Compaginate

/kəmˈpædʒɪneɪt/ verb

Definition

To bind pages together into a complete book or to join things into a unified whole.

Etymology

From Latin compaginatus, past participle of compaginare, from com- (together) + pagina (page). The root refers to joining pages in sequence to form a book, later extended to mean joining any things together.

Kelly Says

This word is nearly extinct in modern English, but it preserves the ancient bookmaking process—before printing presses, scholars would literally compaginate manuscripts by hand, stitching pages together one by one. It's a ghost word from the history of how books were born.

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