Elaborate historical bindings are called treasure bindings. At least in the Western world, the main alternative to the paged codex format for a long document was the continuous scroll, which was the dominant form of document in the ancient world. Some codices are continuously folded like a concertina, in particular the Maya codices and Aztec codices, which are actually long sheets of paper or animal skin folded into pages.
Elaborate historical bindings are called treasure bindings. In the Western world, the main alternative to the paged codex format for a long document was the continuous scroll, which was the dominant form of document in ancient times. Some codices are continuously folded like a concertina, particularly the Maya and Aztec codices, which are actually long sheets of paper or animal skin folded into pages.