The BncF SBN hub
The SBN (National Library Service) CFI hub, coordinated by the National Central Library of Florence, was the first in Italy to launch the creation of a digital catalogue of the material it holds, and the first to link to the SBN Index between 1985 and 1986.
The libraries in the hub
The hub currently brings together 23 libraries, almost all of which are involved in conservation, which share the catalogue and provide services aimed principally at a specialised target.
The catalogue has been online since 1985, but as work continues to recover all the items that, prior to this date, had been registered in physical catalogues, it is necessary to check the extent of coverage of the online catalogue for each library.
Coverage of the online catalogue and BncF services
The online catalogue of the BncF contains the publications acquired from the mid-Eighties onwards, in particular:
all the Italian monographs received by the library since 1984
all the new periodicals received by the library since 1988
all the Italian or foreign works received by the library through acquisition, donation, exchange, etc., since 1989.
The catalogue describes documents from a range of categories of material: printed material, doctoral theses, digital documentation, printed music, maps and graphic material, audio and video recordings.
The online catalogue contains a considerable amount of the descriptions of documents related to the period of coverage of the physical catalogues (general, historical, special) in use until 1984. In particular, the following have been recovered:
- Publications recorded in the Italian National Bibliography (BNI) from 1958 to 1984, including supplements to the BNI from no. 1 to no. 10.
- Publications recorded in CUBI (the cumulative catalogue of the bulletin of publications received by the BncF under legal deposit between 1886 to 1957).
- Publications recorded in the Bulletin of Modern Foreign Works acquired by the library from 1886 onwards.
- Almost all of the titles of periodicals held by the library.
- The Magliabechiana Collection, which comprises approximately 120,000 editions from between the 16th century and the early 1900s.
- Works belonging to antique collections held by the library, including approximately 2,500 from the 1500s and 2,500 works from the Targioni Tozzetti collection.
- Approximately 1,000 maps from between the 17th and the 19th centuries.
- In addition, special modern collections have been catalogued, such as:
- the Bertini Collection (artist’s books)
- the Pannunzio Collection (photographs from the Il Mondo archive)
The catalogue also contains the index entries published in the Italian National Bibliography: the information cards are marked with a code (e.g.: BN 2017-2173), composed of the year of publication in the Italian National Bibliography and the sequential index entry number.
Searches may be further enhanced through consultation of the physical catalogues held in the library.
Services related to the documents listed in the physical catalogues (as well as in their digital versions) may be requested via the personal area in OPAC.
Some descriptions of the documents present in OPAC lack information related to their location. In these cases, the relative location should be searched for in the card index, after which the request can be submitted via OPAC.
Hub coordination
The hub coordination team is responsible, in particular, for:
- assessing applications from libraries to join SBN via the CFI hub.
- providing advice and support to the libraries in the hub with regard to the organisation of collections and catalogues, guaranteeing up-to-date information on national regulations and on the directives issued by the Central Institute for the Union Catalogue (ICCU).
- organising, when required, training and/or refresher courses regarding cataloguing.
- support, maintenance and development of software for the SBNWeb catalogue and the Hub’s catalogue (OPAC).
Contacts
Hub supervisor
Chiara Storti
chiara.storti@cultura.gov.it
bnc-fi.sistemidigitali@cultura.gov.it
tel. (+39) 055/24919 73
Cataloguing supervisor
Paolo Wos Bellini
paolo.wosbellini@cultura.gov.it
tel. (+39) 055/24919 21
Representative for subject indexing
Maria Chiara Iorio
mariachiara.iorio@cultura.gov.it
tel. (+39) 055/24919 20
IT supervisor
Maria Grazia Pepe
maria.pepe@cultura.gov.it
tel. (+39) 055/24919 74
