Incunabula

An Incunabulum or Incunable is a sort of early printed book. These are products of the late-medieval or early-renaissance and the line between an incunable and a regular printed work is ~AD 1500. Gutenberg didn't crank out the first typeset page until the 1440's, so that leaves only a 50 year window during which incunabula could be produced.

What makes the incunable interesting is that it's a work produced by the printing press but before printing technology itself changed the fundamental way that books were organized. They are horseshoes made to fit the horse, rather than the mass produced horseshoe into which the horses foot is forced to fit.

The Library of Congress has the largest remaining collection of incunabula in the West today. They've digitized some of it.

Le Compost et Kalendrier des Bergiers, sample.

The differences between this form and a modern book are subtle but striking. They simultaneously possess the whimsical asymmetry of a medieval manuscript and the rigid order of machine-printed text.