Towards a complete bibliography of seventeenth-century Dutch newspapers: Delpher and its applications

Throughout the seventeenth century, the Dutch Republic provided fertile ground for the expansion of the serial press. In 1946, the Swedish bibliographer Folke Dahl documented this extraordinary dynamism in Dutch Corantos, 1618-1650. He provided the first tentative bibliography of early Dutch newspapers. Since Dahl’s publication, repeated calls have gone out for the extension of his bibliography to the end of the seventeenth century. The failure to do so is in part due to the dispersed nature of the holdings of seventeenth-century newspapers. Here Delpher is an enormous aid to the compilation of a bibliography of all seventeenth-century Dutch newspapers. It provides a unique platform on which dispersed collections are brought together. Scans of newspapers in Moscow, Oldenburg, London, and Amsterdam are displayed on one digital database where content can be rapidly described, typographical developments observed, publication trends easily compared, and variants discovered. Still, the creation of a bibliography can in no way rely purely on Delpher. The resource will not replace the valuable insights gained from detailed book-in-hand inspection of newspapers.