Scientific bibliographic description of collections, which includes bibliographic description of the holding items, their systematization and scientific research, serves to disclose the library holdings. The purpose of the article is to study the process of scientific bibliographic description of the collections of Russian literature abroad in the Russian State Library (RSL) in its historical development. The author shows the evolution of this activity carried out by specialists of various departments of the RSL, and using reference to specific scientific articles on the theory of bibliography explains the importance of scientific bibliographic description of collections for creation of retrospective national bibliography.

The author analyses and systematizes several dozen works related to the scientific bibliographic description of the Russian literature abroad in the RSL. This part of Rossika in the Library is mainly a single array. The work on its scientific bibliographic description is carried out in the traditional (printed) form, in modern (electronic) form, responding to contemporary trends, as well as in parallel in both forms.

The article presents the consolidated list of local databases (DB) of Russian literature abroad, created in the RSL. Two main types of DB are distinguished: 1) Established on the basis of the collections of Russian literature abroad and intended mainly for their disclosure. The names of these resources fully reflect their essence: “Photographs in the Collection...”, “Publications with the owner’s marks from the Collections...”, “Displaced cultural values in the Collection...”; 2) Consolidated databases based on the collections of Russian literature abroad and a number of other sources. It is reflected and even underlined in the title, for example: “Consolidated catalogue of periodicals and continuing editions of Russian abroad in Moscow libraries”.

The author collected and analysed scientific articles of the RSL researchers, revealing the history of these databases, the principles of their construction, the goals, objectives, opportunities and prospects. The article presents correlation between the database and traditional bibliographic indexes of Russian literature abroad in the RSL, as well as lists the cases when the DB is based on the index or, conversely, database serves as the basis for it. The author lists, systematizes and briefly describes traditional bibliographic indexes of the collections of Russian literature abroad created by the staff of the Russian State Library, as well as shows how to use technical possibilities in the indexes placed on electronic media.