Bookmark
A bookmark is a thin marking tool, commonly made of
. Some books may have one or more bookmarks made of woven ribbon sewn into the binding. Furthermore, other bookmarks incorporate a page-flap that enables them to be clipped on a page.History
According to new results of the research done on the history of bookmarks, there are indications that bookmarks have accompanied codices since their first emergence in the 1st century AD.[1] The earliest existing bookmark dates from the 6th century AD and it is made of ornamented leather lined with vellum on the back and was attached with a leather strap to the cover of a Coptic codex (Codex A, MS 813 Chester Beatty Library, Dublin).[2] It was found near Sakkara, Egypt, under the ruins of the monastery Apa Jeremiah. Further earliest bookmarks and remnants of them have been found in Coptic codices dating from the 1st to the 11th century and in Carolingian codices from the 8th to the 12th century. Bookmarks were used throughout the medieval period,[3] consisting usually of a small parchment strip attached to the edge of folio (or a piece of cord attached to headband).
Modern bookmarks are available in a huge variety of materials in a multitude of designs and styles. Many are made of cardboard or heavy paper, but they are also constructed of paper, ribbon, fabric, felt, steel, wire, tin, beads, wood, plastic, vinyl, silver, gold, and other precious metals, some decorated with gemstones.
The first detached, and therefore collectible, bookmarkers began to appear in the 1850s. One of the first references to these is found in Mary Russell Mitford's Recollections of a Literary Life (1852): "I had no marker and the richly bound volume closed as if instinctively." Note the abbreviation of 'bookmarker' to 'marker'. The modern abbreviation is usually 'bookmark'. Historical bookmarks can be very valuable, and are sometimes collected along with other paper ephemera.
By the 1860s, attractive machine-woven markers were being manufactured, mainly in
Woven pictorial bookmarks produced by
Most 19th-century bookmarks were intended for use in Bibles and prayer books and were made of ribbon, woven silk, or leather. By the 1880s the production of woven silk markers was declining and printed markers made of stiff paper or cardboard began to appear in significant numbers. This development paralleled the wider availability of books themselves, and the range of available bookmarkers soon expanded dramatically.
Considerations for safe bookmark usage
Bookmarks that do not damage the books that they are used in should be acid-free, thin, so they will not indent the pages they rest between, and include no dyes or decorative materials that might bleed into the book's paper, with flat, thin, gentle edges.[5]
See also
- Bookmark (World Wide Web)
- Dog ears
- Rotating bookmark
References
- ISBN 978-085-967-904-6.
- ^ Lamacraft, C.T. (1939). Early Book-Bindings from a Coptic Monastery. The Library, Fourth Series, Vol. 20 (1940). pp. 214–233.
- ISBN 0-85967-904-7. For a 15th-century bookmark, see Medeltidshandskrift 34, Lund University Library.
- ISBN 978-0-19-518948-3.
- ^ "Collecting Bookmarks | Book Collecting Guide".
External links
- Earliest History of Bookmarks by Asim Maner
- World of Bookmarks, Reference site featuring history of bookmarks
- History of Bookmarks by Lois R. Densky-Wolff (Archived 21 May 2012 at the Wayback Machine)
- International Friends of Bookmarks (IFOB), community website with much information about bookmarks