The early Roman librarian was a highly educated slave or
prisoner of war from Greece or Asia Minor. Later, the librarian was a native-scholar, who was an author as well. Even later,
the position became that of a civil servant.
Under the emperors, several of
the libraries in Rome appeared to have been administerd by a central director, known as the "procurator bibliothecarum."
Under this director, each library had its own librarian known as the "bibliothcarius" or "magister." Library
staff were many and usually slaves and some were women. There were lesser library positions under the following titles:
Librarius - Appears to have been a jack-of-all trades from cataloger to copyist,
from translator to clerical.
Vilicius - Seems to have been a general attendant somewhere between custodial
or clerical.
Antiquarius - Was the scholar-librarian, historian, and paleographer.
The administrative positions became political appointments
or civil service jobs. The actual library work was done by well-educated but less important assistants. The work in the
larger libraries was highly specialized with varying degrees of service.17
ACQUISTIONS
Roman public libraries usually acquired their books sometimes through donations
but mostly arranging for the making of copies and occasionally through purchase.18
It is most likely that libraries acquired most of their
books through authors' donations. For older writings, sometimes through donations but usally arranging to have copies made.
Another method was to purchase books from bookstores. In the age of Republic, bookstores had to locate books as requested
by customers. This was difficult in a city that had only private libraries. With the arrival of the Empire, Rome became the
center of Latin learning and literature. The city drew writers, scholars, students, teachers, and others and thus expanded
the ranks of bookbuyers. This increase in demand for books led bookstores to provide a new service - having for
ready sale the works of contempoary authors, especially poets. The libraries were a great benefit to the bookstores:
when a customer requested a title they did not have, a scribe was sent to a library to copy it.19
CATALOGING
Roman books were arranged according to general subject but
what categories is unknown. They were divided by language, Greek and Latin, and the works of an author were kept in his major
subject. The works of the different schools of philosophy were kept separately as well as the various schools of religion.
There were two different types of catalogs that were known and sometimes both would be used. The first type was a classified catalog,
or shelf list, arranged just as the rolls themselves were stored. The other was a bibliographical catalog, arranged by author
but gave titles or first lines, lenghts of works, and sometimes biographical information.20
SERVICES
It is believed that Roman libraries must had a scheduled time
when they were opened to the public. This was problably from sunrise to midday, which were the standard business hours in
the Greek and Roman world.21
The members of the public they served included writers,
scholars, lovers of literature and learning, and the like, as well as the scribes the library users sent to do the copying
for them. In addition, the scribes bookdealers sent to duplicate the titles requsted by customers.22
The books were problably fetched by pages
but there is no proof of that. The alternative method was that readers got the books themselves which would have been
difficult and unsafe. The bookcases were numbered but was only a clue to the book's general location. There were several
hundred rolls in the case piled on top of each other. They were arranged in some way but the system would require
someone familar with the collection and experience handling papryus rolls. An inexperienced person like a patron could
damaged the rolls without proper handling since papyrus has a tendency to tear easily.23
When being transported from the bookcases, the
rolls were stacked vertically in buckets of wood or leather. If there was a request for a batch of rolls, the bucket was problably
left beside the reader's chair. According to contemporary writings, some
libraries permitted borrowing.24
