THE ANTIQUARIAN LIBRARY FUNCTIONS AND THEIR APPLICATION IN CONTEMPORARY LIBRARIES OF PAKISTAN

Abstract

Human beings are the only species which, during the course of
its evolution, has developed the ability and mediums to store the
information outside its brain. The libraries, since ancient times,
have been housing and maintaining this extra-somatic
information. Throughout the recorded history of mankind they
have been instrumental in preserving and transferring the
intellectual memory to succeeding generations. Libraries have
connected us with our ancestors by collecting, organizing and
preserving all types of knowledge resources. This has enabled
us to live in a world of cumulative awareness to further build on
it, instead to reinvent the wheel again and again. One could well
term it as a perpetuation of dialogue between the ages. Shera
(1970) described: