Abstract

Even if almost no printing manual mentions it, there is a lot of evidence that books, since the period of the incunabula, and in the most various latitudes of Europe, have been printed for a long time according to the technique of setting by formes, and not in the sequential order of reading. This has important impli- cations not only for the history of the book, but also for philologists who deal with textual bibliography. Instead, the Institución y origen del arte de la imprenta y reglas generales para los componedores by Alonso Víctor de Paredes (1680-1682) offers meticulous and precious details on this fundamental printing technique