The History of the Kingdom of The West
Arts and Sciences -- Miscellaneous

Book -- Peermalion, Donata Bonacorsi


The Box - a dark burgundy velvet, it sort of sucks the light up

The inside of the box, with the 'bee' lining
"Although keeping books in boxes is quite period. This box is of modern
construction, covered in dark burgundy silk velvet with silk bee damask lining." -- Donata

The documentation and the book in the box

The Book -- cover/side view
"The book is bound in a late Gothic/early Renaissance manner with the
quires and end sheets sewn onto leather thongs with integral wrapped
end-bands also on leather thongs. The thongs then move over the outside
of the oak boards in the Gothic fashion. They were then sewn into "v"
shaped channels chipped out of the inner face of the boards. Finally,
the book is covered in vegetable tanned goat skin." -- Donata

The Book -- side view, showing the ribbons used to tie it closed
"The leather and metal clasps used from ancient times were no longer
strictly needed with the advent of paper that, unlike vellum and
parchment, folded easily and didn't fight to open itself. In Italy there
were signs of using ribbon for closures. In the portrait of Jacopo
Strada by Titian in 1568, Titian shows two books using ribbon closures
in the background." -- Donata

The Book -- the inside liner
"Blank pages were added to the front and back of the binding to stablize
the book as early as the 1200's." -- Donata

The Book -- the title page
"The layout is set in the style of the books of the time, with text near
the gutter with wide margins on the outside and bottom. Because the
paper is fairly thin, the text is set on only one side to improve legibility.

"The typeface used for the majority of the book is Adobe's version of
Claude Garamond's type. Active from 1510, Garamond was the first type
designer and punch cutter that worked on his own, unconnected to any
printing firm. He established an independent type foundry around 1530,
and the legibility of his Roman type is credited with a major role in
eliminating Gothic style type from most of Europe." -- Donata


The Book -- the colophon
"The colophon (title page) is placed in the back in the fashion of
incunabula--books printed from around 1450 to the early sixteenth
century. It was handset in two contemporary typefaces Engravers
oldstyle and Bembo (named after Pietro Bembo, the author of De Aetna in
1495, printed of Aldus Manutius). Although it was unusual for these two
types to appear on the same page, the colophon would normally be set
with a more ornate type than the body text and I simply ran out of
"v's"." -- Donata
A book of the play "Peermalion", written by Aldith Angharad St. George, this was a gift
to Aldith by Donata Bonacorsi (aka Donata Ivanovna Basistova).

Photo and Contribution
by Hirsch von Henford

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The West Kingdom History Website was created by and is maintained by Hirsch von Henford (mka Ken Mayer).