4 - Bookbinding 1400–1557

Summary

Since the eighth century, when the codex was first sewn on supports, western European techniques of binding books by hand have not changed much. The folded sheets or gatherings are sewn, one after another, to the supports running perpendicular to the pile of gatherings. The needle or bodkin pierces the fold of the gathering, taking the sewing thread through its centre; it then emerges on the outside of the folded sheets, circles the first support, re-enters the fold and comes out at the next support which is again circled until the whole gathering is firmly anchored. The next gathering is linked to the previous one by a link-stitch or kettle stitch near the head and tail. The boards are attached to the supports and the whole is then covered, usually in leather. Within this very basic and general scheme, there are wide variations, temporal and geographical, in materials and methods.

Hardly any decorated leather bindings that may have been produced in England during the first fifty years of the fifteenth century survive and the plain leather bindings from this period that have survived are difficult to date and to locate. Their structural differences may point to different localities or even reflect personal or work-place habits. Binders, however, like other craftsmen, moved around, they continued past traditions, as well as adopting new practices. Without firm supporting archival evidence, structural or technical features by themselves cannot be used to attribute bindings to a specific place or to date them, except very roughly.