The Quiet Revolution

There are many kinds of revolutions, and one of the most significant occurred during the Dark Ages. This technological revolution created industries that still exist, and left a legacy of increased economic prosperity and the widespread dissemination of knowledge. The beauty of the revolution is that it did not involve war or bloodshed. The event that transformed Western civilization was the invention of the book.

Prior to the eighth century, written material throughout Europe was produced on scrolls. These scrolls were manufactured from the leaves of the papyrus plant, a reed that grows in Middle Eastern countries such as Egypt. After writing on individual sheets, they were glued together into one long sheet that was rolled into a scroll. Large scrolls may have had wooden dowels attached to each side prior to rolling.

Like many inventions, the book evolved because the scroll presented many problems Scrolls were cumbersome to work with, expensive to manufacture, difficult to store and fragile. Someone searching for a specific piece of information may have had to unroll an entire scroll in order to find it. If that particular scroll were the size of atypical copy of the Torah, it would have been several feet in length. Scrolls of this magnitude are also heavy, requiring two people to lift and unroll them without damaging either the scroll or the reader's back.

Scrolls need to be stored upright, so libraries had to have ample shelf space to accommodate its girth. Finally, because papyrus is essentially dried leaves, its surface didn't hold ink or paint well, and its condition degenerated quickly in a moist environment. Because the plant grows in the Middle East, the material was expensive and difficult to acquire in European countries. Monastic scribes who spent their years copying the Bible needed a medium that was more durable, readily accessible and could be stored in the clammy, cave like environment created by the thick stone walls of the monastery.

Europeans discovered that the skin of sheep and goats could be tanned, dried, and used as a painting surface like papyrus. These skins, called parchments, took ink well, were as durable as leather, and could withstand the rigors of heat, cold and humidity. However, when they were stitched together into lengths like the papyrus had been, the end product was extremely heavy and didn't roll as cleanly as did the papyrus.

An anonymous monk decided to try a different approach.Instead of stitching rectangles of parchment together into a length of material, he folded the rectangles in half, and then in half again. This created a unit with four individual leaves that were attached at the top and at the left edge. The common edge was then stitched with a strong thread, and the top trimmed to allow the pages to turn freely.

This unit was known as an octavo (Latin for "eight"). Scribes would then write on the pages of the octavo, and completed octavos would be combined at the common edge by sewing them together. The entire piece was then enclosed by a protective leather cover stiffened with thin pieces of wood that was glued on at the binding edge. The book was born. Monks were delighted with this innovation.

The smaller size of the book made it portable, and because both sides of a page could be used, half the quantity of material was needed to create common documents. Because books are rectangular rather than round, and have a flat bottom, they were easy to store on a shelf, and less space was needed to house a collection. The availability of sheepskin drove the cost of material down, and the compact size of a book made them easier to use.