Dizionario Storico Portatile (1773) – an Italian paper binding
Tocca qui per leggerlo in italiano.
I recently acquired this volume of the Dizionario Storico Portatile (title abbreviated for my sanity), which is an Italian translation of a French encyclopedia of historical and mythical figures by Jean-Baptiste Ladvocat.
I love paper bindings. It always seems like a miracle that they’ve survived centuries of handling. The seller of described this one as a parchment binding, but I suspected it might be heavy paper, and so it was!
Something appears to be handwritten at the head of the spine, but I can’t make it out.
The binding is a folded paper case laced onto two thongs, which I believe to be roughly contemporary with the 1773 printing. The textblock is sewn on the thongs two-on, and there is a fold or score line at the place the thongs re-enter the case.
Barbara Rhodes refers to this type of paper binding as a one-piece case, or limp paper case, defined by these characteristics:
The cover, made apart from the textblock, is a single piece of heavy paper, folded and creased to fit the textblock.
The textblock is sewn on tawed thongs, cords, or vellum straps, which are laced through the cover.
The textblock is not shaped and the edges are left untrimmed.
Rhodes states that the endsheets are usually of the “wrapped-stub variety,” and may or may not be pasted down. These endsheets are indeed of the wrapped-stub type and are pasted down, however the binder used the same size folio as the rest of the textblock, and hence the pastedowns and flyleaves both fall short.
Rhodes adds that this is a common early Italian paper-binding style for small books—the Dizionario Storico Portatile is 197 mm high by 139 mm wide.
The untrimmed fore-edge.
Insect tracks in the cover.
This hole goes through the entire book.
This volume of the Dizionario Storico Portatile appears to have served as a munching ground for some little insect; there are some planar tracks and some holes that go straight through the entire textblock and out the other side.
I intend to build a clamshell for this when things begin to return to normal (by which I mean the literal moment I get my hands back on a board shear). For now, within my personal library’s catalogue, I’ve classed Dizionario Storico Portatile under the bindings section of my Special Collections and am keeping it horizontal with other delicate books awaiting protective enclosures.
Rhodes, Barbara. “18th And 19th Century European and American Paper Binding Structures: A Case Study of Paper Bindings in the American Museum of Natural History Library.” The Book and Paper Group Annual 14 (1995): 51–62.
