A bookcase, or bookshelf, is a piece
of furniture, almost always with horizontal shelves,
used to store books. A bookcase consists of a unit
including two or more shelves which may not all
be used to contain books or other printed materials.
Shelves may be fixed or adjustable to different
positions in the case. In rooms entirely devoted
to the storage of books they may be permanently
fixed to the walls and/or floor. Bookcases frequently
have doors that should be closed to protect the
books from air pollution, and bookshelves are open-fronted.
These doors are almost always glazed, so as to allow
the spines of the books to be read. Especially valuable
books may be kept in locked cases with wooden or
glazed doors. A bookshelf normally stands on some
other piece of furniture such as a desk or chest.
Larger books are more likely to be kept in horizontal
piles and very large books flat on wide shelves.
In Latin and Greek the idea of bookcase is represented
by Bibliotheca and Bibliotheke, derivatives of which
mean library in many modern languages.
When books were written by hand and were not produced
in great quantities, they were kept in small boxes
or chests which owners (usually the wealthy or clergy)
carried with them. As manuscript volumes accumulated
in religious houses or in homes of the wealthy,
they were stored on shelves or in cupboards. These
cupboards are the direct predecessors of today's
bookcases. Later the doors were discarded, and the
evolution of the bookcase proceeded. Even then,
however, the volumes were not arranged in the modern
fashion. They were either placed in piles upon their
sides, or if upright, were ranged with their backs
to the wall and their edges outwards. The band of
leather, vellum or parchment which closed the book
was often used for the inscription of the title,
which was thus on the fore-edge instead of on the
spine. Titles were also commonly written onto the
It was not until the invention of printing had greatly
reduced the cost of books, thus allowing many more
people direct access to owning books, that it became
the practice to write the title on the spine and
shelve books with the spine outwards. Early bookcases
were usually of oak, which is still deemed by some
to be the most appropriate wood for an elegant library.