Body text

The front matter comes before it, containing title pages, content lists, publisher's metadata etc.

[2] In some technical publications, appendices are so long and important as part of the book that they are a creative endeavour of the author, rather than a mere collation exercise by the publisher.

Where illustrations were provided, these were costly and so plates were inserted in sections, either at the end of the body matter, or grouped within the signatures.

[4] Typesetting of the body text is generally considered to be rote work: skilled, but not inherently creative.

This represented the bulk of the work, yet also that part requiring the least human creative input.