| 释义 |
octavo|ɒkˈteɪvəʊ|
Abbrev. 8vo. or oct.
[L., abl. of octavus eighth, in the phrase in octavo in an eighth (sc. a sheet); F. in-octavo n.; Sp. en octavo.]
1. The size of a book, or of the page of a book, in which the sheets are so folded that each leaf is one-eighth of a whole sheet. Orig. in L. phr. in octavo, afterwards apprehended and treated as Eng. prep. and n.
1582Parsons Def. Cens. 148, I haue two editions in greeke: the one of learned Pagnine in folio, the other of Plantyne in octavo. 1607Middleton Five Gallants i. i, Neither in folio nor in decimo sexto, but in octavo, between both. 1619H. Hutton Follie's Anat. Postscr. 59 My head, my muse, I bring to thee to presse..In quarto's forme 't shall not be formed; tut! Pray, trim my head in spruce octavo's cut. 1700Maidwell in Collect. (O.H.S.) I. 313 In octavo..makes 16 pages to one sheet. 1798Creech Let. to Davis 15 Jan. (Sotheby's Catal.), Pray enquire of Mr. Cadell his determination respecting the mode of printing Burns. I am rather inclined to the Octavo. 1837–9Hallam Hist. Lit. I. i. iii. §148. 250 Mattaire..mentions a book printed in octavo at Milan in 1470.
2. A book or volume in octavo.
1712Addison Spect. No. 529 ⁋1 The Author of a Folio..sets himself above the Author of a Quarto; the Author of a Quarto above the Author of an Octavo; and so on. 1728Pope Dunc. i. 141 Quarto's, Octavo's, shape the less'ning pyre. 1834Medwin Angler in Wales I. Pref. 9 Imparting his lucubrations to the world in the shape of one or two octavos. 1850Ld. Houghton in Life (1891) I. x. 445 Wordsworth's new poem..a goodly octavo of blank verse.
3. attrib. passing into adj., as in ‘octavo edition’ = ‘edition in octavo’.
1704Swift Bat. Bks. Misc. (1711) 248 She..gather'd up her Person into an Octavo Compass. 1712Addison Spect. No. 529 ⁋3 Every Octavo Writer in Great Britain, that had written but one Book. 1799Med. Jrnl. II. 193 The mosses are..pasted to coloured octavo pages. a1852Moore Lit. Advert. v, Enough to fill handsomely Two Volumes, oct. 1862Ld. Brougham Brit. Const. App. ii. 420 In three large octavo volumes. 1875Jowett Plato (ed. 2) I. p. vii, The latest 8vo. edition of Stallbaum. |