The craft of bookbinding originated in India, where religious sutra were copied on to palm leaves (cut into two, lengthwise) with a metal stylus. The leaf was then dried and rubbed with ink, which would form a stain in the wound. The finished leaves were given numbers, and two long twines were threaded through each end through wooden boards. When closed, the excess twine would be wrapped around the boards to protect the leaves of the book. Buddhist monks took the idea through Persia, Afghanistan, and Iran, to China in the first century BC.

Modern bookbinding by hand can be seen as two closely allied fields, the creation of new bindings, and the repair of existing bindings. Bookbinders are often active in both fields. Bookbinders can learn the craft through apprenticeship, by attending specialized trade schools, by taking classes in the course of university studies, or by a combination of those methods. Some European countries offer a Master Bookbinder certification, though no such certification exists in the United States.

Hand bookbinders create new bindings that run the gamut from historical book structures made with traditional materials to modern structures made with 21st century materials, and from basic cloth-case bindings to valuable full-leather fine bindings. Repairs to existing books also encompass a broad range of techniques, from minimally invasive conservation of a historic book to the full restoration and rebinding of a text.

Though almost any existing book can be repaired to some extent, only books that were originally sewn can be rebound by resewing. Repairs or restorations are often done to emulate the style of the original binding. For new works, some publishers print unbound manuscripts which a binder can collate and bind, but often an existing commercially-bound book is pulled, or taken apart, in order to be given a new binding. Once the textblock of the book has been pulled, it can be rebound in almost any structure; a modern suspense novel, for instance, could be rebound to look like a 16th-century manuscript.


This Electronic Library Includes All These 39 Books:

:: A Historical Sketch of Bookbinding
(1893) - Prideaux, S. T. (Sarah Treverbian); Duff, E. Gordon (Edward Gordon) - 303 pages

:: A Note on Bookbinding
(1904) - Cockerell, Douglas - 26 pages

:: A Short History of Bookbinding
(1895) - A glossary of styles and terms used in binding, with a brief account of the celebrated binders and patrons of bookbinding from
whom the various styles are named, description of leathers, etc - Zaehnsdorf, Joseph William - 38 pages

:: Bookbinders and Their Craft
(1903) - Prideaux, S. T. (Sarah Treverbian) - 299 pages

:: Bookbinding, and the Care of Books
(1911) - A text-book for bookbinders and librarians - Cockerell, Douglas - 342 pages

:: Bookbinding as a Handwork Subject
(1915) - How books can be bound with simple apparatus in a school classroom. - Halliday, John - 73 pages

:: Bookbinding for Beginners
(1918) - Bean, Florence Ordway; Brodhead, John C. - 97 pages

:: Bookbinding for Bibliophiles
(1905) - Being notes on some technical features of the well bound book for the aid of connoisseurs, together with a sketch of gold tooling,
ancient and modern. - Battershall, Fletcher - 132 pages

:: Bookbinding, with Numerous Engravings and Diagrams
(1907) - Hasluck, Paul N. (Paul Nooncree) - 160 pages

:: Book of Type Specimens
(1907) - Comprising a large variety of superior copper-mixed types, rules, borders, galleys, printing presses, electric-welded chases, paper and card cutters, wood goods, book binding machinery etc., together with valuable information to the craft. Specimen book no.9 - De Young, Charles - 1000 pages

:: Book Repair and Restoration
(1918) - A manual of practical suggestions for bibliophiles, including some translated selections from Essai sur l'art de restaurer les estampen et les livres - Buck, Mitchell Starrett; Bonnardot, Alfred - 126 pages

:: Catalogue of Ornamental Leather Bookbindings
(1907) - Those executed in America prior to 1850 - 106 pages

::Catalogue Raisonnée
(1903) - Works on bookbinding, practical and historical - Avery Library - 108 pages

:: Commercial Bookbinding
(1910 - A description of the processes and the various machines used. - Stephen, Geo. A. - 59 pages

:: Cowie's Bookbinder's Manual
(1852) Containing a full description of leather and vellum binding, directions for gilding of paper and book-edges, and numerous valuable recipes for sprinkling, colouring, & marbling : together with a scale of bookbinders' charges, a list of all the book and vellum binders in London. - Cowie, G. (George) - 141 pages

:: Encyclopedia of Literary and Typographical Anecdote
(1842) - Being a chronological digest of the most interesting facts illustrative of the history of literature and printing from the earliest period to the present time. - Tinperley, Charles H - 1160 pages

:: English Embroidered Bookbindings
(1899) - Davenport, Cyril James Humphries - 113 pages

:: Essay on Bookbinding as an Art
(1886) - With some suggestions to collectors on the care of books - 14 pages

:: A Guide to the Exhibition in the King's Library
(1913 - Illustrating the history of printing, music-printing and bookbinding. - 180 pages

:: Exhibition of Silver, Embroidered, and Curious Bookbindings
(1903) - Grolier Club - 86 pages

:: Historical Essay on the Art of Bookbinding
(1883) - Péne du Bois, Henri - 39 pages

:: Leather for Libraries
(1905) - Hulme, Edward Wyndham - 57 pages

:: Library Bookbinding
(1916) - Bailey, Arthur Low - 248 pages

::Manual of Library Bookbinding
(1911) Practical and historical - Coutts, Henry Thomas; Stephen, Geo. A. (George Arthur) - 251 pages

:: Modern Bookbinding Practically Considered
(1889) - Matthews, William - 90 pages

:: Notes on Bookbinding for Libraries
(1910) - Dana, John Cotton - 172 pages

:: Practical Bookbinding
(1903) - Adam, Paul, Maw, Thomas E. - 183 pages

:: Practical Bookbinding
(1908) A text-book intended for those who take up the art of bookbinding, and designed to give sufficient help to enable handy persons to bind their books and periodicals. - Pearce, W. B. (William Bonner) - 132 pages

:: The Printer's Dictionary of Technical Terms
(1912) - A handbook of definitions and information about processes of printing, with a brief glossary of terms used in book binding. - Stewart, Alexander A. - 367 pages

:: Printers' Handbook of Trade Recipes
(1891) - Hints & suggestions relating to letterpress and lithographic printing, bookbinding stationery, engraving, etc. With many useful tables and an index - Jacobi, Charles Thomas - 360 pages

:: Printing and Bookbinding for Schools
(1914) - Vaughn, Samuel Jesse - 152 pages

:: Report of the Committee on Leather For Bookbinding
(1905) - Cobham, Charles George Lyttleton, Viscount; Wood, Henry Trueman - 119 pages

:: Specimens of Linotype, Monotype, and Handtype
(1905) - Use in the book composing room of the Trow Directory, Printing and Bookbinding Company - 189 pages

:: The Art of Bookbinding
(1880) - Zaehnsdorf, Joseph William; Allsopp, Fred W - 190 pages

:: The Binding of Books
(1915) - An essay in the history of gold-tooled bindings.

:: The book, its Printers, Illustrators and Binders
(1890) - From Gutenberg to the present time - Bouchot, Henri; Bigmore, E. C. (Edward Clements); Grevel, H; Einsle, Anton - 383 pages

:: The Book Collector
(1904) - General survey of the pursuit and of those who have engaged in it at home and abroad from the earliest period to the present time. With an account of public and private libraries and anecdotes of their founders or owners and remarks on bookbinding and on special copies of books - Hazlitt, William Carew - 352 pages

:: The Printed Book
(1916) - Aldis, Harry Gidney - 154 pages

:: Women in the Bookbinding Trade
(1913) - Van Kleeck, Mary - 270 pages

Sample thumbnails taken from Bookbinding for Beginners.
(Low resolution thumbnails - CD images are scanned at 300 DPI)