quarter covers (Q486)

Quarter covers are those which cover only the spine and the back edge of the boards. Books with quarter covers are also known as 'quarter bindings', sometimes qualified by the covering material on the spine, as in quarter calf. The proportion of the boards that they cover varies enormously according to where and when the books may have been bound, but the most common proportion is from about one eighth to one quarter of the board (the name presumably coming from the latter proportion). The term is problematic when applied to fifteenth-century German examples where the covering material may extend to over half of the width of the board, at which point the term 'quarter' seems inadequate. It is, however, such a firmly established term that it is not likely that it can be changed. Instead, a qualifying measurement of the proportion of the board covered in such books may need to be added where a more precise definition is required, as in "a quarter (55%) binding". The primary reason for the use of quarter covers was economy, and they are often found on bindings with other indicators of low-cost in terms of structural short-cuts and inexpensive materials. In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, they were also used, together with half covers to show off expensive materials on the spines of books shelved vertically with their spines outwards, in the modern manner. Quarter covers are commonly found on south German and north Italian bindings in the se