EARLY MEDIAEVAL INK.
CONTROVERSIES AMONG HEBREW SCHOLARS RELATING TO
RITUALISTIC INKS--THE CLASS OF INKS EMPLOYED BY
THE FRENCH AND GERMAN JEWS--CONVENTION OF
REPRESENTATIVES FROM JEWISH CENTERS--SUBMISSION
OF THEIR DIFFERENCES TO MAIMONIDES--HE DEFINES
TALMUDIC INK--SIXTH CENTURY REFERENCE TO
"GALL" INK--ASSERTION OF HOTZ-OSTERWALD THAT
EXCLUSIVE OF THE INDIAN INK, THE WRITING PIGMENTS
OF ANTIQUITY HAVE NEVER BEEN INVESTIGATED--HIS
BELIEF THAT YEAST FORMED A PORTION
OF THEM--SOME OTHER OBSERVATIONS ON THIS
SUBJECT--ANCIENT FORMULAS ABOUT THE LEES OF
WINE IN INK-MAKING--COMMENTS ON INK-MAKING BY
PLINY--ANCIENT FORMULA OF POMEGRANATE INK--
SECRETA BY THE MONK THEOPHILUS--WHAT THE,
THORN TREE HE REFERS TO REALLY IS--IDENTITY OF
THE MYROBOLAM INK OF THE MOST REMOTE ANTIQUITY
WITH THE POMEGRANATE INK OF THE MIDDLE AGES--
THE USES OF THE ACACIA TREE.
MOST of the documents of early mediaeval times
which remain to us containing ink in fairly good condition,
like charters, protocols, bulls, wills, diplomas,
and the like, were written or engrossed with "Indian"
ink, in which respect we of the present century continue
to follow such established precedent when preparing
important written instruments. It is not
remarkable, therefore, that the black inks of the
seventh, eighth, ninth and tenth centuries preserve
their blackness so much better than many belonging
to succeeding ages, including a new class of inks which
could not stand the test of time.
During the twelfth and first years of the thirteenth
centuries there were bitter controversies among Talmudic
(Hebrew) scholars, relative to the character of
the ink to be employed in the preparation of ritualistic
writings. Nice distinctions were drawn as to the
real meaning of the word deyo as understood by the
Jews of the western part of the world, and the Arabic
word alchiber, as then understood nearer Palestine
and the other eastern countries.
The French Jews were using "tusche" (typical of
the "Indian" ink), while the Germans were employing
"pomegranate" and "gall" inks. Representatives
from interested religious Jewish centers came
together and resolved to submit their differences for
final adjustment to Maimonides, born in Spain, A. D.
1130 , and died A. D. 1204--the then greatest living
Hebrew theologian and authority on biblical and
rabbinical laws. Discarding all side issues, their differences
were seemingly incorporated into three questions
and thus propounded to him:
1. Is the Talmudic deyo identical with alchiber?
2. Of what ingredient should the Talmudic deyo
consist, if it is not the same as alchiber?
3. Is alchiber to be understood as relating to the
gall-apple and chalkanthum (blue vitriol)?
To the first and third questions Maimonides declared
that deyo and alchiber were not identical;
and for the reasons that the Talmud declares deyo to
be a writing material which does not remain on the
surface on which it is placed and to be easily effaced.
On the other hand alchiber contains gum and other
things which causes it to adhere to the writing surface.
To the second question he affirmed that the Talmud
distinguishes a double kind of deyo, one containing
little or no gum and being a fluid, and the other referring
to "pulverized coal of the vine, soot from
burning olive oil, tar, rosin and honey, pressed into
plates to be dissolved in water when wanted for use."
Furthermore, while the Talmud excludes the use of
certain inks of which iron vitriol was one, it does not
exclude atramentum, (chalkanthum, copper vitriol),
because the Talmud never speaks of it. He insisted
that the Talmud requires a dry ink (deyo).
As one of the last entries made in the Talmud (a
great collection of legal decisions by the ancient
Rabbis, Hebrew traditions, etc., and believed to have
been commenced in the second century of the Christian
era) is claimed to belong to the sixth century,
mentions gall-apples and iron (copper) vitriol, it must
have referred to "gall" ink. Further investigation
discloses the fact that such galls were of Chinese origin
and as we know they do not contain the necessary
ferment which the aleppo and other galls possess for
inducing a transformation of the tannin into gallic
acid, no complete union could therefore obtain.
Hence the value of this composition was limited until
the time when yeast and other materials were introduced
to overcome its deficiencies.
Hotz-Osterwald of Zurich, antiquarian and scholar,
has asserted that with the exception of the carbon
inks employed on papyrus, the writing pigments of
antiquity and the Middle Ages have scarcely been
investigated. The dark to light-brown pigment,
hitherto a problem, universally used on parchment,
he contends upon historical, chemical and microscopic
evidence is identical with oeno-cyanin and was prepared
for the most part from yeast, and was first
employed as a pigment. Contrary to the general opinion
it contains no iron, except frequently accidental
traces, and after its appearance in Greece in the third
century, it formed almost exclusively the ink of the
ancient manuscripts, until displaced by the gallate
inks, said to have been introduced by the
Arabians. These accidental traces of iron were due
to the employment of iron vessels in the making of
the ink.
My own observations in this direction confirm and
establish the fact that it was the custom in the early
centuries of the Christian era to utilize yeast or an
analogous compound as part of the composition of ink,
to which was added sepia, or the rind of the pomegranate
apple previously dissolved by heat in alkaline
solutions.
This analogous compound was probably the material
procured from wine lees (dregs), deposited after fermentation
has commenced, and which after considerable
application of heat yields not only most of the
tannin contained in the stones and fruit stalks, but a
viscid compound characteristic of gelatine and of a
red-purple color which in course of time changes to
brown.
Bloxam says that the coloring matter of grapes and
of red wine appears to be "cyanin."
One of the methods of treating wine lees, as translated
in the eighteenth century from an old Italian
secreta, is sufficiently curious to partly quote:
"Dry the Lees (dregs) of wine with a gentle fire
and fill with them two third of a large earthen Retort,
place this retort in a reverberatory furnace, and
fitting it to a large receiver, give a small fire to it to
heat the Retort by degrees, and drive forth an insipid
phlegm; when vapours begin to rise, you must
take out the phlegm and luting carefully the junctures
of your vessels, quicken the fire little by little
until you find the receiver filled with white clouds;
continue it in this condition, and you perceive the
receiver to cool, raise the fire to the utmost extremity,
and continue it so, until there arise no more
vapours. When the vessels are cold unlute the receiver,
and shaking it to make the Volatile salt,
which sticks to it, fall to the bottom, pour it all
into a bolt-head; fit it to a Head with a small receiver;
lute well the junctures and placing it in
sand, give a little fire under it, and the volatile salt
will rise and stick to the head, and the top of the
Bolt-head; take off your head and set on another
in its place; gather your salt and stop it tip quickly,
for it easily dissolves into a liquor; continue the
fire, and take care to gather the Salt according as
you see it appear; but when there rises no more
salt, a liquor will distill, of which you must draw
about three ounces, and put out the fire," &c.
The "lees of wine," in connection with the ancient
methods of ink-making is also referred to by the
younger Pliny in his twenty-fifth book, which the
Edinburgh Review has carefully translated and
printed:
"INK (or literally) BLACKING.--Ink also may be
set down among the artificial (or compound)
drugs, although it is a mineral derived from two
sources. For, it is sometimes developed in the
form of a saline efflorescence,--or is a real mineral
of sulphureous color--chosen for this purpose.
There have been painters who dug up from graves
colored coals (CARBON). But all these are useless
and new-fangled notions. For it is made from
soot in various forms, as (for instance) of burnt
rosin or pitch. For this purpose, they have built
manufactories not emitting that smoke. The ink
of the very best quality is made from the smoke of
torches. An inferior article is made from the soot
of furnaces and bath-house chimneys. There are
some (manufacturers) also, who employ the dried
lees of wine; and they do say that if the lees so
employed were from good wine, the quality of the
ink is thereby much improved. Polygnotus and
Micon, celebrated painters at Athens, made their
black paint from burnt grape-vines; they gave it
the name of TRYGYNON. APELLES, we are told,
made HIS from burnt ivory, and called it elephantina
'ivory-black.' Indigo has been recently imported,--
a substance whose composition I have not
yet investigated. The dyers make theirs from the
dark crust that gradually accumulates on brass-kettles.
Ink is made also from torches (pine-knots),
and from charcoal pounded fine in mortars. 'The
cuttlefish' has a remarkable qualify in this respect;
but the coloring-matter which it produces is not
used in the manufacture of ink. All ink is improved
by exposure to the sun's rays. Book-writers'
ink has gum mixed with it,--weavers' ink is
made up with glue. Ink whose materials have been
liquified by the agency of an acid is erased with
great difficulty."
There are but few exceptions respecting the general
sameness of ink receipts of the succeeding centuries,
one of which is the "Pomegranate," credited
to the seventh century but really belonging to an earlier
period:
"Of the dried Pommegranite (apple) rind take
an ounce, boil it in a pint of water until 3/4 be
gone; add 1/2 pint of small beer wort and once
more boil it away so that only a 1/4 pint remain.
After you shall have strained it, boiling hot through
a linnen cloth and it comes cold, being then of a
glutinous consistence, drop in a 'bit' of Sal Alkali
and add as much warm water as will bring it to a
due fluidity and a gold brown color for writing with
a pen."
Following this formula and without any modifications,
I obtained an excellent ink of durable quality,
but of poor color, from a standpoint of blackness.
A less ancient "Secreta," signed by the Italian
monk "Theophilus," who lived about the commencement
of the eleventh century, is most interesting:
"To make ink, cut for yourself wood of the
thorn-trees in April or May, before they produce
flowers or leaves, and collecting them in small bundles,
allow them to lie in the shade for two, three,
or four weeks, until they are somewhat dry. Then
have wooden mallets, with which you beat these
thorns upon another piece of hard wood, until you
peel off the bark everywhere, put which immediately
into a barrelful of water. When you have
filled two, or three, or four, or five barrels with
bark and water, allow them so to stand for eight
days, until the waters imbibe all the sap of the bark.
Afterwards put this water into a very clean pan, or
into a cauldron, and fire being placed under it, boil
it; from time to time, also, throw into the pan some
of this bark, so that whatever sap may remain in it
may be boiled out. When you have cooked it a
little, throw it out, and again put in more; which
done, boil down the remaining water unto a third
part, and then pouring it out of this pan, put it
into one smaller, and cook it until it grows black
and begins to thicken; add one third part of pure
wine, and putting it into two or three new pots,
cook it until you see a sort of skin show itself on
the surface; then taking these pots from the fire,
place them in the sun until the black ink purifies itself
from the red dregs. Afterwards take small
bags of parchment carefully sewn, and bladders,
and pouring in the pure ink, suspend them in the
sun until all is quite dry; And when dry, take from
it as much as you wish, and temper it with wine
over the fire, and, adding a little vitriol, write.
But, if it should happen through negligence that
your ink be not black enough, take a fragment of
the thickness of a finger and putting it into the
fire, allow it to glow, and throw it directly into the
ink."
After reciting many receipts which pertain to other
arts, this good old monk concludes:
"When you shall have re-read this often, and
have committed it to your tenacious memory, you
shall thus recompense me for this care of instruction,
that, as often as you shall successfully have
made use of my work, you pray for me for the pity
of omnipotent God, who knows that I have written
these things which are here arranged, neither
through love of human approbation, nor through
desire of temporal reward, nor have I stolen anything
precious or rare through envious jealousy, nor
have I kept back anything reserved for myself
alone; but, in augmentation of the honour and
glory of His name, I have consulted the progress
and hastened to aid the necessities of many men."
The "thorn" trees which Theophilus mentions are
asserted by some writers (with whom I do not
agree) to be those commonly known as the "Norway
spruce," a species of pine of lofty proportions sometimes
rising to the height of 150 feet with a trunk
from four to five feet in diameter. It lives to a great
age believed to exceed in many instances 450 years.
The leaves (needles, thorns) are short but stand thickly
upon the branches and are of a dusky green color
shining on the upper surface; the fruit is nearly
cylindrical in form and of a purple color covered with
scales ragged at the edges. It is a native of Europe
and Northern Asia. It furnishes the material known
as Burgundy pitch which is obtained by removing the
juice which is secreted in the bark of the tree; it is
purified by a melting process and straining either
through a cloth or a layer of straw. It gives forth a
peculiar odor not unpleasant, resembling turpentine.
The Burgundy pitch or rosin is soluble in hot alcohol
(spirits of wine).
An ink prepared after the method laid down by this
monk, assuming that he referred to the spruce-pine,
while troublesome to write with, would be almost as
lasting as "Indian" ink and would be most difficult
to erase from parchment into which it would be absorbed
due to its alcoholic qualities.
"The ink," remarks Montfaucon, "which we see in
the most ancient Greek manuscripts, has evidently
lost much of its pristine blackness; yet neither has it
become altogether yellow or faint, but is rather tawny
or deep red, and often not far from a vermillion."
While there are some monuments of this kind of ink
in fair condition of the fourth and succeeding centuries,
they aggregate but a very small proportion of
the vast number of principally Indian ink specimens
which remain to us of those epochs. As exemplars,
however, of a forgotten class of inks belonging to a still
more remote antiquity, careful research adduces certain
proof of their existence more than nine hundred
years before the Christian era commenced.
Reference has earlier been made to the ancient
Myrobolam ink, which was characteristically the same
in color phenomena as those which Montfaucon mentions.
These "tawny" colored inks I estimate were
products obtained from the "thorn" trees spoken of
by the monk Theophilus. The thorn trees were of
two species. The pomegranate, anciently called the
"Punic apple," because it was largely employed by
the Carthagenians for the purposes of dyeing and
tanning; and the acacia, known in Egyptian times
as the lotus. The former was held in such high esteem
that the Arabians and Egyptians made it an emblem
to designate one of their dieties and termed it
raman.
The products of these thorn, trees were collectively
used together as ink, most of the tannin being obtained
from the pomegranate, and the gum from the acacia.