A small lexicon of the antique book

ARMS: see Coat of Arms.

BODONIANA: printed edition by Giambattista Bodoni (1740–1813), famous printer active in Parma.

CATCHWORD: the first initial letters of the line on the next page, below the last final line of each page.

CHAIN WIRES: the set of metal wires parallel to the long side of the frame on which the paste that will make up the sheet of paper is laid (see also threads, with which they cross).

CHALCOGRAPHY: technique of making images using matrices engraved on metal plate (see xylography).

CINQUECENTINA: a text printed between 1501 and 1600.

COAT OF ARMS: or arms; insignia on the binding and/or on the title pages of the volumes, and signify that the volumes belonged to noble families or ecclesiastical orders, institutes, states, bodies and can be imprinted on the binding (we therefore speak of armorial binding, see supralibros) or within the volume (following the dedication or patronage attributed to powerful and prominent figures, see dedication).

“Armorial” binding with the coat of arms of Pope Urban VIII in the center of the plates

COLOPHON: or subheading; i.e. the page or part of a page at the end of the publication that provides information on publication and printing, and more rarely other bibliographic information; data that was then progressively moved to the title page.

CORNICE: decorative frieze, open or whole, framing the text, often present on the title pages and variously decorated with symbolic images, coats of arms and mythological figures.

DEDICATION: dedication of a book to a person, generally of high secular and religious rank, with the intention of placing the work under his protection and especially under his economic protection. It is usually found at the beginning of a work.

EDITION: printed publication of a new work, which reproduces the manuscript or a text in any case approved by the author (editio princeps). All copies, the exemplars, that derive from the same typographic composition (see also impression) belong to the same edition (see also variant). An edition can be identified as.

• anonymous: without the declared name of the author
• critical: an edition which, through a reconstruction work documented by the critical apparatus, intends to present the text of a work in the form most similar to the original one conceived and written by the author
• luxury: by size (large), materials (grain, weight and colour of the paper), illustrations, and particularly accurate in all its typography (limited number of typos, particularly refined characters)
• limited: in a limited number of copies (also numbered)
• mutilated: without part of the text (for various reasons)
• numbered: a limited edition, copies of which are numbered consecutively
• pirate: text printed, published and distributed clandestinely, violating printing privileges, often exploiting other editions already published, sometimes with the indication of false typographical notes to avoid censorship
• posthumous: edition published after the death of the author
• princeps: abbreviated form of the Latin expression editio princeps in Italian, first edition
• bowdlerised: that in which censorship – civil or religious – has cancelled some parts of the text
• renewed: edition often remained unsold, in which the title page is usually changed, and sometimes a small part of the text is modified, either by the author's will or more easily by the publisher's intervention, to be then put back into circulation
• without typographical notes: without the indication of the place of printing, the name of the printer or publisher and a date; often a trial version, printed to check its accuracy, or sometimes a pirated edition

ELZEVIR: edition published by the Dutch printing family Elzevier between the 16th and 17th centuries

EMBELLISHMENT: ornament, referring both to the binding and to the illustrative apparatus of the text (xylographic or engraved).

ENDPAPER(S): one or more sheets attached to the pastedown and placed between the covers of the binding and the printed book, to protect it and ensure better preservation. Sometimes decorated and coloured.

EXEMPLAR: the text of an author, printed on paper and bound. It can be:

• interleaved: specimen where two white cards have been inserted between two printed sheets
• unopened: a specimen not yet cut at the edge of the sheets, and therefore never read
• wide margin: specimen with large white margins around the printed text still to be trimmed, often with the paper "beards" still visible
• membranous: specimen written or printed on mutilated parchment
• mutilated: without part of the original text (often due to poor conservation)
• cut: when, as a result of a new ligature, the margins are equalised and renewed by cutting them, sometimes with loss of postils and other handwritten notes or those of possession

FILIGREE: disegno ottenuto grazie alla presenza di un filo metallico inserito nel telaio usato per la realizzazione dei fogli di carta, su cui la pasta si deposita in uno strato più sottile: a foglio asciutto è possibile vederne così in controluce la trama che può essere utile per identificare produttori e tipologie di carta prodotte.

FINAL: the frieze or figure (sometimes a real illustration) that adorns the end of a chapter or work (see also headline).

FOLIATION: the operation of progressively numbering (with a Roman, Arabic numeral etc. placed in the upper or lower corner or in the upper or lower margin) of the front only, all the papers of a printed book or a manuscript (see also Pagination). The number of cards is half the number of pages.

FORMAT: for antique books, the format is based on the number of times the printed sheet was folded to obtain the book's gatherings:

• In folio: (no folds or only one, over 38 cm)
• In 4°: (two folds, between 28 and 38 cm)
• In 8°: (three folds, between 20 and 28 cm)
• In 16°: (four folds, between 15 and 20 cm)
• In 24°: (parallel folds, between 10 and 15 cm)
• etc. (in 32°, in 64°, in 128°)

FRONTISPIECE: an illustrated page preceding the title page and generally containing an illustration and/or another title.

GATHERINGS/SIGNATURES: the product of the folding of the sheet already printed on both sides, which together with the others according to the signatures will form the book.

HALF-TITLE PAGE: recto of the paper that generally precedes the title page or can replace it, containing the title, also abbreviated, of the publication.

HEADPIECE: a decorative frieze at the beginning of a text or part of it (e.g. at the beginning of the various chapters, or even at the beginning of paragraphs, etc.). Often it is the same embellishment used for the endings.

IMPRESSION: the set of copies of an edition printed at once (in the era of manual printing often edition and impression coincide).

INCUNABLE: or incunabula, a book printed with the technique of moving characters between the middle of the fifteenth century and the year 1500 inclusive. Generally, incunabula do not have a title page and have a manuscript-like appearance.

Bartolomaeus Anglicus, Liber de proprietatibus rerum..., incunable of 1491 (from Phaidra)

INITIAL: the initial letter of a chapter and a paragraph particularly decorated with floral, vegetable, animal elements or scenes and landscapes, first xylographed and then engraved and derived from the practice used in manuscript codices, where the "initial" was usually larger and illuminated.

ISSUE: the set of copies of an edition (or impression) offered for sale at one time. If they remained unsold for a long time, they could also receive a new title page with new typographic notes and be put back into circulation as a "new" edition (successive issues; refreshed editions). Simultaneous issues are also considered different issues, i.e. they come out in the same year with different cover pages, often because they are shared for sale between two or more publishers or booksellers who share in the expenses and each sign a part of the copies, putting their name accompanied, or not, by the brand that distinguishes them.

LAID WIRES: the set of metal wires parallel to the short side of the frame on which the paste that will make up the sheet of paper is laid (see also wire rods, with which they cross).

NOTES: those markings mostly graphic and manuscript, but also printed and glued (ex-libris, tiles, labels) or imprinted (seals, coats of arms, initials), present on books, thanks to which it is possible to know in full or in abbreviated form the name of the owner(s) of the volume or its users, in which institute or library it has been present and, often, also in which historical moment. Here is a short list of them:

• annotations: all those handwritten notations (even of several hands) that, added to the text in the margins or between the lines, correct it, integrate it, explain it, comment on it; the annotations can also be personal and concern facts and events of the life of the book owner or indicate the price
• cards: mostly glued on the endpapers or on the fly-leaves, sometimes inserted in the text, can testify to the passage of a book in a library, at a bookbinder's, or a bookseller/antique, or indicate its price
• award dedication: dedication made on a donated book to students who have won a school competition, passed an exam, or a competition
• ex-dono: Lat.: gift of; gift indication followed by the name of the donor
• ex-libris: Lat.: from the books of; paper label, often with a motto and a symbolic image, and entrusted to the engraving of great artists; it bears the name of the owner or the indication of origin. On the basis of the illustrations, the ex-libris are divided into heraldic, epigraphic, monogrammatical and figurative works
• insert: a fragment, often paper or other, that is free or bound within the volume and can help to understand where it comes from
• manicula: drawing of a hand, usually in the margins of volumes, with the index pointing to significant passages or points, drawn by the owner or one of the readers of the volume
• notabilia: Lat. notable things; marks of attention consisting of underlining, or vertical lines, to signal passages of particular interest
• mark of ownership: handwritten indication of ownership of the volume often expressed in Latin to the genitive (of me...) and followed sometimes by signature, place of purchase date and price; sometimes the names of the owners are expressed with acronyms or monograms
• supralibros: the decorations imprinted on the plates or the back of the ligatures that may contain a coat of arms (see below) or the name of the owner, also expressed in abbreviated form (acronyms, monograms)
• label: small rectangular cut-out generally made of paper, cloth or other material on which a location marking can be indicated (imprinted or handwritten or printed) which, because of its specific characteristics, can help to reconstruct the origin of a volume
• stamp: a drawing of generally round or oval shape made by the instrument of the same name after having been passed on an ink pad; the symbols, legends, images that characterize it can help and reconstruct the origin of a volume

PAGINATION: the operation of progressively numbering (with a Roman, Arabic numeral etc. placed in the upper or lower corner or in the upper or lower margin) on the recto and verso, all the sheets of a printed book or a manuscript (see also Foliation). The number of pages is twice the number of sheets.

PAPER: one of the elements that constitutes a booklet in a codex or printed book, obtained mainly in the latter, from the folding of a larger sheet of paper. It consists of a front – the upper side – and a back, the lower one (see also Foliation/Pagination). They can be distinguished from each other, depending on the number of folds of the strands and wire rods and the watermark.

PASTEDOWN: he page attached to the endpaper, but glued to the inside of the boards (front and back) of the book binding. Often it bears handwritten notes of possession, ink marks, notes and ancient collocations.

PRESSMARK: letters and/or numbers or signs printed at the foot of the page on the first and usually on some subsequent maps of each issue of the publication to enable the sheet to be printed, folded and collated correctly. The set of all the marks punctually indicated in the bibliographic description is called the collational formula that allows you to understand how the book was produced and assembled. In another sense, the equivalent of Location, i.e. the address that the book has in the library.

RECTO: the upper part of a sheet of paper; it generally corresponds to odd-numbered pages (see pagination, verso).

RUNNING HEAD: title, often abbreviated, of the publication or part of it, printed at the top of the pages.

SHEET: piece of paper of variable size, thickness, size, material and colour for different uses.

SOTTOSCRIZIONE: see colophon

STATE: random variation within a publication which distinguishes it from other copies within the same impression or issue but which does not, in the intention of the publisher, have the purpose of identifying the copies as a discrete unit and is caused by the addition of a dedication, a fascicolo, a colophon, a change in date without recomposition of the title page, corrections of errors remaining after proofreading, or imposition errors (edition, impression, issue, variant).

TABLE: a simple page entirely illustrated, in the text when its numbering follows that of the text and outside the text when it has a numbering independent of the text, or does not have it at all.

TITLE PAGE: a page normally placed at the beginning of the text, which presents the most complete information about the publication and the works contained therein and which usually bears the most complete title, an indication of responsibility (Author), as well as all or part of the indication of publication (notes and typographic brand).

• engraved: obtained not from the printing of a typographic form but of an engraved plate, in which the title, the author's name and other printing data are often placed in a decorative context that represents a scene, characters, a landscape

TYPOGRAPHIC COMPOSITION: all the operations that lead to the creation of the typographic form.

TYPOGRAPHICAL FORM: the matrix that, inked and pressed on the sheet thanks to a press, will give life to the printed sheet. Due to the limited availability of the typographic characters, the forms were disposed of once the number of copies considered useful had been obtained. Therefore, once an impression had been made, if there was a need for other copies, the forms had to be remade and a second impression had to be made which gave rise to successive issues considered as new editions, which required different descriptions. Conventionally, a new issue is considered to be the one produced by the recomposition of more than half of the forms.

VARIANT: one or more copies that have bibliographically significant variations with respect to other copies of the same edition, either intentional or unintentional. The term may refer to impression, issue or state.

VERSO: the lower part of a paper, generally corresponds to even pages (see pagination, recto).

VIGNETTE: embellishment with floral elements, engraved, used at the beginning or at the end of books, chapters or pages as a decorative element.

XYLOGRAPHY: technique of making images using matrices made on wood (see chalcography).