Units of paper quantity and US measure, in some sources, a quire was originally 24 sheets.) Quires of 15, 18 or 20 sheets have also been used, depending on the type of paper. The current word "quire" derives from OE "quair" or "guaer", from OF "quayer", "cayer", (cf. modern Fr. "cahier"), from L. "quaternum", "by fours", "fourfold". Later, when bookmaking switched to using paper and it became possible to easily stitch 5 to 7 sheets at a time, the association of "quaire" with "four" was quickly lost. In the Middle Ages, a quire (also called a "gathering") was most often formed of 4 folded
Codex where the membrane was folded so that it turned out an eight-leaf quire, with single leaves in the third and sixth positions. The next stage was tacking the quire. Tacking is when the scribe would hold together the leaves in quire with thread. Once threaded together, the scribe would then sew a line of parchment up the "spine" of the manuscript, as to protect the tacking. Codex A codex () (from the Latin "caudex" for "trunk of a tree" or "block of wood", "book"), plural "codices" (), is a book constructed of a number of sheets of paper, vellum, papyrus,