Early subject headings

In the nineteenth century such library classification schemes as existed were very rudimentary, often consisting only of a few broad subject divisions with the books then arranged by size or author's name, or some other principle unrelated to the subject. Locating a book on a specific topic could be a very hit and miss affair, as the lack of detail in the classification meant that related material was usually scattered throughout the relevant class. The more usual method of subject searching was through alphabetically arranged subject catalogues. These might take the form of large ‘guard books’ or ledgers into which the catalogue entries were written or pasted, and which were commonly reproduced as printed books. The alternative form of card catalogue came into common use in British and American libraries from the 1870s onwards.

The earliest subject entries were usually simply names of topics, such as ‘Geology’ or ‘Cricket’. In many cases the subject keywords or ‘catchwords’ were taken directly from the title of the book or article. Where necessary the subject headings might be combinations of two or more words, for example, ‘Military history’ or ‘Education of women’, and in some early subject catalogues and indexes headings can be found with subdivisions, rather in the manner of book indexes.

Whatever the format, most of these early headings were created on an impromptu basis, and there were no general rules applied to ensure that the format of headings was logical or consistent. It often appears that not much common sense was exercised in their selection, nor thought for what a reader might reasonably look up.

Cutter's Rules

The idea of systematic subject headings is usually credited to Charles Ammi Cutter, an American librarian, who, in 1876, the same year that Dewey created his Decimal Classification, published a slim volume called Rules for a Dictionary Catalog. This was one of the earliest comprehensive statements of theoretical principles for making entries in a catalogue, although several libraries had produced some sets of cataloguing rules during the mid-nineteenth century. Most of Cutter's Rules were concerned with how to enter the details of the author and title of a work, and what are known as the descriptive elements (the physical dimensions of a book and the number of pages, for example), but he also provided some guidelines on how to make subject entries in a catalogue.