[Heb-NACO] Maccabees/Hasmoneans

[Kuperman, Aaron]

LCSH usually goes with popular misnomers (e.g. use of the "Antisemitism" and "Philosemitism" even though the terms have nothing to do with the semitic language family),  and popular usage identifies the Hasmoneans as the Maccabees.  However families are in theory now to be established in the NAF under RDA, but no one seems to be too anxious to address the implications of this (I checked the Windsors, Romanovs and Hapsburgs and they are still in LCSH).  However it does seem logical given the bias of subject cataloging to meeting user expectations, to use a well known albeit wrong term.

Aaron Kuperman, LC Law Cataloging Section.
This is not an official communication from my employer


From: Heb-naco [mailto:heb-naco-bounces at lists.osu.edu] On Behalf Of Barry Walfish
Sent: Wednesday, May 06, 2015 5:23 AM
To: heb-naco at lists.osu.edu
Subject: [Heb-NACO] Maccabees/Hasmoneans

Dear Safranim,

I just noticed that Maccabees is an authorized subject heading, with Hasmoneans a see ref to it.
This seems wrong to me. Maccabees and Hasmoneans are not equivalent. The Hasmoneans were around for 103 years as rulers of Judea. The Maccabees were Judah and his brothers who were around as leaders for about 20 years.
So all Maccabees were Hasmoneans, but not all Hasmoneans were Maccabees.
It would be easiest to flip the two headings, but it's true that most of the literature deals with the Maccabees and their rebellion.
Is this something that could be sent to the Subject Headings committee for review?

Best,

Barry

Barry Dov Walfish, Ph.D.
Judaica Specialist
University of Toronto Libraries
Toronto, ON M5S 1A5
Canada
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