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A bookcase, sometimes known as a bookshelf, is a piece of furniture with horizontal shelves, typically in the form of a cabinet, that is used to hold books and other printed materials. Private residences, public and university libraries, workplaces, and retailers all have bookcases. Bookcases varies in size from tiny, low versions that are the height of a table to tall models that extend to the ceiling. Shelves in the case can be permanent or movable to various places. They may be permanently mounted to the walls and/or floor in areas solely dedicated to the storing of books, such as libraries.

A bookshelf may include glass doors that may be closed to keep dust and moisture out of the books. Glass is nearly often used on bookcase doors so that the spines of the books can be read. Rare books that are particularly precious should be preserved in secured cabinets with wooden or glass doors. A tiny bookshelf can also be placed on top of other furniture, such as a desk or chest. Larger volumes are more likely to be stacked horizontally, while extremely large books are more likely to be kept flat on shelves or coffee tables.

Bibliotheca and Bibliothk (Greek: o), variants of which signify library in various modern languages, indicate the notion of a bookshelf in Latin and Greek. A bookshelf, a bookstand, a cupboard, and a bookrack are all terms used to describe a bookcase. Large bookshelves in a library are referred to as “stacks.”

During the late Roman republic, Seneca preached against libraries set up for display by illiterate owners who hardly read their titles in a lifetime but displayed them in bookcases (armaria) made of citrus wood inlaid with ivory that ran all the way to the ceiling: “by now, like bathrooms and hot water, a library is set up as standard equipment for a fine house” (domus).

Zhuanluntang, or revolving bookcases, have been chronicled in imperial China, and its development is ascribed to Fu Xi in 544. Revolving bookcases have been described in Chinese manuscripts from the 8th and 9th centuries. During the Song Dynasty, when Emperor Taizu ordered the mass printing of the Buddhist Tripiaka texts, revolving bookcases were popular in Buddhist monasteries. Li Jie’s architectural treatise, the Yingzao Fashi, has a picture of a spinning bookshelf.

When books were written by hand and not in large quantities, they were kept in little boxes or chests carried by their owners (typically affluent nobles or clergy). Manuscript volumes were housed on shelves or in cabinets as they gathered in religious buildings or rich residences. The forerunners of today’s bookshelves are these cupboards. The doors were eventually removed, and the bookshelf continued to evolve. The books, however, were not organized in a contemporary manner even back then. They were either stacked on their sides or arrayed with their backs against the wall and edges outwards if they were standing. The book’s closing band of leather, vellum, or parchment was frequently utilized for the title’s inscription, which was therefore on the fore-edge rather than the spine. Titles were frequently scribbled on the fore-edge.

It wasn’t until the development of printing dramatically decreased the cost of books, allowing many more people to buy them, that the practice of writing the title on the spine and shelving books with the spine outwards became commonplace. (Because the books were now in the shape of a codex rather than a scroll, this was conceivable.) Early bookshelves were often made of oak, which is still considered by some to be the best wood for a beautiful library. The oldest bookshelves in England are those at Oxford University’s Bodleian Library, which were installed in the last year or two of the sixteenth century and contain the first existing instances of shelved galleries above flat wall-cases. Long lines of bookcases have a harsh aspect, and various attempts have been made to soften them with carved cornices and pilasters. In the hands of English cabinetmakers in the second part of the eighteenth century, these endeavors were most effective.

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