You learn something every day. Today I visited Neatorama and encountered this seventeenth-century Old Testament bound in "concertina" fashion. I can't imagine a practical utility to this; perhaps it was a whimsical creation of the bookbinder to please a wealthy patron.
Readers who did not encounter concertinas in their youth can brush up on the subject at the Wikipedia page. Interestingly, there is a subtype of pop-up book called a "tunnel book" that is structured in a concertina fashion -
Tunnel books (also called peepshow books) consist of a set of pages bound with two folded concertina strips on each side and viewed through a hole in the cover. Openings in each page allow the viewer to see through the entire book to the back, and images on each page work together to create a dimensional scene inside. This type of book dates from the mid-18th century and was inspired by theatrical stage sets. Traditionally, these books were often created to commemorate special events or sold as souvenirs of tourist attractions. The term "tunnel book" derives from the fact that many of these books were made to commemorate the building of the tunnel under the Thames River in London in the mid-19th century. In the United States, tunnel books were made for such attractions as World's Fairs and the New York Botanical Gardens.
You learn something every day.
Fascinating yet impractical.
ReplyDeleteI suppose it saves material. That is assuming the four books shown need a spine for stability at that thickness and cannot be bound with fewer thicker spines. Four individual books would require leather and other materials to form 8 covers (1 front and 1 back each). This configuration binds four books with the same number of spines, but only 5 covers.
ReplyDeleteThat would make sense. Thanks, Dan.
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