A sheet of printed paper folded into one of the formats, e.g., quarto, octavo. Often, these folded sheets make up a quire alone, but occasionally a sheet of paper is printed “work and turn,” meaning that the same half form is printed on each half of the sheet, on both sides, torn or cut into two half sheets, then folded once and nested into the center of the original quire or wrapped around the outside of it. For example, if this is done with a quarto format, the structure is described as “a quarto in sixes,” meaning that the original quarto has four leaves and the half sheet has two, totaling six leaves. When used by binders or bibliographers, the term quire is synonymous with signature, gathering, and section. [CB]

See also: collation, format, gathering, signatures