How to reference a multi-volume book with bibtex?

Question

I would like to reference a multi-volume book, like so:

Boncompagni, Baldassarre. Scritti di Leonardo Pisano matematico del secolo decimoterzo. — Roma, Tipografia delle scienze matematiche e fisiche, 1857 − 1862. — 2 v. (in Lat.)   
Vol. I : Leonardi Pisani, Liber Abbaci = Il Liber Abbaci di Leonardo Pisano. 1857. — 459 p.  
Vol. II : Leonardi Pisani Practica geometriae ed opuscoli = La Practica Geometriae di Leonardo Pisano; Opuscoli di Leonardo Pisano. 1862. — 283 p.

The above can be interpreted as:

1. Title & info of the multi-volume book
2. Title & info of the first volume
3. Title & info of the second volume

If this is not possible in bibtex - are there some alternatives?

Answer 1

In my opinion, your example should be treated as several bibliography entries -- one for the multi-volume book as a whole and one for each volume.

Here's a minimal working example using biblatex. See section 2.3.5 of the biblatex manual for another example using a multi-volume work (and the @mvbook entry type); see section 2.4.1 for reasons why biber (instead of BibTeX) is recommended as a backend when using the crossref mechanism.

\documentclass{article}

\usepackage[latin,english]{babel}

\usepackage[backend=biber]{biblatex}

\usepackage{filecontents}

\begin{filecontents}{\jobname.bib}
@mvbook{Bon,
  language = {latin},
  author = {Boncompagni, Baldassarre},
  year = {1857/1862},
  title = {Scritti di Leonardo Pisano matematico del secolo decimoterzo},
  volumes = {2},
  location = {Roma},
  publisher = {Tipografia delle scienze matematiche e fisiche},
}    
@book{BonI,
  year = {1857},
  title = {Leonardi Pisani, Liber Abbaci = Il Liber Abbaci di Leonardo Pisano},
  volume = {1},
  pagetotal = {459},
  crossref = {Bon},
}    
@book{BonII,
  year = {1862},
  title = {Leonardi Pisani Practica geometriae ed opuscoli = La Practica Geometriae di Leonardo Pisano; Opuscoli di Leonardo Pisano},
  volume = {2},
  pagetotal = {283},
  crossref = {Bon},
}
\end{filecontents}

\addbibresource{\jobname.bib}

\nocite{*}

\begin{document}

\printbibliography

\end{document}

Answer 2

I would use the indexsorttitle-field (or perhaps the sorttitle-field) writing something like

indexsorttitle = {Scritti di Leonardo Pisano matematico del secolo decimoterzo0001} for the first volume and indexsorttitle = {Scritti di Leonardo Pisano matematico del secolo decimoterzo0002} for the second one so in the bibliography they appear directly after the multivolume entry.

The fields are described in section 2.2.3 of the BibLaTeX-manual.

Answer 3

Thanks for the input all, but I've come up with a solution using @Set. Note that this will also show only the @Set entry in the bibliography - not any of the entries that compose it:

@Book{Boncompagni_2_vol,
  author="Boncompagni, Baldassarre",
  title="Scritti di Leonardo Pisano matematico del secolo decimoterzo.",
  address="Roma", 
  publisher="Tipografia delle scienze matematiche e fisiche",
  date={1857/1862},
  volumes = {2},
  note="(in Lat.)"
}
@Book{Boncompagni_vol_1,
  volume = {I},
  title="Leonardi Pisani, Liber Abbaci = Il Liber Abbaci di Leonardo Pisano.",
  date={1857},
  pagetotal={459},
}
@Book{Boncompagni_vol_2,
  volume={II},
  title= "Leonardi Pisani Practica geometriae ed opuscoli = La Practica Geometriae di Leonardo Pisano; Opuscoli di Leonardo Pisano.",
  date={1862},
  pagetotal={283},
}

@Set{Boncompagni_collection,
  entryset={Boncompagni_2_vol, Boncompagni_vol_1, Boncompagni_vol_2},
}