1894.] on Bookbinding : its Processes and Ideal. 179 



otherwise fastening the parts of the sheet to one another at the back 

 crease or fold. And a number of folded sheets or of sections, as they 

 are called, are bound by fastening each of them at the back to some 

 common support, so that when all are sewn or otherwise fastened at 

 the bach, they may yet be free to open and shut at the front, or fore- 

 edge. 



The invention of the folded sheet thus gave rise to the invention 

 of modern binding, which in its essence is the union at the back of 

 the folded sheets, which together constitute the folded book, or as I 

 might say, despite the latent contradiction, the folded volume. 



Throughout the long period which has elapsed since the invention 

 of the folded sheet — it is said to have been invented in the third 

 century before Christ — binding must have undergone many and 

 important changes. But of these changes few records remain. 

 Speaking generally of the binding of the middle and later ages, we 

 may say that at each successive epoch the form of the binding 

 adapted itself to the state of literature at the time. When books 

 were few and large and stationary, the binding was correspondingly 

 large and bossy and heavy ; and when books became numerous and 

 lighter and portable, the binding adapted itself to the new conditions, 

 and, dropping the oak boards, the brass fittings, clasps, bosses and 

 chains, became itself light and portable and beautiful. And thus 

 wood, and silk, and velvet and leather, iron and brass, and silver and 

 gold, and precious stones, were all used by the artificers of the middle 

 and earlier ages, in the protection and embellishment of the world's 

 written wealth. The invention of printing, however, and the multipli- 

 cation of books, gave the victory to leather and to gold tooling, and 

 with the invention of printing, binding passed into its modern phase, 

 and became ultimately a craft apart, the craft of the bookbinder. 



To the renown of bookbinding many countries and cities and 

 patrons have contributed, as well as the artists and craftsmen whose 

 work it has been. Singularly enough the names of very few bookbinders 

 are known, but it is well known that to Grolier and to France is 

 mainly due the gold tooling which is still the chief means of making 

 the bound book beautiful. This tooling, of obscure origin, was 

 practised first in Europe in Italy, but was soon after introduced into 

 France by Grolier, and the French schools of the sixteenth and seven- 

 teenth centuries are still the great schools of design in that decorative 

 method. 



Deserving of mention or of allusion in this connection, even in the 

 shortest account of bookbinding, are the innumerable crafts — crafts 

 for the production of materials and crafts for the production of tools — 

 upon which the binder's own craft depends. For this collaboration of 

 crafts is a fact of capital importance and should always be borne in 

 mind, that the solidarity of all industries may be understood and tho 

 dignity of each be appreciated. 



It is to be regretted, however, that at this moment the craftsmen 

 immediately concerned in making a book, the paper-maker, the 



