Archiviazione dei dati museali: l'esperienza dell'Erbario di Roma

The Herbarium of Rome (RO) has never had a general catalogue. RO stores about one milion specimens and most labels are handwritten and often more or less cryptic to all but the most experienced users. A catalog covering the whole RO Herbarium is for the time being unrealistic. A priority list has been produced. Near the top of the list we have placed the nearly 100.000 specimens belonging to "Flora Romana", our local flora. Recently the University of Rome "La Sapienza" and IBM Semea have joined to produce a program for the visual presentation and catalogation of Museum items. The IBM partner provides the hardware, most of the software, part of the man power and computer know-how. Our catalogue, based on a data base sistem with image fields, takes into consideration also historical and topographical data. Image fields should be devoted to the specimen labels containing information not interpretable during the filing. Such system would also accomplish the separation of labels from specimen. A solution that could help specimen preservation.