Williams and Abbott, Chapter I ("Introduction") --Types of Bibliography and Review of Terms

1)  Reference bibliography--what one puts at the end of an article, book, or scholarly paper to identify the authors, titles, and editions of works one refers to or cites.  Also, a bibliography (sometimes annotated) to support the study of some specific scholarly topic or field.

2)  Historical bibliography--studying the history of printing (e.g., William Caxton's press output, 1475-1491); studying the history of bookselling (e.g., networks of C17 London booksellers who also printed auction pamphlets and sold their back stock into estate auction bidding [cf. 1687-9 Chaucer Works]).

3)  Analytical bibliography--"edition specific" study of how a copy or all copies of an individual edition was made including imposition of type in the formes and on the printed paper (clues to format), type font, page layout including "skeleton" (repeating headers, footers, page or folio numbers, signatures), edition layout (front matter [title pages, prefaces, dedications], division into books or chapters, printed marginal and foot notes, tables of contents and indices, and binding (if "publisher's binding" after about 1800, or if custom bound pre-about-1800).  Serves as the basis for "copy-specific" bibliograhpy of variants in an individual copy to establish relation of that individual copy to the press run that produced it (especially for rare books).

4)  Descriptive bibliography ("desbib")--description of the ideal form of a given print edition (not any one copy) with significant/substantive variants introduced during a press run.

5)  Textual criticism--studying the sequence of alterations we detect in the printing of an edition to establish "aut)horial intention" (e.g., MS, 1st edition, revised edition, "death-bed edition" (last produced while author was alive and overseeing alterations, e.g., Whitman's Leaves of Grass) or to detect sources and effects of editorial alterations in successive editions (e.g., Malory's Morte Darthur).


Review of Terms for “Anatomy of a Hand Press Book” and Williams and Abbott Ch. 1
Can you talk like a bibliographer?  Define these terms and use them in a sentence about a book or books.

Format

Laid and wove paper

Deckles, chainlines, and wirelines

Watermarks and countermarks

Gatherings, signatures, and bolts

Imposition, chaise, and furniture

Folio, quarto, octavo, sextodecimo (extra credit for duodecimo, 32mo, and 64mo)

Some additional terms you will need for your “cadaver books”:

Foliation (“Fo.” or “Fol.” in upper right corner of recto leaves only) vs. pagination (both sides numbered)

Title pages (at front of the book) vs. colophons (at the end of the book)

Catchwords (lower right corner of the verso of leaf, matching 1st word of 1st recto line opposite)