stationery

thumb|Le Count Bros. & Mansur's Stationery Establishment, San Francisco, circa 1865?-1880? by Eadweard Muybridge thumb|Inside a stationery shop in Hanoi Stationery refers to sheets, pads, envelopes, rolls, reels, and books for writing on, including cut paper, continuous form paper. Stationery usually specifies materials to be written on by hand (e.g., letter paper) or by equipment such as computer printers. Fasteners, writing instruments, utensils, machines, and containers sold by stationers or stationery shops are not stationery, but office supplies.

==History of stationery== Originally, the term 'stationery' referred to all products sold by a stationer, whose name indicated that his bookshop was at a fixed location. This was usually somewhere near a university, and permanent, while medieval trading was mainly carried on by itinerant peddlers (including chapmen, who sold books) and others (such as farmers and craftsmen) at markets and fairs. It was a unique term used between the 13th and 15th centuries in the manuscript culture. Stationers' shops were places where books were bound, copied, and published. These shops often rented books to students at nearby universities. The books were loaned out in sections, allowing students to study or copy them, and the only way to get the next section was to return the previous one.