Abraham Ortelius, Abraham Ortelius his epitome of the theatre of the worlde, 1603 - binding view.

Description:Binding for everyday use in Shakespeare's time.

Elizabethan books were usually sold unbound, the price being set by a Stationers' Company ordinance, or regulation, of 1586 at 1d. [one old penny] per sheet of a standard type, or three farthings [0.75 of an old penny] a sheet for broadsides and pamphlets. Special illustrated books had no set price and fine folios sold for as much as a pound [twenty shillings, one shilling = 12 old pence]. Booksellers often also acted for binders who would bind a book for a few pence for an octavo volume or three or four shillings for a fine folio.

This typical, contemporary binding of leather covering strong, paper-pulp boards has protected the book for its four-hundred years. Perhaps the book accompanied its early owners on their travels on the grand-tour of Europe, or beyond.

Full title: Abraham Ortelius his epitome of the theatre of the worlde. Now latlye renewed and augmented. The mappes all newe grauen by Michael Coignet. London, printed for Ieames Shawe, 1603.