Block Cutter at Work woodcut by Jost Amman, 1568.
Woodcuts were one of the first inventions in the western world for adding pictures to books instead of drawing in them. These are pieces of wood cut in relief and reversed (like a stamp). Ink is then rolled onto them like on a press before they're pressed to the paper or parchment.
The Art of Etching and Engraving, anonymous etching published in The Universal Magazine (1748). Copyright by the Trustees of the British Museum.
Engravings are similar to woodcuts in that they're carved in reverse, but they are different in that instead of carving out what you don't want to see (in relief) you carve out what you do want to see. Copper plate engravings have a very different process for inking and printing than woodcuts. With copper plates, the ink needs to be massaged into the grooves into plate and the excess wiped off. In addition, tradition hand presses don't exert enough pressure to force paper or parchment into the grooves of the copper plate, so engraving must be printed using a rolling press.
Smellie, William. Encyclopaedia Britannica; or, A Dictionary of Arts and Sciences, Compiled upon a New Plan ... : Illustrated with One Hundred and Sixty Copperplates. Edinburgh: Printed for A. Bell and C. Macfarquhar; and sold by Colin Macfarquhar ..., 1771. Print. https://digital.nls.uk/144811733.
So how does the press work? Using the image above, let's walk through the process of printing a sheet of paper/parchment before 1800. Once the paper is made (video demonstration to the right), the type cast, and the book commissioned, the first person to start production of the printed book is the composer. This is the person who takes the pieces of type and puts them in order on the composing stick (also pictures above) to create the pages. Once each line of text is composed, they will put them in order in what is called the form (q). Once the pages are compiled and the form complete, it will be placed in the chaise (m).
Next, one person will use the ink balls (n) to ink the type. Ink at this time was not as smooth as inky today and was much tackier, so this was one with a rocking motion, rather than simply rolling it on. While this is happening, the other person puts the paper/parchment into the tympan (o) and pulls the frisket (p) down over the paper/parchment in order to keep it in place and protect the margins from any excess ink. Once the type is inked and ready, the parchment will be folded over on top of it.
Unseen in this image, there is a crank around hip height used to move the horizontal portion of the press underneath the platen (f). Then, the second crank (k) is pulled across the person's chest, and this is the mechanism that pushes the platen down to press the paper/parchment into the type and transfer the ink. Then, this is done for however many copies of the book will be printed, and the pages are hung to dry.
In the hand press era, the printing and binding of books were completely separate processes that happened by different professionals at different businesses. Often times, when someone purchased a book, they would purchase just the pages, uncut and unbound, and take it to a binder to perform the cutting and binding.
The process of binding a book involves ordering, cutting, sewing, and gluing pages together to form what we know as the 'codex.' The word "book" technically means a lot of different things: a scroll, a clay tablet, a digital pdf, or a bound codex. This is just one way a book can be created and interfaced!
Look to the links above for a step by step process of a medieval binding.