# Librarians: Filing compound names **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [March 30, 2003, 1:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/librarians-filing-compound-names/165126 "2003-03-30T01:23:35Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![N9IWP](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/n9iwp/32/3154_2.png) [@N9IWP](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/N9IWP)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2003, 1:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/librarians-filing-compound-names/165126/1 "2003-03-30T01:23:35Z")
I was looking for a book by L Spague de Camp at Barnes & Noble. I didn’t find it–I looked in the "s"s, "d"s and "c"s. (Fiction books are alpha by author) How are compound names handled? Is “Mc” expanded to “Mac”? “St” expanded to “Saint” (Ex: Jill St. John tho I don’t think she has written any books). I’m guessing in general it is by the first section of the name. What about people who change thier name? Is Pope John-Paul under “J” or “w”? Are names in different languages transliterated first (Sun-Tzu)? Any insight would be appreciated Brian ---
**Author:** ![BobT](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/8e8cbc/32.png) [@BobT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobT)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2003, 1:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/librarians-filing-compound-names/165126/2 "2003-03-30T01:39:40Z")
“John Paul II, Pope” “St. John, Jill” “Saint, Eva Marie” At my library, “Mc” is equal to “Mac”. As for names in different languages, it depends. You would need to have access to the name authority file. ---
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2003, 2:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/librarians-filing-compound-names/165126/3 "2003-03-30T02:08:29Z")
You should see the [Library of Congress database](http://catalog.loc.gov/) to look up the “name authority” (that means the standardized form of the name that is used in all catalog entries; the other variant forms of the name are cross-referenced to the authority form. Or, in the modern day, linked to the page with the authority form). The book _Anglo-American Cataloging Rules_, 2nd ed., goes into exhaustive detail on how to format a multipart name. The procedure is a bit different for each country, language, or culture. _AACR2_ runs down each of them individually. Mc equal to Mac? I thought that was obsolete years ago. Are you still using card catalogs? ---
**Author:** ![lel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8797f3/32.png) [@lel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lel)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2003, 2:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/librarians-filing-compound-names/165126/4 "2003-03-30T02:13:28Z")
Another thing you might want to note is that the way that a bookstore will organize its books is different from the way books are organized in a library. ---
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2003, 4:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/librarians-filing-compound-names/165126/5 "2003-03-30T04:06:01Z")
**lel** — that sort of thing is at the discretion of the individual bookstore manager, I suppose, but more and more these days the book business organizes its data fields along library catalog lines. For one obvious example, look at how [amazon.com](http://amazon.com) finds similar items to your purchases: it correlates Library of Congress Subject Headings (you can see them displayed as links on the purchase information page for each book). One of the main central databases for finding where to order current titles is Bowker’s _Book in Print_, which files authors according to Library of Congress name authorities, and subjects according to Library of Congress Subject Headings. I believe the major book jobbers like Blackwell also organize their stock along library lines. It’s such a colossal task to keep track of authors, titles, and subjects, if the library catalogers have already done this for you and the data are freely available, why reinvent the system? So the chances are better than even that a bookstore, especially a larger chain store, would file authors according to the library name authorities. ---
**Author:** ![MaryEFoo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba8739/32.png) [@MaryEFoo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MaryEFoo)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2003, 4:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/librarians-filing-compound-names/165126/6 "2003-03-30T04:45:58Z")
I don’t know the library standard, but sometimes you will see the de Alba, de Camp, de Vicenzi sequence separate and preceding the Dean, Delaney, Devore sequence. Nuisance, and one more place to look. And you can’t always trust the humans not to put it under Camp; I see you checked for that. [imho] L. Sprague de Camp, yay! “Ancient Engineers” wholeheartedly recommended, science fiction also. [/imho] ---
**Author:** ![Polycarp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/82dd89/32.png) [@Polycarp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polycarp)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2003, 5:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/librarians-filing-compound-names/165126/7 "2003-03-30T05:06:03Z")
According to Follett’s _Modern American Usage_, names with “de” as the initial element are abbreviated and indexed as follows: de preceding a two-syllable or longer name is considered a particle, and abbreviation/indexing goes by the rest of the name, as in “Maupassant, Guy de” de preceding a single-syllable name is considered an element of the name, as in “de Camp, L(yon) Sprague” What would be de preceding a name beginning with a vowel is contracted to D’ and is considered an element of the name, as in “D’Aubigny, Claire” des, du, and other variations are considered an element of the name. It’s also important to note that some French (and other language) surnames are multi-word. Pierre Teilhard de Chardin’s surname begins with “Teilhard” and would be so indexed. (I assume this is why the OP was looking under “Sprague” for de Camp’s work – considering that it might have been the first element of a surname, rather than a middle name by which he was commonly known.) ---
**Author:** ![lel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8797f3/32.png) [@lel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lel)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2003, 5:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/librarians-filing-compound-names/165126/8 "2003-03-30T05:56:37Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Jomo Mojo \* > \*\ ***lel** — that sort of thing is at the discretion of the individual bookstore manager, I suppose, but more and more these days the book business organizes its data fields along library catalog lines. > > For one obvious example, look at how [amazon.com](http://amazon.com) finds similar items to your purchases: it correlates Library of Congress Subject Headings (you can see them displayed as links on the purchase information page for each book). > > One of the main central databases for finding where to order current titles is Bowker’s _Book in Print_, which files authors according to Library of Congress name authorities, and subjects according to Library of Congress Subject Headings. I believe the major book jobbers like Blackwell also organize their stock along library lines. It’s such a colossal task to keep track of authors, titles, and subjects, if the library catalogers have already done this for you and the data are freely available, why reinvent the system? So the chances are better than even that a bookstore, especially a larger chain store, would file authors according to the library name authorities. \*\* I wasn’t particulary aware of this development, thanks for bringing this to light. Actually, I was thinking more of physical layout in bookstores as compared to libraries – how do those compare? Are there any difficulties with using a system of cataloging designed with call number access in mind when a bookstore has titles that are physically arranged in a different manner than in libraries? ---
**Author:** ![BobT](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/8e8cbc/32.png) [@BobT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobT)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2003, 7:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/librarians-filing-compound-names/165126/9 "2003-03-30T07:34:24Z")
The “Mc” and “Mac” are considered the same where I work because the people in charge of the fiction section can be kindly described as troglodytes. ---
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2003, 11:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/librarians-filing-compound-names/165126/10 "2003-03-30T11:38:08Z")
The Library of Congress name authority for the author inquired about in the OP is De Camp, L. Sprague (Lyon Sprague), 1907-. His books get the cutter number .D4 meaning they’re filed under D alphabetically. If the bookstore manager doesn’t shelve them that way, you have a right to inquire why they don’t follow the industry standard. There is a general rule in _AACR2_ that covers this kind of compound name—and thanks, **Polycarp** , but Follett is of no relevance here. American and British names with de, du, d’, etc. are treated as compounds, with the _de_ part of the name. Therefore L. Sprague De Camp and Daphne Du Maurier are filed under D. But Continental European names don’t include the _de_ as part of the name and are filed under the following element. Thus Maupassant, Guy de. Does this seem arbitrary to you? I see a rationale behind it. In countries like France and Spain there are so many names with de, it would make the D’s overcrowded if they were all filed under D. But such names are relatively uncommon in the Anglophone world, and Anglophones are more used to thinking of the de as part of the name, so it makes more sense to file under D. ---
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2003, 11:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/librarians-filing-compound-names/165126/11 "2003-03-30T11:41:16Z")
Another example: European: Beethoven, Ludwig van American: Van Buren, Martin It just seems more natural that way. ---
**Author:** ![N9IWP](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/n9iwp/32/3154_2.png) [@N9IWP](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/N9IWP)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2003, 1:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/librarians-filing-compound-names/165126/12 "2003-03-30T13:31:28Z")
**PolyCarp** , exactly. I wasn’t sure if his surname was “Sprague de Camp” or “de Camp”. thanks all Brian