Defining Leather Book Bindings
(A compilation of articles from various web sites)
Book collecting began just as soon as the first Bible was published by Gutenberg in 1455. Books published in that first 50 years are called incunabula.
Prior to the printing press, written works were copied onto scrolls or codexes. The availability of paper in the 15th century made the printing press possible. Paper was made from linen rags. Today fine paper is still made from linen fibers.
Materials used for bookbinding were leather, wood, metals and fabrics over another harder surface. Book covers for cathedrals or royalty were sometimes covered with enamel paintings or pearls and other precious stones. Rarely does one of these books come on the market, but occasionally a European family will dispose of such a book.
Leather-bound books are collected widely today. The skins of adult and young sheep, cows, pigs, seals and several varieties of goats were used to make bindings. Because many books were printed on a subscription basis, the purchaser could order the binding he wished. That is why you can find two first editions of the same book with two different bindings.
Some collectors specialize in bindings. They look for particular binders or types of bindings. A binding can add a lot of value to a book. It is not uncommon to find a binder's signature on the leather or at the top of a fly page. It is tiny and easy to miss if you do not know to look for it. Some of the more important English binders were Bayntun, Riviere and Zaehnsdorf. There are many others who were masters of their craft. The binding can be worth more than the book.
Binding can refer to the binding style of a book (i.e. hardcover) or to the act of assembling a book from its individual pages. Western books were traditionally sewn, signature by signature, on linen cords or tapes, but this process has more recently been replaced by hot glue bindings which hold the spine ends of the pages together, sometimes with sewing as a re-enforcement.
The art and business of bookbinding began with the protection of parchment manuscripts with boards. Papyrus had originally been produced in rolls, but sheets of parchment came to be folded and fastened together with sewing by the 2d century A.D. In the Middle Ages the practice of making fine bindings for these sewn volumes rose to great heights; books were rare and precious articles, and many were treated with exquisite bindings: they were gilded, jeweled, fashioned of ivory, wood, leather, or brass. The techniques of folding and sewing together sheets in small lots, combining those lots with tapes, and sewing and fastening boards on the outside as protection changed but little from the medieval monastery to the modern book bindery. The invention of printing greatly increased the demand for the bookbinder's work, establishing it as a business.
Leather quickly became the choice for book covers. It wasn't the rich red with gold lettering that we see today but more likely to be vellum, the cured skin of a young goat or a lamb.
The finest binding is still done by hand. In machine binding (called casing), the cover, or case, is made separate from the book and then glued to it. The covering of the boards, usually called the binding, is most frequently of cloth, heavy paper, vellum, leather, or imitations of leather. The preferred leathers are oasis goat and Levant. Leather bindings are sometimes decorated by marbling, tooling, or embossing.
Three binding styles often stated in dealer's catalogs are three quarter bound, half bound and quarter bound. (See below for definitions) The remainder of the board is often covered in marbled paper or decorative paper, though sometimes another leather or cloth is used in place of this paper. These terms often are abbreviated and used as a prefix in descriptions, so a book that is half bound in calf would be stated by a dealer as "half calf".
Leather Binding Definitions
Full binding: Volume is entirely encased in leather (calf, sheep, morocco, etc.)
Three quarter binding: volume has leather spine and corners which occupy approx. 3/4 of the space along top edge of board (cover).
Half binding: the spine and corner leather occupy only approx. 1/2 of top edge.
Quarter binding: usually lacks leather corners and leather of the spine occupies only approx. 1/4 of the top edge.
Leather Binding: Caveat Emptor
From the Craft Bookbinding Company
There are a great variety of leathers and a wide range of quality. Any animal skin may be tanned and used as leather but they vary in their quality; strength, longevity, suitability for the purpose, etc. A good example is four of the most used leathers; cowhide, calfskin, goatskin and sheepskin. There are many types of leather use in bookbinding, but, for the sake of brevity, I will only deal with those mentioned above. All have their good and bad points.
Cowhide is tough and reasonably durable, but in its natural state is not as attractive as calf or goatskin. It does have the distinct advantage of being much less expensive. It is also comes in very large skins and can accommodate even the largest of books. With cowhide in particular, and others to some extent, one must be sure that they are getting top grain rather than a split. Splits are very easy to pass off as top grain after they have been given a nice finish. More will be said on splits below.
Goatskin is one of the most durable of leathers and perhaps the most beautiful. The most widely used goatskins are produced in Nigeria, where they are pre-tanned and sent to tanneries in Europe to be retanned. Nigerian goats are smallish animals and produce relatively small skins which will not accommodate very large books such as atlases or large folios. Natural grain Nigerian goat is both beautiful and pleasing to touch. It is, however, on the expensive side because of the small quantities produced and the limited amount of material available in each skin for a book cover. There is often a tremendous amount of "off-cut;" left over material too small for practical use.
Calfskin is smaller than cowhide, yet larger than goat and has a very nice feel and appearance. It shows off gold and other tooling to great advantage. The drawbacks to this leather is that its surface mars easily and it is less tough than either goatskin or cowhide. In older books that have begun to dry out, it often exhibits "hang-nails" that expose the inner layer of the leather.
Sheepskin probably has the most delightful feel of any leather. The aspect of sheepskin that gives it such a luxurious feel is also that which makes it unsuitable for covering books. As with other skins it has three layers; the surface or hair-side, or in the case of sheep, the wool side, the inner portion or corium, and flesh side. In wool bearing animals, the corium consists of a mass of vertical hair-like fibers that are somewhat resilient. These inner fibers give sheepskin its wonderful softness. These fibers are weak and do not hold fast to the surface layer. This allows damage to occur with amazing ease. There is little or no tear strength to sheepskin and the surface shows "hang-nails" almost immediately.
Beside the nature of the skin, the quality of leather is also affected by the tanning method. There are myriad substances used to tan leather, all resulting in different characteristics. Vegetable tanned leather is preferred by most bookbinders because it is easily molded and takes tooling better than metal or mineral tanning. Certain vegetable tannins, while they still produce leather, render that leather short-lived. This is evident in the dry powdery condition known as "red rot" or "brown rot." Others result in leather of generally poor behavior.
Metal tannage is usually incredibly strong, resilient, and of great longevity. This leather, while durable does not tool well or give the fine craftsman like appearance seen in vegetable tanned leather.
Poor tannage cannot be detected by looking at it. One has to rely on the tannery that manufactured the leather. A conscientious bookbinder will buy from a tannery that is well known for surpassing quality leather, one that has, over many years, established a good reputation.
Today there is a new product on the scene that one looking for a leather binding should be particularly aware of; bonded leather. Bonded leather is made of approximately 99% leather fibers and thereby gets away with being passed off as genuine leather. Bonded leather has none of the desirable qualities of the genuine article. Some bookbinders and publishers are honest enough to say that they have used bonded leather, but many let the buyer believe they have purchased a high quality product when in fact they haven't.
A fine leather binding can be a delight to have and behold, but when identifying book covers, buyer beware!
