5 Interesting Facts About Books

Discover surprising facts about these everyday objects, from why books are that shape to who wrote the most expensive one

Books are all around us, but have you ever stopped to ask yourself the important questions, like why they're rectangular, or what that musty old book smell is?

From Egyptian scrolls to eBooks, books have transformed dramatically over thousands of years. But when you hear the word book, you probably think of those rectangular objects that contain whole worlds of information, stories, and pictures.

So why did scrolls lose popularity? Who wrote the most expensive book in the world? And what mathematical phenomenon has led to the rectangular shape we know today? Sharpen up your trivia skills by watching this video:

5 Interesting Facts About Books

1. A trailblazing design

Many of us know that the Ancient Egyptians invented Papyrus and rolled it into scrolls, some of which date back to 2900BC. And although it may be hard to imagine now, for thousands of years scrolls were the only conceivable way of holding large sections of text. That is, until 1AD, when the Romans invented books as we know them today. Codices - or a codex in the singular - were a revolutionary new format with a bound spine, protective cover, and pages that you could actually turn. It was such an ingenious design, that 2000 years later… we’re still using them.

2. Why are books rectangular?

We all have books, maybe even hundreds of them, but have you ever asked yourself why they're that shape? We can partly thank our own anatomy for that: rectangles fit nicely in our hands and we don’t have to strain our eyes by following lines that are too long or too short. But that's not the only reason. Parchment - made from goat, cow, or sheep skins - was a great new alternative to papyrus, which rotted quickly in humid conditions. After trimming away the curves and folding the skins into a folio, we ended up with the rectangular book shape we know today.

3. What do a pyramid, the Mona Lisa, and a book have in common?

From the Gutenberg bible to Penguin paperbacks, many books have been manufactured according to something called “the golden ratio”. This is a mathematical phenomenon that has plagued statisticians and philosophers alike for thousands of years. Anything with this ratio in art, nature, and architecture, achieves perfect aesthetic harmony. Ever wondered why Da Vinci’s Mona Lisa, the Pyramids of Giza, and the Pepsi logo are so great to look at? They go by the golden ratio too!

4. Can you judge a book by its… smell?

Vanilla, fresh fruit, or rotten socks - what do you smell when you open up an old book? In 2017, researchers came up with something called The Historic Book Odor Wheel. What they found was that smell can tell you a lot about a book: where it came from, how it was made, and what materials it’s made of. If you smell farms and old-clothing, the paper is probably releasing a chemical called “Hexanol” as it decays - particularly common among the quickly and cheaply printed books of the mid-19th century. So don’t just judge a book by its cover, give it a sniff, too.

5. The most expensive book

It looks like a really old notebook - but this is the most expensive book in the world. And perhaps it's no surprise who wrote it, considering that his "Mona Lisa" is the most expensive painting in the world. The "Codex Leicester" contains sketches, diagrams, and ideas from Leonardo DaVinci. So, who would buy the world's most expensive book? None other than one of the richest men in the world: Bill Gates. Gates bought the book for $30.8 million in 1994, which is $54.4 million today. But look at the book a bit closer, and you will see that the writing goes from right to left, meaning that if you want to read the Codex Leicester, you'll have to use a mirror. Some suggest that DaVinci was trying to prevent the ink from smudging since he was left-handed, but the truth is, it's still a mystery.

Perhaps you're interested in making books yourself, in which case check out Susana Dominguez Martin's Domestika course, Bookbinding of Your Artwork Without Folds. Or maybe, you're interested in filling your book with stories, in which case, head to this creative writing course for beginners by Shaun Levin.

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