brass in the centre, with smaller bosses or buttons upon the corners, was also used to protect the gilding from abrasion. 
A Sumptuously Bound Book.[1]
[From Chambers.]On the cheaper books, bound in hog-skin, iron corners and a closely set studding of round-headed iron nails were used for the same purpose. To prevent the covers from warping outward, two clasps of brass were attached to the covers.
The book thus bound was too weighty to be held in the hand; it was so full of angles and knobs that it could not be placed upon a flat table without danger of scratching it. For the safety of the book and the convenience of the reader, it was necessary that the book should be laid on an inclined desk or a revolving lecturn, provided with a ledge for holding it up and with holdfasts for keeping down the leaves. The lecturn was really required for the protection of the reader. Petrarch, when reading an unwieldy volume of the Epistles of Cicero, which he held in his hands, and in which he was
- ↑ This is one of the finest existing specimens of antique bookbinding in the National Library at Paris. It is a work of the eleventh century, and encases a book of prayers in a mass of gold, jewels and enamels. The central object is sunk like a framed picture, and represents the Crucifixion, the Virgin and St. John on each side of the cross, and above it the veiled busts of Apollo and Diana; thus exhibiting the influence of the older Byzantine school, which is, indeed, visible throughout the entire design. This subject is executed on a thin sheet of gold, beaten up from behind into high relief, and chased upon its surface. A rich frame of jeweled ornament surrounds this object, portions of the decoration being further enriched with colored enamels; the angles are filled in with enameled emblems of the evangelists; the ground of the whole design enriched by threads and foliations of delicate gold wire. Chambers, Book of Days.
