Since I last wrote about our Antiphonal, much has happened. We brought the book back to the lab, thinking a quick cleaning, consolidation of the text block and board tightening would just be an outpatient treatment. But as we all have had the experience- the job got bigger and more people got involved. Now after many months we are on the home stretch to return the Antiphonal back to Special Collections in a far superior state than a quick job would have resulted in.
During the first examination Giselle and I discovered that the pages were really quite soiled, so every page needed a good going over with the hepa vac.
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| A close up of an endband unraveling and poor board attachment. |
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| On the other end, the core of the endband has completely pulled away. |
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| New linings and reinforcing the sewing for the endsheets. Also, new primary endbands. | |
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We were able to call on the expertise of Greg Elder, the college carpentry instructor. Here, he is getting ready to even out the edge of the lower board in order to attach a new extension. The lower board had about 6 inches missing at the foredge.
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| Putting the new extension in place. |
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| Securing all points. |
A new foredge to support the back pages. This will be covered in leather after some of the other loses are filled in.
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| Endband before repair... |
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| ...and after. |
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| All wrapped up. Reattaching the leather. |
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This has been a lot bigger project that I had anticipated. A large part of the time was figuring out what to do and how to do it. I am also working with our Jewelry instructor to fabricate some new catch plates and perhaps even some new hardware as many of the corner bosses are missing. All in all this has been a great learning experience and an opportunity to work with other expertise on our campus. I am looking forward to the final touches and the Antiphonal's return to Special Collections.
Written by Deborah Howe
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