I wanna be a vaquero baby

Blink and you’ll miss it, but there is a figure riding a horse hidden on a document. Also within these documents are a fancy winged and crowned crest and a symbol that looks something like a kabob. What are they doing there and what do they mean? They are watermarks and they tell us who made the paper. Just as artists sign their artwork, papermakers, bookbinders, and scribes [possibly linked to All Pen no Press] have creative ways of leaving their mark or signatures on their work. Let’s take a closer look at how papermakers did this and the amazing watermarks in this book.

Paper is one of the most important yet overlooked aspects of what makes a book a book. The quality of the paper used to create a book can tell us a lot about the people involved in its creation. This book consists of different quality papers varying from document to document. We can judge the quality of the paper by how well it has held up to the test of time, its thickness, and other subtle factors. Let's take a closer look at the paper the horse rider watermark was on.
Do you see the parallel horizontal and vertical lines covering the page? The thicker horizontal lines are called “wire lines” and the vertical lines are “chain lines”. They tell us that this is “laid paper,” iconic for its texture and visible wire lines left behind from the paper making process. These same wires used to create the paper are also used to make the papermakers watermark. After bending the wire into the shape of the watermark, the papermaker incorporated the wire outline of their watermark into the wire mesh used to create the paper. In some cases, papermakers also included their names and/or the place the paper was made.
Each papermaker's watermark was unique, just like a person's signature. Shown here are two very similar watermarks with slightly different symbols in each of the circles. What does this suggest? Since many watermarks reflected the personal preference of the papermaker, it is difficult to answer. Maybe they worked together in the same workshop or perhaps one was the apprentice of the other. What do you think they mean? What symbols do you recognize in these watermarks?
What would your watermark look like if you were a paper maker in 16th century Mexico? Would you include both image and text or just an image?

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Fold it “hotdog” or “hamburger” style?

Another neat element found when looking closely at the paper are fold marks and creases. These marks suggest that some of these documents were folded into letters or simply stored folded.

Who’s been eating my book?!

Bookworms! Yes, these real mischievous little insects love to nibble away at paper. Many of these funky holes they left behind while eating can be found throughout this book.