Maintenance and Preservation of Book Collections in the "Lucian Blaga" Central University Library Cluj-Napoca

The paper presents the situation of general collections of the “Lucian Blaga” Central University Library, Cluj-Napoca. It is structured according to guidelines referring to the short history of the library, the presentation of the rooms for deposit and reading, sanitation methodology applied in the library, preservation problems in the case of the branch libraries, and, finally, it outlines the directions of a preservation plan on an institutional level. Following a sketchy presentation of the most important dates in the history of the library, the organization and structure of the library’s reading and deposit rooms are described in detail. Thus, the interested reader may follow how the reading rooms are placed on the three levels of the building, and how the closed access stock is organized in the closed deposit. Further on, the authors present the ways and means of sanitation of the building, the methods and material used for hygiene. The discussion of preservation problems is completed by three case-studies, referring to cases of serious problems, in the branch libraries of the Faculty of Mathematics, Law and Letters. Finally, the authors outline the purpose of collection preservation, and also draw attention on the two objectives of a general preservation program, regarding preventive and active collection preservation.

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