Old Stellar Populations. VI. Absorption-Line

All galaxies were observed at Lick Observatory between 1972 and 1984 with the Cassegrain Image Dissector Scanner spectrograph, making this study one of the largest homogeneous collections of galaxy spectral line data to date. We also present a catalogue of nuclear velocity dispersions used to correct the absorption-line strengths onto the stellar Lick/IDS system.

Extensive discussion of both random and systematic errors of the Lick/IDS system is provided. Indices are seen to fall into three families: alpha-element-like indices (including CN, Mg, Na D, and TiO2) that correlate positively with velocity dispersion; Fe-like indices (including Ca, the G band, TiO1, and all Fe indices) that correlate only weakly with velocity dispersion and the alpha indices; and Hbeta which anti-correlates with both velocity dispersion and the alpha indices.