The innovation of the codex in late antiquity -- The wooden tablet codex -- The single gathering codex -- The multigathering codex : an introduction -- Sewing the gatherings -- Boards and their attachment -- Spine linings -- Endbands -- Covers and their decoration -- Fastenings -- Bookmarks and board corner straps

This book is a volume in the Penn Press Anniversary Collection. To mark its 125th anniversary in 2015, the University of Pennsylvania Press rereleased more than 1,100 titles from Penn Press's distinguished backlist from 1899-1999 that had fallen out of print. Spanning an entire century, the Anniversary Collection offers peer-reviewed scholarship in a wide range of subject areas.

Sheds light on the concept of late antiquity and the events of its time, showing that this was in fact a period of great transformation

Beyond tree calf: bindings decorated by staining -- Not altogether unpleasing: the experiment with canvas bindings -- Wrapped with care: overcovers -- Good enough for Galileo: books made for scholars -- A gift from the desert: a report on the Nag Hammadi codices / co-authored with Pamela Spitzmueller -- A model approach.

An expanded version of a series of lectures, supplemented with the results of ten years of intensive research in major libraries on the Continent, the United Kingdom and the USA, this major volume surveys the evolution of binding structures from the introduction of the codex two thousand years ago to the close of the Middle Ages.