Front page

This article explains the term from the book system, for the term library system see title entry .

Front Matter ( English front matter ) is a term from the book trade . It is used to describe the pages of a book (more precisely: a book block ) that precede the actual content. The page / sheet in front of the front cover is the flying sheet of the endpaper .

Components of the front page

The front page usually consists of:

• the half- title page or front title (page 1)
• the frontispiece or vacant side (page 2)
• the title page or inside title (page 3)
• the imprint page (page 4)

These pages have no pagination . Then, on page 5 of the book block at the earliest , the actual text begins. In addition, a dedication page (on the next recto page after the title page , i.e. on page 5), tables of contents and pages with forewords can be added to the front cover . The text part can be followed by an appendix , in which endnotes , the bibliography , one or more registers , a glossary etc. can be found.

Title sheet

In the past, a separate print sheet , the title sheet , was kept free for all the information preceding the text section in extensive works . It was only after the completion of printing the remaining sheets with Roman numerals paginated . So the table of contents, which of course could only be set at the end, could be arranged at the beginning of the book. Because the letters were expensive, in letterpress printing they were set sheet by sheet, corrected and the typesetting dissolved again after printing; only in exceptional cases was the sentence retained after it was printed (“ standing sentence ”).

In addition to the information mentioned above, the title sheet can also contain lists of figures and references, longer dedications , forewords and lists of abbreviations .

The tradition of paginating the front cover with Roman numerals was retained even after the lead type had ended , but this is no longer common in Europe.

literature

• Rainer Groothuis: How do books come to earth? About publishers and authors, manufacturers, sellers and designers, the calculation and the retail price, the beautiful book and related things. 2nd completely revised edition. DuMont, Cologne 2001, ISBN 3-7701-3164-9 .
• Helmut Hiller, Stephan Füssel: Dictionary of the book. 6th fundamentally revised edition. Vittorio Klostermann, Frankfurt am Main 2002, ISBN 3-465-03220-9 .
• Ursula Rautenberg (Hrsg.): Reclams Sachlexikon des Buches. 2nd improved edition. Reclam, Stuttgart 2003, ISBN 3-15-010542-0 .