Incunabula

[archbishop]

As you know this means books printed before 1501,but in Latin it means 'swaddling clothes'. Can someone let me know what the connection is?

[sft42]

Because, and as a man of the cloth should know, books before 1436 (or 1452 depending on source) weren't printed at all but hand written on pressed sheets of Velum, papyrus and the like, which often included cotton fibres as a binding agent to make the "paper" more durable....This made the making and buying of books expensive and the preserve of the monarchy and clergy.

After Gutenburg's invention this sparked a need for a cheaper material to print on the press and sparked a cultural revolution allowing books to become more commonplace.

For more paper info try these links

http://www.wovepaper.freeserve.co.uk/

http://communication.ucsd.edu/bjones/Books/printec
h.html

and best of the lot http://www.stlcc.cc.mo.us/fv/users/nfuller/paper/

[Quizmonster]

'Incunabula' did, indeed, mean 'swaddling-clothes' and figuratively, by extension, the cradle, infancy or origin of things. In book terms, it just means the earliest phases of book production....'baby-books', as it were.

[archbishop]

Thank you both.

[geofbob]

I think the previous answers may have inadvertently missed the point that the term "incunabula" is used not for manuscript books, but for early PRINTED books (usually before 1501) - sorry about the capitals, but I don't know how to do underlining or italics on AB!