[DCRM-L] Strangely bound book: explanations?

[Deborah J. Leslie]

Hi Nina,

Having a little bout of book envy (how come she gets to handle a real book and I don't?) (-;

Two copies have been digitized, Harvard <https://bit.ly/35DeXQ4> and University of Michigan<https://bit.ly/3beFGUj>. It's hard to say much of anything about the book block, except that they both seem to be trimmed. Looking at the digitized covers (Harvard has back cover only digitized), they look like they both might be a maroon cloth, while yours might be quarter boud in parchment with green cloth?

That in itself doesn't say much because we know that 19th-century publishers often issued the same texts in different bindings, but I wonder if the different binding is a clue. Anyone on this list more conversant with late 19th-century printing and binding practices?

______________________________
Deborah J. Leslie, MA, MLS (she/her) | Folger Shakespeare Library | 201 East Capitol St., SE, Washington, DC 20003 | 202.675-0369 | djleslie at folger.edu | www.folger.edu
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From: DCRM-L <dcrm-l-bounces at lib.byu.edu> on behalf of Nina Whittaker <nina.m.whittaker at gmail.com>
Sent: Thursday, May 7, 2020 01:52
To: dcrm-l at lib.byu.edu <dcrm-l at lib.byu.edu>
Subject: [DCRM-L] Strangely bound book: explanations?

Kia ora / hello colleagues, and greetings from New Zealand. My name is Nina Whittaker, and I'm the cataloguing librarian at the Auckland War Memorial Museum. I hope you are all managing to stay well in these changing times.

I have just encountered the strangest book, and I was hoping someone might have an explanation for it. It is, all in all, bizarre. It's an 1884 book (OCLC Number: 5806137): $a Two treatises on civil government /$cby John Locke ; preceded by Sir Robert Filmer's "Patriarcha" ; with an introduction by Henry Morley.

It's been case bound, and the top edge is lovely and smooth and gilded. However, the bottom edge and fore-edge are a mess, because each gathering seems to be made up of a whole bunch of different-sized sheets, some of which have deckled edges, and some of which are completely unopened. I don't think it's a simply unopened or uncut book though, because some leaves are perfectly cut (as per below), and there are open pages which are smaller than some of the unopened sets of pages.

There is a consistent signature pattern throughout, with A1-A2, B1-B2, etc. being signed. Each signature has sixteen leaves, and they seem to have two recurring patterns.

Unopened/opened/cut/uncut: leaf pattern for signatures B, D, F etc.:

  1.  Two smaller, opened leaves;
  2.  4 larger leaves with deckled fore-edges, the latter 2 of which are unopened along bottom edge;
  3.  2 smaller pages unopened along bottom edge;
  4.  1 set of 4 leaves, unopened along fore-edge and bottom edge;
  5.  1 set of 4 leaves, deckled on bottom edge and unopened on fore-edge.

Leaf pattern for signtatures A, C, E, etc. (no deckled edges in these ones):

  1.  4 opened and cut leaves, but all of odd sizes;
  2.  2 sets of 2 leaves each, unopened along bottom edge;
  3.  1 set of 4 leaves, unopened along fore-edge and bottom edge;
  4.  1 set of 4 leaves, unopened along fore-edge, inner pages mismatched in length.

The font and printing are consistent throughout, but the paper changes with the different leaf patterns in each signature. I thought it might be a sophisticated copy, but don't know why it has been bound with the top edge gilded and neat, and the rest of the book unopened/uncut/mismatched. If anyone has any ideas or explanations, I'd love to know! This one well and truly has me stumped...

Sending you all warm and bookish regards from Auckland,
Nina

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