Over het boekenbezit van Gerrit Jan Mulder, aan de hand van een veilingcatalogus

Abstract

On the library of Gerrit Jan Mulder, judged from the contents of an auction-catalogue Gerrit Jan Mulder (1802-1880) was the most famous Dutch chemist of the mid-19th century, and especially well-known as the founder of a teaching laboratory at the Medical School of Rotterdam and, later, at Utrecht University. This article describes the contents of a recently discovered catalogue of an auction of Mulder's books, which was held in February 1881, and gives an interpretation of the findings. A comparison with Mulder's autobiography shows that large parts of his library are not contained in this catalogue. Nevertheless, Mulder's fields of research and teaching are well mirrored by the contents of this book-list, as is his dramatic turning away from chemistry after his retirement in 1867. Mulder must have had a large collection of books on general chemistry and most of the chemical journals of the day. His university laboratory lacked a chemical library, though, and it is argued that this fact is well in line with Mulder's rather traditional attitude towards his professorship, characterised by a strong emphasis on his personal responsibility. In Mulder's opinion it was the personal duty of a professor — and not of the university — to buy the latest scientific literature. This attitude is compared to that of chemists like Liebig, Kolbe and Hofmann, who all founded flourishing research schools and also stressed the necessity for students to have the most recent chemical publications at hand. They all set up special laboratory libraries. This part of the institutionalisation of the university laboratory was clearly missed by Mulder — his own library gives ample proof of that.