Spelling and punctuation conventions for retrospective conversion

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These instructions document past practice for retrospective conversion of catalog cards.

Do not follow these instructions in current work.


act, scene, line Spell out when devising a title or making a note. Use Arabic numerals and commas. (For capitalization and punctuation in authorized access points, follow RDA and LC/PCC policy standards.) Twelfth night, act 2, scene 1, line 5
after Not 'ff.' or 'follows' or 'following'
ART All caps when part of call number
copy Not 'c.' or 'cop.' Also for copies, as in copy 2-3; not capitalized, use a space after the word copy
cs[no.] When recording 'case numbers' omit any punctuation or space between the 'cs' and the number: e.g., cs 46 becomes cs46
Ex.ill. No space after first period, no hyphen, lowercase 'i'
fol. Folio; not 'f.' or 'fo' or 'fo.' or 'folio' when describing a leaf; BUT: folio when describing the shelf location) [art]
fol./fols In a call number use fol. when referring to one or more numbered leaves within an item) [ms]
folio When it is part of a shelf location [ms]
leaf/leaves Use for 'f.', 'fol.' in 3xx and 5xx fields [ms]; use for "sig." in notes when referring to a leaf by its signature reference notation [books]
ms./mss. Manuscript/manuscripts; (not MS or MSS) NSS: been using in 3xx (e.g. "1 ms. score"), but generally spelling out entire word in notes.
MS When part of accession records beginning MS Add
no. Number/numbers; not 'nos.' or 'num.'
p. Page, pages in AACR2 3XX fields; spelled out in RDA and notes.
PHOTO All caps when part of call number, not 'Photo.' as on some cards
v. For volume/volumes when used in 3XX fields and call numbers
Vol. For volume, when in an ART Vol. call number [art]
vs. Various; shows up in case number call numbers