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I'm having trouble seeing the distinction between a general cognomen so defined and an undifferentiated name heading. How would we express it in the LC-PCC policy to allow the one but not the other?

The Wikipedia definition cited leans heavily the verb "attributed." A simpler solution might be to find some accommodation for an attribution relationship which does not require that a particular responsible agent be specified.  In that case, would works attributed in scholarship to Pseudo Aristotele be attributed to Pseudo Aristotele, or just to Aristotle, or both?

FAQ A1.6 is a better match for the case of house pseudonyms, where there is a unifying agent, the publishing house or syndicate, which "owns" the pseudonym and takes works from the authors writing independently for the pseudonym line. And it too points up the problem with current complex reference practice. The authority for a particular author is assigned the reference, "For works of this author written under other names, search also under: $b [established form of the shared pseudonym]". In fact, some if not many of the works entered under the pseudonym, and maybe all those in a given catalog's collection, are not by the author the user is interested in, so the reference is misleading.

Stephen

On Mon, Aug 6, 2018 at 1:51 AM, Moore, Richard <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

Stephen

 

This works theoretically, but I’m not sure it’s necessary to help scholars, who have already conceived the collective name under which to lump together these various works.

 

The NAR quotes wikiepedia to explain the usage, so I’m not sure further notes or references are needed:

 

“Pseudo-Aristotle is a general cognomen for authors of philosophical or medical treatises who attributed their work to the Greek philosopher Aristotle, or whose work was later attributed to him by others”.

 

 

Regards

Richard

 

________________________

Richard Moore

Authority Control Team Manager

The British Library

                                                                       

Tel.: +44 (0)1937 546104                                  

E-mail: [log in to unmask]      

 

 

 

From: Program for Cooperative Cataloging <[log in to unmask]> On Behalf Of Stephen Hearn
Sent: 04 August 2018 16:24


To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [PCCLIST] Pseudo Aristotele

 

The authority for "Aristotle's masterpiece" is not a problem. A Pseudo name to which a single work is attributed is not a problem. The problem comes with a Pseudo name which is used for what are assumed to be multiple unrelated persons, as is the case with Pseudo Aristotele.  The traced reference authority is needed in this case for "Pseudo Aristotele," the undifferentiated name, to enable its use as an entry element in authority 400 fields. 

 

That said, I'll admit that a closer reading of the 664 definition makes this solution more complicated. The 664 on the Pseudo Aristotele authority would have to say something like:

 

100 0 $a Pseudo Aristotele

664    $a search under $b Pseudo Aristotele (Author of De coloribus) $b Pseudo Aristotele (Author of Quaestiones mechanicae) $b ...

 

100 0 $a Pseudo Aristotele $c (Author of De coloribus) 

400 0 $w nnnb $a Pseudo Aristotele

 

etc., which would entail the need to establish each real author known as Pseudo Aristotele under a separate authority; or

 

100 0 $a Pseudo Aristotele

664    $a search under the titles of works attributed to Pseudo Aristotele $b De coloribus $b Quaestiones mechanicae $b ...

 

130 0 $a De coloribus

400 0 $w nnnb $a Pseudo Aristotele. $t De coloribus

 

etc., which would entail establishing each work under title and enumerating them on the traced authority record.  Of these two options, I'd prefer the latter, establishing each work under title with a 400 see reference on the work authority for Pseudo Aristotele. $t ...

 

A better option would be simply not to suppress the 4XXs. MARC inverts its own logic in the way it manages complex references, suppressing the simple references added to established heading authorities and loading all the redirection instructions into the traced reference authority.  If the references on the established authorities were unsuppressed, then the redirection offered to users in a given catalog would be customized to the contents of that catalog.  Under standard MARC logic, only 4XX references for established headings in use in the catalog would display, and no 400 redirections would display for works not held. As it is currently in MARC, all the redirections would appear in the traced reference authority's 664, potentially resulting in blind references for users if one of the subfield $b's was for a work not held. Or no references, if the catalog can't handle exotica like traced reference authorities.

 

If the MARC Authority Format were revised on this point, it could enable a simpler solution:

 

100 0 $a Pseudo Aristotele

664    $a For references to works in the catalog attributed to Pseudo Aristotele, search under $b Pseudo Aristotele

 

130 0 $a De coloribus

400 0 $a Pseudo Aristotele. $t De coloribus

 

etc. That still entails establishing each work under title, but would offer a better approach to providing references. Bonus: even systems that would be flummoxed by a traced reference authority could probably handle the 400 on the established heading authority, which would suffice.

 

Note that this MARC problem is specific to authorities. BIBFRAME is so far intended only as a replacement for the MARC Bibliographic Format. If that means that the MARC Authority Format will continue in use in parallel with BIBFRAME, then this problem with complex references might be worth addressing.

 

Stephen

 

On Sat, Aug 4, 2018 at 2:22 AM, Gene Fieg <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

This discussion interests me, since in the field I worked in, religion and Christianity, this issue also comes up.  We have several "Pseudo" authors.  Once piece of advice I got while doing authority work as that the Pseudo person has to represent a body of work (On that basis, there might be several Pseudo-Aristotles in the examples given)  But I am more intrigued about this idea of "non-persons."  So if we have a Pseudo author writing is the work is a Pseudo work?  Really?  If there is a work, there is some presumption, whether stated or not, that the work was written by a real person.  One would hope.  The idea of Nomen came up.  The idea of nomen is that nomen indicates nothing.  For instance, at the grocery story you are looking for aisle where coffee is located. You see the indication [nomen where it should be located]; you go there.  There is no coffee.  But the nomen still exists [otherwise you would not have gone to that aisle].

 

Historically speaking, thank God for the Pseudos; otherwise, we would not have as much ancient literature as we do; much was destroyed; but much was preserved under Pseudo authors; the names of those authors were recognized and authoritative; so the Pseudo works were not destroyed because they were hidden by the accepted, canonical names.  Read Norden and discover some literature has come down to us simply because the were listed under the names of the canonical authors.  [Yes there was sense of canon in ancient literature.]

 

Gene Fieg

 

On Wed, Aug 1, 2018 at 11:53 PM, Moore, Richard <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

Ted

 

Undifferentiated? I guess so, maybe. Or think of them as a bit like the kind of “house” pseudonym used by some publishers, although in this case the “pseudonym” is assigned retrospectively by academics.

 

Mostly I agree with Bob’s first paragraph, below.

 

 

Regards

Richard

 

________________________

Richard Moore

Authority Control Team Manager

The British Library

                                                                       

Tel.: +44 (0)1937 546104                                  

E-mail: [log in to unmask]      

 

 

 

From: Program for Cooperative Cataloging <[log in to unmask]> On Behalf Of Gemberling, Ted P
Sent: 02 August 2018 00:12
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [PCCLIST] Pseudo Aristotele

 

One more thought on this. I actually don’t think LRM’s position on fictional persons is in conflict with the sort of practice advocated by John and Robert because there is no question that these “pseudo” writers existed. They existed. We just don’t know what their real names were. So the problems with treating fictional persons as authors—in particular for me the problem of putting them in fictional time periods—does not apply to these authors.

I disagree slightly with one thing Robert said. I would say these are “undifferentiated” names, at least in spirit. By setting up the “pseudo” authority, we are saying we don’t really know what their identity was. I think that’s pretty much the same as the spirit of old undifferentiated authorities, because occasionally several of the identities on them might be found to be the same person, too.

 

Ted Gemberling

 

From: Program for Cooperative Cataloging <[log in to unmask]> On Behalf Of Robert Maxwell
Sent: Wednesday, August 1, 2018 5:43 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [PCCLIST] Pseudo Aristotele

 

I agree with John's point about huge disruption in the file for not much (if any) benefit. First, most of these "Pseudo" names are well known to classics scholars and others under the "Pseudo" name (frequently evidenced by usage on title pages). If our primary goal is "convenience of the user", works should be gathered together under the name users expect to find, in spite of theoretical problems now in place thanks to LRM. However, it also has to be admitted that these works haven't all been treated the same. Some have been established under a "Pseudo" name and others have been established under title.

The problem with separating them all out as individual authors (e.g. "Pseudo Aristotle (Author of ...)") is that these are defined by what they are not: the works of, for example, "Pseudo Aristotle" are works that have been attributed to Aristotle and that are now believed not to be by Aristotle. Generally that's all we know about them. So (in my opinion) it would be misleading to separate them into individual person records because maybe works A B & C are in fact by one person (though not Aristotle) whereas D & E are by someone else (still not Aristotle); but we just don't know. So separating the authors of A-E into five separate "person" records would be misleading.

The treatment of the "Pseudo" authors is in some ways the exact opposite of treatment of pseudonyms. With a pseudonym you have a real person pretending to be a fictitious character. With the "Pseudo" authors you have works being created pretending to be by a real person for one reason or another, usually to give more authority to the work (this is almost exclusively a phenomenon associated with pre-modern works), so a different treatment for them from that of pseudonyms might be warranted. Similarly, they aren't exactly undifferentiated names either (all the works now attributed to a "Pseudo" name might in fact be by a single person whose real identity is unknown).

With John, I think making a change in this practice would result in a disruption that does not serve the user. However, I have for some time felt that it would be a good idea for PCC to study the issue of the "Pseudo" authors, first to see what if any consistency there is in current practice and then to see if it continues to serve the user or if a different practice would be better. I'd be interested in being part of such a study if PCC decides to commission one.

Robert L. Maxwell
Ancient Languages and Special Collections Cataloger
6728 Harold B. Lee Library
Brigham Young University
Provo, UT 84602
(801)422-5568

"We should set an example for all the world, rather than confine ourselves to the course which has been heretofore pursued"--Eliza R. Snow, 1842.


From: Program for Cooperative Cataloging <[log in to unmask]> on behalf of Hostage, John <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Wednesday, August 1, 2018 3:06:03 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Pseudo Aristotele

 

Stephen raises some good questions.  I don’t know the answers, but couldn’t the same arguments be made about many of the dozens (hundreds?) of other “Pseudo” authors in the file?  It seems like a huge disruption.  Does it serve the user and the scholars who might know them as Pseudo Aristotele or whatever?  We’ve been told that we’ll be able to get around LRM’s nonsense about real persons by the use of nomens or something like that, so that shouldn’t be an issue.

 

Note, however, this 667 on the NAR for Virgil: “Works attributed to "Pseudo-Virgil" or otherwise once attributed to Virgil but now known to be spurious such as the Appendix Vergiliana should normally be entered under a uniform title with an added entry for Virgil.”

 

Any name that you used in an author-title 400 would have to be established, according to my understanding of the policies.

 

------------------------------------------

John Hostage

Senior Continuing Resources Cataloger

Harvard Library--Information and Technical Services

Langdell Hall 194

Harvard Law School Library

Cambridge, MA 02138

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+(1)(617) 495-3974 (voice)

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From: Program for Cooperative Cataloging [mailto:[log in to unmask]GOV] On Behalf Of Stephen Hearn
Sent: Wednesday, August 01, 2018 14:35
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: [PCCLIST] Pseudo Aristotele

 

The LCNAF includes "Pseudo Aristotele" (n 2001003970), defined in a 670 attributed to Wikipedia as "a general cognomen for authors of philosophical or medical treatises who attributed their work to the Greek philosopher Aristotle, or whose work was later attributed to him by others."  Should it be coded as an undifferentiated name heading? And then what?

 

There are several titles attributed in LCNAF to "Pseudo Aristotele". Arguably this is a case where catalogers have inherited attribution to an undifferentiated name from classical scholarship. Nevertheless, should we break "Pseudo Aristotele" into separate, individuated authorities (implied in the work examples below) in accordance with the RDA and IFLA/LRM principle that authors must be real persons? That would also enable the work authorities to be more clearly distinguished as being by separate authors:

 

Pseudo Aristotele. $t De coloribus -> Pseudo Aristotele $c (Author of De coloribus). $t De coloribus

 

Pseudo Aristotele. $t Pepli epitaphia -> Pseudo Aristotele $c (Author of Pepli epithaphia). $t Pepli epitaphia

 

Pseudo Aristotele. $t Quaestiones mechanicae ->  Pseudo Aristotele $c (Author of Quaestiones mechanicae). $t Quaestiones mechanicae

 

Then there's Anaximenes of Lampsacus, whose work Rhetorica ad Alexandrum has been attributed at times to Aristotle and to Pseudo Aristotle. Should we change the 400s on the authority for the "Anaximenes ... $t Rhetorica ad Alexandrum" to:

 

400 0 $a Pseudo Aristotle $c (Author of Rhetorica ad Alexandrum). $t Rhetorica ad Alexandrum

 

Hopefully that would not entail also establishing " Pseudo Aristotle $c (Author of Rhetorica ad Alexandrum)" for which there is currently no attributed resource.

 

Alternatively, these could all be entered under title, with 400s for the former entries under "Pseudo Aristotele" (unqualified). With no need to attribute works to the differentiated identities of Pseudo Aristotele, we could dispense with re-establishing them individually--the 100 name heading would be superseded by 400 $a $t references to works entered under title.

 

Lastly, at the moment it appears that "Quaestiones mechanicae" has been established under both "Aristotle" and "Pseudo Aristotele" in LCNAF, so entry under title might be a way to resolve that argument.

 

Thanks,

 

Stephen

 

 

--

Stephen Hearn, Metadata Strategist

Data Management & Access, University Libraries

University of Minnesota

170A Wilson Library (office)

160 Wilson Library (mail)

Ph: 612-625-2328

Fx: 612-625-3428

ORCID:  0000-0002-3590-1242


 
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--

Stephen Hearn, Metadata Strategist

Data Management & Access, University Libraries

University of Minnesota

170A Wilson Library (office)

160 Wilson Library (mail)

Ph: 612-625-2328

Fx: 612-625-3428

ORCID:  0000-0002-3590-1242




--
Stephen Hearn, Metadata Strategist
Data Management & Access, University Libraries
University of Minnesota
170A Wilson Library (office)
160 Wilson Library (mail)
309 19th Avenue South
Minneapolis, MN 55455
Ph: 612-625-2328
Fx: 612-625-3428
ORCID:  0000-0002-3590-1242