ONE of Oxford's best known bookshops is preparing to close, bringing to an end a history of book-selling stretching back to the reign of Queen Victoria.

The bookshop business in Turl Street, next door to the Mitre, was taken over by the Janus Society 15 months ago and specialises in selling academic books. But it is holding a closing down sale, with the book shop expected to become a stationery store.

Jason Leech, creator of the Janus Society, put the shop closure down to a fall in book buying and a rent increase of 30 per cent by Lincoln College, which owns the building. He also blamed the Oxford Transport Plan, with customers unable to reach the shop by car, put off by the prospect of hauling heavy volumes through the city centre.

The Janus Society bookshop looks like being the latest in a growing line of closures, with Mr Leech fearful that the traditional book shop is no longer viable in the centre of the great university city.

Competition from charity shops such as Oxfam, who were able to sell books cheaply, had also added to the pressures, he said.

The shop, which has sold books since the end of the 19th century, was trading as Gadney's at the time of the First World War. Originally, books were sold on three floors and in a cellar, but the shop only now occupies the ground and first floor.

Mr Leech said: "People are buying fewer and fewer books. At the same time colleges are squeezing their tenants for money.

"We sold mainly academic books. But I am afraid Oxfam is able to undercut independent book shops."

With the shop expected to close in March, Mr Leach said he had wanted to maintain the property's traditional use. He hoped that some books would still be sold if the shop became a stationers, as seemed likely.

Mr Leech, a graduate of Wadham College, created the Janus Society as a "philanthropic organisation" to foster a love of language and student welfare and social activities in Oxford.

Thornton's, Oxford's oldest independent bookshop, quit its shop premises nearby in Broad Street three years ago to focus on Internet sales from a business park in Abingdon. Thornton's dated back to 1835, when Joseph Thornton opened his first bookshop in Magdalen Street.