The history of the book is written, as it were, in the very pages of this collection. A.D. White and subsequent collectors sought out handwritten books and other manuscripts that pre-dated the advent of Western printing. These books were important not only for their content, but also for their value in teaching the history of the creation and transmission of text. The leaf from the Gutenberg Bible, for example, is often used to show the first book printed in the West with movable metal type. Others, such as the miniature Bibles and prayer books, demonstrate the various techniques in printing and binding as well as the competition between printers to create the smallest (or largest!) books as novelties. The Qur’an exemplifies the uses of paper, with gold leaf pressed into it, and the medieval fragment of the Book of Hours shows the process of illumination.