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The section is the basic building block of codex bindings. In Western bookbinding, sections are sewn through their folds, with the sewing thread securing each section to the one bound before it.
The gatherings can be seen by looking at the top or bottom sides of the book, though cheaper modern books are perfect bound with no gatherings, each sheet glued directly to the binding. The gatherings are sewn together at the spine, done in such a way that two or more stretches of thread are visible along each gathering's innermost fold.
In medieval manuscripts, a gathering, or quire, was most often formed of four folded sheets of
In bookbinding
Bookbinding is the process of building a book, usually in codex format, from an ordered stack of paper sheets with one's hands and tools, or in modern publishing, by a series of automated processes. Firstly, one binds the sheets of papers alon ...
, a section, gathering, or signature is a group of sheets folded in half, to be worked into the binding as a unit.
The section is the basic building block of codex bindings. In Western bookbinding, sections are sewn through their folds, with the sewing thread securing each section to the one bound before it.
The gatherings can be seen by looking at the top or bottom sides of the book, though cheaper modern books are perfect bound with no gatherings, each sheet glued directly to the binding. The gatherings are sewn together at the spine, done in such a way that two or more stretches of thread are visible along each gathering's innermost fold.
In medieval manuscripts, a gathering, or quire, was most often formed of four folded sheets of vellum
Vellum is prepared animal skin or membrane, typically used as writing material. It is often distinguished from parchment, either by being made from calfskin (rather than the skin of other animals), or simply by being of a higher quality. Vellu ...
or parchment
Parchment is a writing material made from specially prepared Tanning (leather), untanned skins of animals—primarily sheep, calves and goats. It has been used as a writing medium in West Asia and Europe for more than two millennia. By AD 400 ...
, i.e. 8 leaves, 16 sides. The term ''quaternion'' (or sometimes ''quaternum'') designates such a unit. A gathering made of a single folded sheet (i.e. two leaves, four sides) is a ''bifolium'' (plural ''bifolia''); a gathering of two sheets (i.e. four leaves, eight sides) is a ''binion''; and one of five sheets (10 leaves, 20 sides) is a ''quinion''. This last meaning is preserved in the modern Italian meaning of ''quire'': ''quinterno di carta''. When bookbinders started using paper, it became possible to easily stitch five to seven sheets at a time, and the number of sheets per gathering started to vary more.
See also
*Section (typography)
In books and documents, a section is a subdivision, especially of a chapter.
In fiction, sections often represent scenes, and accordingly the space separating them is sometimes also called a scene break. Scene breaks represent gaps in story t ...
* Signature mark
* Units of paper quantity
* Book size
The size of a book is generally measured by the height against the width of a leaf, or sometimes the height and width of its cover. A series of terms is commonly used by libraries and publishers for the general sizes of modern books, ranging from ...
* Octavo
* Imposition
Imposition is one of the fundamental steps in the prepress printing process. It consists of the arrangement of the printed product's pages on the printer's sheet, in order to obtain faster printing, simplify binding and reduce paper waste.
Corr ...
References
Book terminology Bookbinding {{book-art-stub