Rare-book

Book collecting is the collecting of books, including seeking, locating, acquiring, organizing, cataloging, displaying, storing, and maintaining whatever books are of interest to a given collector. The love of books is bibliophilia, and someone who loves to read, admire, and collect books is called a bibliophile.

Book collecting can be easy and inexpensive: there are millions of new and used books, and thousands of bookstores, including online booksellers such as Abebooks, Alibris, Amazon, and Biblio.com. Wealthy book collectors pursue great rarities such as the Gutenberg Bible, and Shakespeare's First Folio, books which are both famous and extremely valuable. Collectors of lesser means may collect works by a favorite author, first editions of modern authors, or books on a given subject. Book prices generally depend on the demand for a given edition, the number of copies available, and a book's condition. Some collectors join associations such as The Fine Press Book Association, which is aimed at collectors of modern fine printing. The Private Libraries Association also covers modern fine printing, but is much more general in its outlook.

In the ancient world, papyri and scrolls (the precursors of the book in codex form) were collected by both institutions and private individuals. In surviving accounts there are references to bibliophile book collectors in that era. Socrates was reported by the historian Xenophon to have criticized a rich young man seeking to outdo his friends by collecting the works of famous poets and philosophers. Seneca the Younger deplored ostentatious book collecting, asking: "What is the use of possessing numberless books and libraries, whose titles their owner can hardly read through in a lifetime?"

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Wikipedia