A folding book is a book or pamphlet typified by a continuous unbound paper sheet, folded as to form folios. A folding book folded in repeated parallel alternating folds, in the fashion of an accordion pleat, is further known as a concertina, accordion, or leporello.
Construction Leporello The style of folding is similar to that of the air bellows of a concertina or the eponymous accordion, such that every written page faces another written page when the book is closed. It may therefore be opened to any page. It may have a cover attached to the front and back end sections of the book, or holes in the back cover to allow the book to be "laced."Diehl, Edith. "Primitive Records and Ancient Book Forms." Bookbinding; Its Background and Technique. New York: Rinehart &, 1946. 12. Print. The name derives from a visual gag associated with a scene in Mozart's Don Giovanni, where Giovanni's servant Leporello produces a small book or paper with a list of his master's affairs, only to reveal that it is folded up and in fact is enormously long.
Folding book manuscript
A folding-book manuscript is from one of many pre-modern hand-written folding book traditions.
Modern examples
Brochure Single-sheet chapbook
See also Accordion Concertina Don Giovanni, an opera featuring the eponymous Leporello Dog-ear Folded almanac Obi (publishing) Spadea
References Sabine Gross; Die Geschichte(n) gefalteter Bücher. Leporellos, Livres-accordéon und Folded Panoramas in Literatur und bildender Kunst. [The (Hi)stories of Folded Books. Leporellos, Livres-accordéon, and Folded Panoramas in Literature and the Visual Arts.]. Poetics Today 1 September 2022; 43 (3): 583–587. doi: https://doi.org/10.1215/03335372-9780445