare books. The concept of Polonica and "the rare book" are defined here mostly as those categories of publications that could be associated with Poland for the readers of a bibliographic list. These include publications in the Polish language, of Polish authors, printed in Polish publishing houses. The studies of the author reveal that book monuments of the Polish culture constituted a small part of these lists, and prints in Polish were mentioned there especially rare. Moreover, most of the described prints consist of the 16th and 17th centuries editions, mostly from Cracow, and as regards the content and subject, religious and devotional publications dominated.