| Abstract: | SUMMARY. The results from a previously published survey done at the Uppsala University Library (Uppsala universitetsbibliotek - UUB), see Appendix, has been the basis for the present surveys done at the Royal Library (Kungliga biblioteket - KB), the National Archives (Riksarkivet - RA) and the Gothenburg Universty Library (Göteborgs universitetsbibliotek - GUB). The surveys have been made within a national research and development project on paper conservation and carried out in two ways. KB and RA made a Stanford survey with random sampling of the books to be tested and GUB made a survey on the same books, present in their library, that had been tested in the UUB survey in Uppsala with the purpose of detecting possible effects of different preservation environments. The results of this report are, in short, the following: ˙The number of books with paper in bad condition (P 3) is roughly the same at RA and KB, about 20%. The UUB survey showed a similar result. ˙The highest number of books with bad paper - in proportion to the amount of tested books - is from a period between 1860 to 1890. The same goes for UUB. Regarding the amount of deteriorated paper and the timing, the results are unambiguous and probably representative on a national level. ˙RA has a great amount of paper with P 2-grading (worn), 30%. One explanation could be the nature of archive materials - it is "worn" already when it arrives at the archives. Another explanation could be that R A has a relatively large number of samples from the first half of the 19th century, which means they are almost entirely made out of rag. Especially the survey results from GUB showed that paper made of this fiber has a tendency to fall into the P 2 category owing to unfavorable visual appearance. ˙The papers tested in the comparison between UUB and GUB that have the same P-values show low content of groundwood. It is the reverse with paper that have different P-values in UUB and GUB. Here there is a greater amount of groundwood present, which confirms other results on the instability of groundwood and its sensitivity to preservation environments. ˙The distribution of P-values in the group of papers with more or less content of groundwood shows that the preservation environment has been more favorable in UUB than in GUB. Extensive deterioration of paper in books and documents has been detected in the Swedish collections investigated. The main picture of the situation differs quite a lot, however, from a recently published survey made in some libraries in the Nordic countries. The differences can be explained on methodological grounds and the way the survey was performed. The results in this report show more resemblance with results from known international surveys though the state of the deterioration is not as alarming in Sweden. A conclusion is that the results stress the importance of deepening our knowledge about the influence of climate and the preservation environment on the deterioration of paper. |
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