[615] Dioscor. lib. v. cap. 107, p. 366. Περὶ Ἰνδικοῦ.
[616] Plin. lib. xxxv. cap. 6, § 27, p. 688; and Isidorus, Origin. lib.
xix. cap. 7, p. 464.
[617] Foesii Œconomia Hippocratis. Francof. 1588, fol. p. 281.
[618] Ἔγχυλον means also juicy, or something that has a taste. Neither
of these significations is applicable here, where the subject relates
to a substance which is dry and insipid, or at any rate which can
possess only a small degree of astringency. It must in this place
denote an inspissated or dried juice; but I can find no other passage
to support this meaning.
[619] In Pliny’s time people coloured a white earth with indigo, or
only with woad, _vitrum_, in the same manner as coarse lakes and
crayons are made at present, and sold it for indigo. One of them he
calls _annularia_, and this was one of the sealing earths, of which I
have already spoken in the first volume. In my opinion it is the same
white pigment which Pliny immediately after calls _annulare_: “Annulare
quod vocant, candidum est, quo muliebres picturæ illuminantur.”
These words I find nowhere explained, and therefore I shall hazard a
conjecture. Pliny, I think, meant to say that “this was the beautiful
white with which the ladies painted or ornamented themselves.”
[620] Plin. lib. xxxv. § 12, p. 684.--Vitruv. lib. vii. cap. 14.
[621] Tavernier, ii. p. 112. We are told so in Malta Vetus et Nova a
Burchardo Niederstedt adornata. Helmest. 1659, fol. lib. iv. cap. 6, a
work inserted in Grævii Thesaurus Ital. vi. p. 3007. This man brought
home with him to Germany, after his travels, a great many Persian
manuscripts, which were purchased for the king’s library at Berlin.
Niederstedt, however, is not the only person who speaks of indigo being
cultivated in Malta. Bartholin, Epist. Med. cent. i. ep. 53, p. 224,
says the same.
[622] It is entirely different from the molybdate of tin, the laborious
preparation of which is described by J. B. Richter in his Chemie, part
ii. p. 97.
[623] It deserves to be remarked, that the Greek dyers, speaking of a
fermenting dye-pan covered with scum, used to say, like our dyers, that
it had its flower, ἐπάνθισμον. In Hippocrates the words ἐπάνθισμα
ἀφρῶδες denote a scum which arises on the surface. Among the Latins
_flos_ in this sense is very common.
[624] Caneparius de Atramentis, Rot. 1718, 4to, v. 2. 17.--Valentini
Museum Museor. i. p. 225.--Pomet, i. p. 192.
[625] See his edition of Dioscorides, Colon. 1529, fol. p. 667.
[626] Lib. xxxvii. 10. sect. 61, p. 791.
[627] Lib. xxxv. cap. 6.
[628] _Perfici_ is a term of art which is often used to express
the finishing or last labour bestowed upon any article: _Vasa sole
perficiuntur_. When vessels of earthen-ware have been formed, they must
be suffered to dry and become hard in the sun. See Hardouin’s index to
Pliny.
[629] Gum and gummy substances of every kind used to make ink thicker
and give it more body, were called _ferrumen_. See Petronius, cap. 102,
15.
[630] Vitruv. vii. 10, p. 246.
[631] Lib. xxxv. cap. 7.
[632] Exercitat. Plin. p. 816, b. And in the Annotationes in Flavium
Vopiscum, p. 398, in Historiæ Augustæ;, Paris, 1620, fol.
[633] De Composit. Pharmac. secundum locos, lib. iv. cap. 4. Edit.
Gesn. Class. v. p. 304.
[634] Lib. iv. cap. 7.
[635] Salmasii Exercitat. Plin. p. 908, a.
[636] Pauli Æginetæ libri vii. Basiliæ, 1538, fol. p. 246, lib. vii.
[637] Parabilium lib. i. 161, p. 43.
[638] Salmasius in Homonymis Hyl. Iatr. p. 177, a; and in Exercitat.
Plin. p. 810, b; and p. 936, b. In regard to the manuscripts of the
work of Zosimus, which is commonly called Panopolita, see Fabricii
Bibl. Græca, vol. vi. pp. 612, 613; and vol. xii. pp. 748, 761. I wish
I may be so fortunate as to outlive the publication of it; it will
certainly throw much light on the history of the arts. It is remarkable
that Zosimus calls indigo-dyers λαχωταὶ and ἰνδικοβάφοι, in order
perhaps to distinguish them from the dyers with woad. The distinction
therefore between indigo-dyers and those who dyed with woad must be
very old.
[639] In the edition of some Arabian physicians, published by Brunfels,
at Strasburg, 1531, fol.
[640] Avicennæ Canon. Med.... Venet. 1608, fol. ii. p. 237.
[641] Antiquitates Italiæ Medii Ævi, ii. p. 894.
[642] Lib. iii. cap. 31, p. 150.
[643] Lisbona e Lucca, 1766, 4to.
[644] Ramusio Viaggi, 1613, i. p. 342.
[645] Geschichte der Farberkunst. Stendal, 1780, 8vo, p. 69.
[646] Anleitung zur Technologie, fourth edit. p. 123. I can now add,
that Roso, in Memorie della Societa Italiana, Verona, 1794, 4to, vii.
p. 251, quotes also the edition per Francesco Rampazetto, 1540, 4to.
[647] Itinerarium Benjaminis, Lugd. Bat. 1633, 8vo.
[648] Du Cange quotes a diploma of the emperor Frederick II., dated
1210, and under the word _Tintoria_, a diploma of Charles II. king of
Sicily.
[649] Ramusio, i. p. 323.
[650] Totius Belgii Descript. Amst. 1660, 12mo, i. p. 242.
[651] [They both belong to the same genus but are specifically
distinct, the species cultivated in India being principally the
_Indigofera tinctoria_, and that in America the _Indigofera anil_.]
[652] This work has been several times printed. It is also in Barcia
Historiadores primitivos de las Indias Occidentales. Madrid, 1749,
fol. vol. i. At p. 61, we find among the productions of the above
island, _minas de cobre_, _anil_, _ambar_, &c. An English translation
in Churchill’s Collection, ii. p. 621, renders these words _mines of
copper, azure, and amber_.
[653] Encyclop. vol. xxix. p. 548.
[654] His works may be found in Barcia’s Collection, vol. ii.
[655] All these prohibitions may be found in Schreber’s Beschreibung
des Waidtes. Halle, 1752, 4to, in the appendix, pp. 1, 2.
[656] Schreber _ut supra_, p. 11.
[657] See Mémoires de l’Acad. à Paris, année 1740.
[658] Statutes at Large, vol. ii. Lond. 1735, p. 250. [Dr. Ure,
however, says that indigo was actually denounced as a dangerous drug,
and forbidden to be used by our Parliament in the reign of Queen
Elizabeth. An Act was passed authorizing searchers to burn both it and
logwood in every dye-house where they could be found. This Act remained
in full force till the time of Charles II., that is, for a great part
of a century.]
[659] Marperger’s Beschreibung des Hutmacher-handwerks. Altenburg,
1719, 8vo, p. 85.
[660] [This observation has been verified; for tolerably large
quantities of indigo are now extracted from the _Polygonum tinctorium_,
which is cultivated in some parts of France and Belgium for that
purpose.]