Are Foldouts Always Shorter to Left but Longer to Right?

[ChenZheChina]

There are still unanswered questions. The early mix-up between herbal A and herbal B folios happened before the gathering marks were added. This is because, for example, the 5th quire mark is on a B folio.
There are several different possible explanations for this.

Hi René,

I’m not sure about what do you mean by mix-up between Herbal A and Herbal B. For me, there are two understandings.

1. Folios were split into piles. Some piles contain only Herbal A pages, while other piles contain only Herbal B pages. The binder did not know which piles are Herbal A or which piles are Herbal B, so they assigned gathering marks arbitrarily. The mix-up between Herbal A and Herbal B folios happened here, at quire-level. By doing so, gathering marks of 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 7th, 15th and 17th are given to Herbal A piles, while gathering marks of 5th and 6th are given to Herbal B piles. Pages were re-ordered later, so there are quires mixing Herbal A and Herbal B pages.
   
2. The pages were completely out-of-order. The binder knew nothing about page contents, so they decided to bind folios into quires arbitrarily. The mix-up between Herbal A and Herbal B folios happened here, at folio-level. By doing so, gathering marks of 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 7th, 15th and 17th are given to Herbal A pages coincidentally, while gathering marks of 5th and 6th are given to Herbal B pages coincidentally.