The ancient inkstand found at Herculaneum, said to contain a substance resembling a thick oil or paint characteristic of a material which it is alleged, "some of the manuscripts have been written in a sort of relievo, visible in the letters when a 'leaf' is held to the light in a horizontal direction," it is not impossible, indeed it is quite probable, belonged to an era centuries later than the period to which it has been assigned.
"No perfect papyri, but only fragments, have been found at Pompeii. At Herculaneum, up to the year 1825, 1,756 had been obtained, besides many others destroyed by the workmen, who imagined them to be mere sticks of charcoal. Most of them were found in a suburban villa, in a room of small dimensions, ranged in presses round the sides of the room, in the center of which stood a sort of rectangular bookcase.
"Sir Humphry Davy, after investigating their chemical nature, arrived at the conclusion that they had not been carbonized by heat, but changed by the long action of air and moisture; and he visited Naples in hopes of rendering the resources of chemistry available towards deciphering these long-lost literary treasures. His expectations, however, were not fully crowned with success, although the partial efficacy of his methods was established; and he relinquished the pursuit at the end of six months, partly from disappointment, partly from a belief that vexatious obstacles were thrown in his way by the jealousy of the persons to whom the task of unrolling had been intrusted. About five hundred volumes have been well and neatly unrolled. It is rather remarkable that, as far as can be learned, no manuscript of any known standard work has been found, nor, indeed, any production of any of the great luminaries of the ancient world. The most celebrated person of whom any work has been found is Epicurus, whose treatise, De Natura, has been successfully unrolled. This and a few other treatises have been published. The library in which this was found appears to have been rich in treatises on the Epicurean philosophy. The only Latin work which it contained was a poem, attributed to Rabirius, on the war of Caesar and Antony."
Beginning with A. D. 200, the employment of inks became more and more constant and popular. Rediscoveries of ancient formulas belonging to a more remote antiquity multiplied in number. Silver ink was again quite common in most countries. Red ink made of vermilion (a composition of mercury, sulphur and potash) and cinnabar (native mercuric sulphide) were employed in the writing of the titles as was blue ink made of indigo, cobalt or oxide of copper. Tyrian purple was used for coloring the parchment or vellum. The "Indian" inks made by the Chinese were imported and used in preference to those of similar character manufactured at home. The stylus and waxed tablets though still used, in a measure gave way to the reawakened interest in ink and ink writings.
A greater facility in writing, due to the gradual reduction in size of the uncial (inch) letters was thereby attained.
There were "writers in gold" and "writers in silver" who travelled from the East into Greece and who bad found their way before the third century into the very heart of Rome. Their business was to embellish the manuscript writings of those times. It was considered en regale for authors to "illuminate" their MSS. and those who failed to do so suffered in popularity.
These authors frequently allude to their use of red, black and secret inks.
Martial in his first epistle points out the bookseller's shop opposite the Julian Forum where his works may be obtained "smoothed with pumice stone and decorated with purple." Seneca mentions books ornamented "cum imaginabus." Varro is related by the younger Pliny to have illustrated his works by pictures of more than seven hundred illustrious persons. Martial dwells on the edition of Virgil, with his portrait as a frontispiece.
The earliest recorded instance of the richer adornments of golden lettering on purple or rose-stained vellum is given by Julius Capitolinus in his life of the Emperor Maximinus the younger. He therein mentions that the mother of the emperor presented to him on his return to his tutor (early in the third century), a copy of the works of Homer, written in gold upon purple vellum.
The fugitive character, as before stated, of a great many of the colored inks, and indeed most of the black ones which were undoubtedly employed, is the principal reason why so few specimens of them remain to us. Those which have proved themselves so lasting in character as to be still extant, bear evidence of extreme care in the preparation of both the inks and the materials on which the writings appear. Perhaps one of the finest illustrations of this practice is to be found in a book of the Four Gospels of Italian origin, discovered in the tenth century (a work of the fourth century) and deposited in the Harlein Library. This book is written in "Indian" ink and possesses magnificently embellished and illuminated letters at the beginning of each Gospel, which are on vellum stained in different colors.
St. Jerome calls attention to this class of books in a well-known passage of his preface to the Book of Job, also written in the fourth century, where he explains as translated:
"Let those who will have old books written in gold and silver on purple parchment, or, as they are commonly called, in uncial-letters,—rather ponderous loads than books,—so long as they permit me and mine to have copies, and rather correct than beautiful books."
It has been said that the Tanno-gallate of Iron Inks (iron salts, nut-galls and gum) were first used in the fourth century. There is positively no credible authority for such a statement, nor is there a single monument in the shape of a documentary specimen of ink writing of that one or an earlier century made with such an ink in any public or private library and as far as known in existence.
About A. D. 390 the inspired writings (often termed pagan) of the classical countries, or at least the copies or extracts of them, upon a special search made by order of the Roman Senate, including those already mentioned as of the time of Tarquin (some nine hundred years earlier), were gathered up in Greece, Italy and other parts and destroyed, because, as we are informed, this Roman Senate had embraced the Christian faith and furthermore "such vanities began to grow out of fashion; till at last Stilicho burnt them all under Honorius (a son of Theodosius the Great), for which he is so severely censured by the noble poet Rutilius, in his ingenious itinerary."
Not only Roman Arms the Wretch betrayedTo barbarous Foes; before that cursed Deed,He burnt the Writings of the sacred Maid,We hate Althaea for the fatal Brand;When Nisius fell, the weeping Birds complained:More cruel he than the revengeful Fair;More cruel heth at Nisius' Murderer.Whose impious Hands into the Flames have thrownThe Heavenly Pledges of the Roman Crown,Unrav'lling all the Doom that careful Fate had spun."
The destruction of Rome by Alaric, King of the Western Goths, A. D. 410, and the subsequent dismemberment of the entire Roman Empire by the barbarians of the North who followed in his wake, announced that ancient history had come to an end.
It may be truly said as well that the ending of the ancient history of the black and colored writing inks which began in the obscurity of tradition between 2000 and 1800 B. C., a period of some 2200 years, was also contemporaneous with these events.
The eclipse of ink-written literature for at least 500 of the 1000 years which followed, and known as the Middle or "Dark" Ages, except in the Church alone, who seem to have kept up the production of manuscript books principally for ecclesiastical and medical purposes was complete. Hence, any information pertaining to those epochs about ink, writing materials and ink writings, must be sought for in the undestroyed records and the ink writings themselves left by the fathers of the Church. All else is tainted and of doubtful authority.
* * * * * * * *
"When waned the star of Greece was there no cry,To rouse her people from their lethargy?Was there no sentry on the Parthenon—No watch-fire on the field of Marathon,When science left the Athenian city's gate,To seek protection from a nameless fate?The sluggish sentry slept—no cry was heardNo hands the glimm'ring watch-fire's embers stirr'd.Fair science unmolested left the land,That she had nurtured with maternal hand;And wandered forth some genial spot to find,Where she might rear her altar to the mind."Long thro' the darken'd ages of a world,Back to primeval chaos rudely hurled,She journey'd on amid the gath'ring gloom,A spectre form emerging from the tomb.Earth had no resting place—no worshipper—No dove returned with olive branch to her:Her lamp burned dimly, yet its flick'ring light,Guided the wanderer thro' the lengthen'd night.Oft in her weary search, she paused the while,To catch one gleam of hope—one favour'd smile;But the dim mists of ignorance still threw,Their blighting influence o'er the famish'd few,Who deigned to look upon that lustrous eye,Which pierced the ages of futurity.
"For ten long centuries she groped her way,Through gloom, and darkness, ruin and decay;Yet came at last the morning's rosy light,A thousand echoes hail'd the glorious sight—Joy thrill'd the universe—one iningled cryOf exultation, pealed along the sky!Science came forth in richer robes arrayedShe trod a pathway ne'er before essayed;Up the steep mount of fame she fleetly pressed,And hung her trophies on its gilded crest."
THE storming of Alexandria and the destruction of the Pergamus library, composed largely of ink-written volumes, by the Saracens, A. D. 642, has already been reverted to. Astle observes:
"Thus perished by fanatical madness, the inestimable Alexandrian library, which is said to have contained at that time upwards of five hundred thousand volumes; and from this period, barbarity and ignorance prevailed for several centuries. In Italy and all over the west of Europe learning was in a measure extinguished, except some small remains which were preserved in Constantinople.
"Theodosious, the younger, was very assiduous in augmenting this library, by whom, in the latter end of the fourth century, it was enlarged to one hundred thousand volumes, above one-half of which were burnt in the fifth century by the Emperor Leo the First, so famous for his hatred to images.
"The inhabitants of Constantinople had not lost their taste for literature in the beginning of the thirteenth century, when this city was sacked by the Crusaders, in the year 1205; the depredations then committed are related in Mr. Harris's posthumous works, vol. ii, p. 301, from Nicetas the Choniate, who was present at the sacking of this place. His account of the statues, bustos, bronzes, manuscripts, and other exquisite remains of antiquity, which then perished, cannot be read by any lover of arts and learning without emotion.
"The ravages committed by the Turks who plundered Constantinople, in the year 1453, are related by Philelphus, who was a man of learning, and was tutor to aeneas Sylvius (afterwards pope, under the name of Pius the Second) and was an eye-witness to what passed at that time. This tutor says, that the persons of quality, especially the women, still preserved the Greek language uncorrupted. He observes, that though the city had been taken before, it never suffered so much as at that time; and adds, that, till that period, the remembrance of ancient wisdom remained at Constantinople, and that no one among the Latins was deemed sufficiently learned, who had riot studied for some time at that place; he expressed his fear that all the works of the ancients would be destroyed.
"Still, however, there are the remains of three libraries at Constantinople: the first is called that of Constantine the Great; the second is for all ranks of people without distinction; the third is in the palace, and is called the Ottoman library; but a fire consumed a great part of the palace, and almost the whole library, when as is supposed, Livy and a great many valuable works of the ancients perished. Father Possevius has given an account of the libraries at Constantinople, and in other parts of the Turkish dominions, in his excellent work entitled, Apparatus Sacer. (He calls attention to no less than six thousand authors.)
Many other losses of the writings of the ancients have been attributed to the zeal of the Christians, who at different periods made great havock amongst the Heathen authors. Not a single copy of the work of Celsus is now to be found, and what we know of that work is from Origen, his opponent. The venerable fathers, who employed themselves in erasing the best works of the most eminent Greek or Latin authors, in order to transcribe the lives of saints or legendary tales upon the obliterated vellum, possible mistook these lamentable depredations for works of piety. The ancient fragment of the 91st book of Livy, discovered by Mr. Bruns, in the Vatican, in 1772, was much defaced by the pious labours of some well-intentioned divine. The Monks made war on books as the Goths had done before them. Great numbers of manuscripts have also been destroyed in this kingdom (Great Britain) by its invaders, the Pagan Danes, and the Normans, by the civil commotions raised by the barons, by the bloody contests between the houses of York and Lancaster, and especially by the general plunder and devastations of monasteries and religious houses in the reign of Henry the Eighth; by the ravages committed in the civil war in the time of Charles the First, and by the fire that happened in the Cottonian library, October 23, 1731."
Mr. Astle's comments on the volumes or remnants of volumes which remain to us, becomes most interesting in the lights thrown on them by Professor Anthon in his "Classical Dictionary," 1841, which are quoted in part following those of Mr. Astle.
Mr. Astle remarks:
"The history of Phoenicia by Sanconiatho, who was a contemporary with Solomon, would have been entirely lost to us, had it not been for the valuable fragments preserved by Eusebius."
Says Prof. Anthon:
"Sanchoniathon, a Phoenician author, who if the fragments of his works that have reached us be genuine, and if such a person ever existed, must be regarded as the most ancient writer of whom we have any knowledge after Moses. As to the period when be flourished, all is uncertain. He is the author of three principal works, which were written in Phoenician. They were translated into the Greek language by Herennius Philo, who lived in the second century of our era. It is from this translation which we obtain all the fragments of Sanchoniathon that have reached our times. Philo had divided his translation into nine books, of which Porphyry made use in his diatribe against the Christians. It is from the fourth book of this lost work that Eusebius took, for an end directly opposite to this, the passages which have come down to us. And thus we have those documents relating to the mythology and history of the Phoenicians from the fourth hand."
Mr. Astle continues:
"Manetho's History of Egypt, and the History of Chaldea, by Berosus, have nearly met with the same fate."
From Anthon:
"Berosus; a Babylonian historian. He was a priest of the temple of Belus in the time of Alexander. The ancients mention three books of his of which Josephus and Eusebius have preserved fragments. Annius of Viterbo published a work under the name of Berosus, which was soon discovered to be a forgery."
By Astle:
"The Historical Library of Diodorus Siculus consisted likewise of forty books, but only fifteen are now extant; that is, five between the fifth and the eleventh, and the last ten, with some fragments collected out of Photius and others."
By Anthon:
"Diodorus, surnamed Siculus, a contemporary of Julius Caesar and Agustus. He published a general history in forty books, under the title 'Historical Library,' which covered a period of 1138 years. We have only a small part remaining of this vast compilation. These rescued portions we owe to Eusebius, to John Malala and other writers of the lower empire, who have cited them in the course of their works. He is the reputed author of the famous sophism against motion. 'If any body be moved, it is moved in the place where it is, or in a place where it is not, for nothing can act or suffer where it is not, and therefore there is no such thing as motion.' "
By Astle:
"The General History of Polybius originally contained forty books; but the first five only, with some extracts or fragments, are transmitted to us."
By Anthon:
"Polybius, an eminent Greek historian, born about, B. C. 203. Polybius gave to the world various historical writings, which are entirely lost with the exception of his General History. It embraced a period of 53 years. Of the forty books which it originally comprehended, time has spared only the first five entire. Of the rest, as far as the seventeenth, we have merely fragments though of considerable size. Of the remaining books we have nothing left except what is found in two merger abridgments which the Emperor Constantine Porphyrogenitus, in the tenth century caused to be made of the whole work."
From Astle:
"Dionysius Halicarnassensis wrote twenty books of Roman antiquities, extending from the siege of Troy, to the Punic war A. U. C. 488; but only eleven of them are now remaining, which reach no further than the year of Rome 312."
From Anthon:
"He was born in the first century B. C. His principal work was 'Roman Antiquities.' It originally consisted of twenty books, of which the first ten remain entire. Dionysius wrote for the Greeks, and his object was to relieve them from the mortification which they felt at being conquered by a race of barbarians, as they considered the Romans to be. And this he endeavored to effect by twisting and forging testimonies, and botching up the old legends, so as to make out a prima facie proof of the Greek origin of the city of Rome. Valuable additions were made in 1816, by Mai, from an old MSS."
By Astle:
"Appian is said to have written the Roman History in twenty-four books; but the greatest part of the works of that author is lost."
By Anthon:
"He was the author of a Roman History in twenty-four books which no longer exist entire; the parts missing have been supplied but was not written by Appian but is a mere compilation from Plutarch's Lives of Crassus and Antony."
By Astle:
"Dion Cassius wrote eighty books of history, but only twenty-five are remaining, with some fragments, and an epitome of the last twenty by Xiphilinus."
By Anthon:
"His true name was Cassius, born A. D. 155; —we have fragments remaining of the first thirty- six books, they comprehend a period from B. C. 65 to B. C. 10;—they were found by Mai in two Vatican MSS., which contain a sylloge or collection made by Maximus Planudes (who lived in the fourteenth century. He was the first Greek that made use of the Arabic numerals as they are called)."
Mr. Astle further observes:
"The Emperor Tacitus ordered ten copies of the works of his relation, the historian, to be made every year which he sent into the different provinces of the empire; and yet, notwithstanding his endeavours to perpetuate these inestimable works, they were buried in oblivion for many centuries. Since the restoration of learning an ancient MSS. was discovered in a monastery in Westphalia, which contained the most valuable part of his annals; but in this unique manuscript, part of the fifth, seventh, ninth and tenth books are deficient, as are part of the eleventh, and the latter part of the sixteenth. This MSS. was procured by that great restorer of learning Pope Leo X., under whose patronage it was printed at Rome in 1515; he afterwards deposited it in the Vatican library, where it is still preserved. Thus posterity is probably indebted to the above magnificent Pontiff, for the most valuable part of the works of this inimitable historian."
Accounts which differentiate in their descriptive details of questioned ink-written fragments of antiquity and on the genuineness or authenticity of which rests the truth or falsity of ancient history or other literature, serve to taint such remains with a certain degree of suspicion and doubt. When, however, in the light of investigation, the materials of which they are composed are found to approach closely the age they purport to represent, then it is that such fragments can be said to have fairly established their own identity.
Taylor asserts:
"The remote antiquity of a manuscript is of ten established by the peculiar circumstance of its existing BENEATH another writing. Some invaluable manuscripts of the Holy Scriptures, and not a few precious fragments of classic literature, have been thus brought to light.
"The age of a manuscript may often be ascertained with little chance of error, by some such indications as the following:—the quality or appearance of the INK, the nature of the material; that is to say, whether it be soft leather, or parchment, or the papyrus of Egypt, or the bombycine paper; for these materials succeeded each other, in common use, at periods that are well known;— the peculiar form, size, and character of the writing; for a regular progression in the modes of writing may be traced by abundant evidence through every age from the remotest times;—the style of the ornaments or illuminations, as they are termed, often serves to indicate the age of the book which they decorate.
"From such indications as these, more or less definite and certain, ancient manuscripts, now extant, are assigned to various periods, extending from the sixteenth, to the fourth century of the Christian era; or perhaps, in one or two instances, to the third or second. Very few can claim an antiquity so high as the fourth century; but not a few are safely attributed to the seventh; and a great proportion of those extant were unquestionably executed in the tenth; while many belong to the following four hundred years. It is, however, to be observed, that some manuscripts, executed at so late a time as the thirteenth, or even the fifteenth century, afford clear internal evidence that, by a single remove only, the text they contain claims a REAL antiquity, higher than that even of the oldest existing copy of the same work. For these older copies sometimes prove, by the peculiar nature of the corruptions which have crept into the text, that they have been derived through a long series of copies; while perhaps the text of the more modern manuscripts possesses such a degree of purity and freedom from all the usual consequences of frequent transcription, as to make it manifest that the copy from which it was taken, was so ancient as not to be far distant from the time of the first publication of the work."
LA CROIX' preface to his "Science and Literature of the Middle Ages and the Renaissance," refers to the Dark Ages:
"In the beginning of the Middle Ages, at the commencement of the fifth century, the Barbarians made an inroad upon the old world; their renewed invasions crushed out, in the course of a few years, the Greek and Roman civilization; and everywhere darkness succeeded to light. The religion of Jesus Christ was alone capable of resisting this barbarian invasion, and science and literature, together with the arts, disappeared from the face of the earth, taking refuge in the churches and monasteries. It was there that they were preserved as a sacred deposit, and it was thence that they emerged when Christianity had renovated pagan society. But centuries and centuries elapsed before the sum of human knowledge was equal to what it had been at the fall of the Roman empire. A new society, moreover, was needed for the new efforts of human intelligence as it resumed its rights. Schools and universities were founded under the auspices of the clergy and of the religious corporations, and thus science and literature were enabled to emerge from their tombs. Europe, amidst the tumultuous conflicts of the policy which made and unmade kingdoms, witnessed a general revival of the scholastic zeal; poets, orators, novelists, and writers increased in numbers and grew in favour; savants, philosophers, chemists and alchemists, mathematicians and astronomers, travellers and naturalists, were awakened, so to speak, by the life-giving breath of the Middle Ages; and great scientific discoveries and admirable works on every imaginable subject showed that the genius of modern society was not a whit inferior to that of antiquity. Printing, was invented, and with that brilliant discovery, the Middle Ages, which had accomplished their work of social renovation, made way for the Renaissance, which scattered abroad in profusion the prolific and brilliant creations of Art, Science, and Literature."
This author to some extent discredits himself, however, p. 455, where he remarks:
"Long before the invasions of the Barbarians the histories written by Greek and Latin authors concerning the annals of the ancient peoples had been falling into disfavor. Even the best of them were little read, for the Christians felt but slight interest in these pagan narratives, and that is why works relating to the history of antiquity were already so scarce."
Another authority writing on the same subject discusses it from a different standpoint, remarking:
"As in the middle ages invention busied itself with instruments of torture, and as in our days it is taken up almost as much with the destructive engines of war as with the productive arts of peace, so in those early ages it applied itself to the fabrication of idols, to the mechanism and theatrical contrivances for mysteries and religious ceremonies. There was then no desire to communicate discoveries, science was a sort of freemasonry, and silence was effectually secured by priestly anathemas; men of science were as jealous of one another as they were of all other classes of society. If we wish to form a clear picture of this earliest stage of civilization, an age which represents at once the naivete of childhood and the suspicious reticence of senility, we must turn our eyes to the priest, on the one hand, claiming as his own all art and science, and commanding respect by his contemptuous silence; and, on the other hand, to the mechanic plying the loom, extracting the Tyrian dye, practising chemistry, though ignorant of its very name, despised and oppressed, and only tolerated when he furnished Religion with her trappings or War with arms. Thus the growth of chemistry was slow, and by reason of its backwardness it was longer than any other art in ridding itself of the leading-strings of magic and astrology. Practical discoveries must have been made many times without science acquiring thereby any new fact. For to prevent a new discovery from being lost there must be such a combination of favorable circumstances as was rare in that age and for many succeeding ages. There must be publicity, and publicity is of quite recent growth; the application of the discovery must be not only possible but obvious, as satisfying some want. But wants are only felt as civilization progresses. Nor is that all; for a practical discovery to become a scientific fact it must serve to demonstrate the error of one hypothesis, and to suggest a new one, better fitted for the synthesis of existing facts. But (some) old beliefs are proverbially obstinate and virulent in their opposition to newer and truer theories which are destined to eject and replace them. To sum up, even in our own day, chemistry rests on a less sound basis than either physics, which had the advantage of originating as late as the 17th century, or astronomy, which dates from the time when the Chaldean shepherd had sufficiently provided for his daily wants to find leisure for gazing into the starry Heavens."
The observations of a still earlier commentator are of the same general nature. He says:
"In the first ages of Christianity, when the fathers of the Church, the Jews, and the Heathen philosophers were so warmly engaged in controversy, there is reason to believe that pious frauds were not uncommon: and that when one party suspected forgeries, instead of an attempt at confutation, which might have been difficult, they had recourse perhaps to a countermine: and either invented altogether, or eked out some obscure traditional scraps by the embellishments of fancy. When we consider, amongst many literary impositions of later times, that Psalmanazar's history of Formosa was, even in this enlightened age and country (England, about 1735), considered by our most learned men as unquestionably authentic, till the confession of the author discovered the secret, I think it is not difficult to conceive how forgeries of remote events, before the invention of printing and the general diffusion of knowledge might gain an authority, and especially with the zealous, hardly inferior to that of the most genuine history."
De Vinne, however, in his "Invention of Printing," New York, 1878, best explains the status quo of those times, relative not only to book (MSS.) making, and methods of circulation, but the causes which led up to their eventual disappearance and the literary darkness which ensued. His remarks are so pertinent that they are quoted at length:
"The civilization of ancient Rome did not require printing. If all the processes of typography had been revealed to its scholars the art would not have been used. The wants of readers and writers were abundantly supplied by the pen. Papyrus paper was cheap, and scribes were numerous; Rome had more booksellers than it needed, and books were made faster than they could be sold. The professional scribes were educated slaves, who, fed and clothed at nominal expense, and organized under the direction of wealthy publishers, were made so efficient in the production of books, that typography, in an open competition, could have offered few advantages.
"Our knowledge of the Roman organization of labor in the field of bookmaking is not as precise as could be wished; but the frequent notices of books, copyists and publishers, made by many authors during the first century, teach us that books were plentiful. Horace, the elegant and fastidious man of letters, complained that his books were too common, and that they were sometimes found in the hands of vulgar snobs for whose entertainment they were not written. Martial, the jovial man of the world, boasted that his books of stinging epigrams were to be found in everybody's hands or pockets. Books were read not only in the libraries, but at the baths, in the porticoes of houses, at private dinners and in mixed assemblies. The business of bookmaking was practised by too many people, and some were incompetent. Lucian, who had a keen perception of pretense in every form, ridicules the publishers as ignoramuses. Strabo, who probably wrote illegibly, says that the books of booksellers were incorrect.
"The price of books made by slave labor was necessarily low. Martial says that his first book of epigrams was sold in plain binding for six sesterces, about twenty-four cents of American money; the same book in sumptuous binding was valued at five denarii, about eighty cents. He subsequently complained that his thirteenth book was sold for only four sesterces, about sixteen cents. He frankly admits that half of this sum was profit, but intimates, somewhat ungraciously, that the publisher Tryphon gave him too small a share. Of the merits of this old disagreement between the author and publisher we have not enough of facts to justify an opinion. We learn that some publishers, like Tryphon and the brothers Sosii, acquired wealth, but there are many indications that publishing was then, as it is now, one of the most speculative kinds of business. One writer chuckles over the unkind fate that sent so many of the unsold books of rival authors from the warehouses of the publisher, to the shops of grocers and bakers, where they were used to wrap up pastry and spices; another writer says that the unsold stock of a bookseller was sometimes bought by butchers and trunk makers.
"The Romans not only had plenty of books but they had a manuscript daily newspaper, the Acta Diurna, which seems to have been a record of the proceedings of the senate. We do not know how it was written, nor how it was published, but it was frequently mentioned by contemporary writers as the regular official medium for transmitting intelligence. It was sent to subscribers in distant cities, and was, sometimes, read to an assembled army. Cicero mentions the Acta as a sheet in which he expected to find the city news and gossip about marriages and divorces.
"With the decline of power in the Roman empire came the decline of literature throughout the world. In the sixth century the business of bookmaking had fallen into hopeless decay. The books that had been written were seldom read, and the number of readers diminished with every succeeding generation. Ignorance pervaded in all ranks of society. The Emperor Justin I, who reigned between the years 518 and 527, could not write, and was obliged to sign state papers with the form of stencil plate that had been recommended by Quintilian. Respect for literature was dead. In the year, 476, Zeno, the Isaurian, burned 120,000 volumes in the city of Constantinople. During the year 640, Amrou, the Saracen, fed the baths of Alexandria for six months with the 500,000 books that had been accumulating for centuries in its famous library of the Serapion. Yet books were so scarce in Rome at the close of the seventh century that Pope Martin requested one of his bishops to supply them, if possible, from Germany. The ignorance of ecclesiastics in high station was alarming. During this century, and for centuries afterward, there were many bishops and archbishops of the church who could not sign their names. It was asserted at a council of the church held in the year 992, that scarcely a single person was to be found in Rome itself who knew the first elements of letters. Hallam says, 'To sum up the account of ignorance in a word, it was rare for a layman of any rank to know bow to sign his name.' He repeats the statements that Charlemagne could not write, and Frederic Barbarossa could not read. John, king of Bohemia, and Philip, the Hardy, king of France, were ignorant of both accomplishments. The graces of literature were tolerated only in the ranks of the clergy; the layman who preferred letters to arms was regarded as a man of mean spirit. When the Crusaders took Constantinople, in 1204, they exposed to public ridicule the pens and inkstands that they found in the conquered city as the ignoble arms of a contemptible race of students.
"During this period of intellectual darkness, which lasted from the fifth until the fifteenth century, a period sometimes described, and not improperly, as the dark ages, there was no need for any improvement in the old method of making books. The world was not then ready for typography. The invention waited for readers more than it did for types; the multitude of book buyers upon which its success depended had to be created. Books were needed as well as readers. The treatises of the old Roman sophists and rhetoricians, the dialectics of Aristotle and the schoolmen, and the commentaries on ecclesiastical law of the fathers of the church, were the works which engrossed the attention of men of letters for many centuries before the invention of typography. Useful as these books may have been to the small class of readers for whose benefit they were written, they were of no use to a people who needed the elements of knowledge."
In the more ancient times, however, when MSS. books (rolls) were not quite so plentiful there was seemingly no difficulty in obtaining large sums for them.
Aristotle, died B. C. 322, paid for a few books of Leusippus, the philosopher, three Attick talents, which is about $3,000. Ptolemy Philadelphus is said to have given the Athenians fifteen talents, an exemption from tribute and a large supply of provisions for the MSS. of aeschylus, Sophocles and Euripides written by themselves.
Arbuthnot, discussing this subject, remarks that Cicero's head, "which should justly come into the account of Eloquence brought twenty-five Myriads of Drachms, which is the equivalent of $40,000. Also, "the prices of the magical books mentioned to be burnt in the Acts of the Apostles is five. Myriads of Pieces of Silver or Drachms."
Picolimini relates that the equivalent of eighty golden crowns was demanded for a small part of the works of Plutarch.
If we are to believe any of the accounts, the environment of the art of handwriting and handwriting materials at the beginning of the fifth century had contracted within a small compass, due principally to the general ignorance of the times.
As practiced it was pretty much under the control of the different religious denominations and the information obtainable about inks from these sources is but fragmentary. What has come down to us of this particular era is mostly found on the old written Hebrew relics, showing that they at least had made no innovations in respect to the use of their ritualistic deyo.
The invention of the quill pen in the sixth century permitted a degree of latitude in writing never before known, the inks were made thinner and necessarily were less durable in character. Greater attention was given to the study and practice of medicine and alchemy which were limited to the walls of the cloister and secret places. The monk physicians endeavored by oral instructions and later by written ones to communicate their ink-making methods not only of the black and colored, but of secret or sympathetic inks, to their younger brethren, that they might thus be perpetuated. All the traditional and practical knowledge they possessed was condensed into manuscript forms; additions from other hands which included numerous chemical receipts for dyeing caused them to multiply; so that as occasion required from time to time, they were bound up together booklike and then circulated among favored secular individuals, under the name of "Secreta."
The more remote of such treatises which have come down to us seem to indicate the trend of the researches respecting what must have been in those times unsatisfactory inks. Scattered through them appear a variety of formulas which specify pyrites (a combination of sulphur and metal), metals, stones and other minerals, soot, (blue) vitriol, calxes (lime or chalk), dye-woods, berries, plants, and animal colors, some of which if made into ink could only have been used with disastrous results, when permanency is considered.
The black ink formulas of the eighth century are but few, and show marked improvement in respect to the constituents they call for, indicating that many of those of earlier times had been tried and found wanting. One in particular is worthy of notice as it names (blue) vitriol, yeast, the lees (dregs) of wine and the rind of the pomegranate apple, which if commingled together would give results not altogether unlike the characteristic phenomena of "gall" ink. Confirmation of the employment of such an ink on a document of the reign of Charlemigne in the beginning of the ninth century on yellow-brown Esparto (a Spanish rush) paper, is still preserved. Specimens of "pomegranate" ink, to which lampblack and other pigments had been added of varying degrees of blackness, on MSS., but lessening in number as late as the fourteenth century, are still extant in the British Museum and other public libraries.
THE ancient history of the art of writing in more northern sections of the Western world, William Nicolson, Arch-Deacon of Carlisle, author of "The English Historical Library," London, 1696, tells very quaintly:
"The Danes register'd their more considerable transactions upon Rocks; or on parts of them, hewen into various Shapes and Figures. On these they engrav'd such Inscriptions as were proper for their Heathen Alters, Triumphal Arches, Sepulchral Monuments and Genealogical Histories of their Ancestors. Their writings of less concern (as Letters, Almanacks, &c.) were engraven upon Wood: And because Beech was most plentiful in Demnark, (tho Firr and Oak be so in Norway and Sweden) and most commonly employ'd in these Services, form the word Bog (which in their Language is the Name of that sort of Wood) they and all other Northern Nations have the Name of Book. The poorer sort used Bark; and the Horns of Rain- Deer and Elks were often finely polish'd and shaped into Books of several Leaves. Many of these old Calendars are likewise upon Bones of Beasts and Fishes: But the Inscriptions on Tapestry, Bells, Parchment and Paper, are of later use.
"Some other Monuments may be known to be of a Danish Extraction, tho they carry nothing of a Runic Inscription. Few of their Temples were cover'd; and the largest observ'd by Wormius (at Kialernes in Island) was 120 foot in length, and 60 in breadth.
"The next Monument of Age is their Edda Islandorum; the meaning of which Appellation they that publish the Book hardly pretend to understand. As far as I can give the Reader any satisfaction, he is to. know that Island was first inhabited (in the year 874) by a Colony of Norwegians; who brought hither the Traditions of their Forefathers, in certain metrical Composures, which (as is usual with Men transplanted into a Foreign Land) were here more zealously and carefully preserv'd and kept in memory than by the Men of Norway themselves. About 240 years after this (A. D. 1114) their History began to be written by one Saemund, surnam'd Frode or the wise; who (in nine years' travel through Italy, Germany and England) had amass'd together a mighty Collection of Historical Treatises. With these he return'd full fraught into Island; where he also drew up an account of the affairs of his own Country. Many of his Works are now said to be lost: But there is still an Edda, consisting of several Odes (whence I suspect its Name is derived) written by many several hands, and at different times, which bears his Name. The Book is a Collection of Mythological Fables, relating to the ancient State and Behaviour of the Great Woden and his followers, in terms poetical and adapted to the Service of those that were employ'd in the composure of their old Rhymes and Sonnets.
"There is likewise extant a couple of Norwegian Histories of good Authentic Credit; which explains a great many particulars relating to the Exploits of the Danish Kings in Great Britain, which our own Historians have either wholly omitted or very darkly recorded. The former of these was written soon after the year 1130, by one Theodoric a Monk, who acknowledges his whole Fabrick to be built upon Tradition, and that the old Northern History is no where now to be had save only ab Islendingorum antiquis Carminibus.
" 'Tis a very discouraging Censure which Sir William Temple passes upon all the Accounts given us of the Affairs of this Island, before the Romans came and Invaded it. The Tales (says he) we have of what pass'd before Caesar's Time, of Brute and his Trojans, of many Adventures and Successions, are cover'd with the Rust of Time, or Involv'd in the Vanity of Fables or pretended Traditions; which seem to all Men obscure or uncertain, but to be forged at pleasure by the Wit or Folly of their first Authors, and not to be regarded. And again; I know few ancient Authors upon this Subject (of the British History) worth the pains of perusal, and of Dividing or Refining so little Gold out of so much course Oar, or from so much Dross. But some other Inferiour People may think this worth their pains; since all Men are not born to be Ambassadors: And, accordingly, we are told of a very Eminent Antiquary who has thought fit to give his Labours in this kind the Title of Aurum, ex Stercore. There's a deal of Servile Drudgery requir'd to the Discovery of these riches, and such as every Body will not stoop to: for few Statesmen and Courtiers (as one is lately said to have observ'd in his own Case) care for travelling in Ireland, or Wales, purely to learn the Language.
"A diligent Enquirer into our old British Antiquities would rather observe (with Industrious Leland) that the poor Britains, being harass'd by those Roman Conquerours with continual Wars, could neither have leisure nor thought for the penning of a Regular History: and that afterwards their Back-Friends, the Saxons, were (for a good while) an Illiterate Generation; and minded nothing but Killing and taking Possession. So that 'tis a wonder that even so much remains of the Story of those Times as the sorry Fragments of Gildas; who appears to have written in such a Consternation, that what he has left us looks more like the Declamation of an Orator, hired to expose the miserable Wretches, than any Historical Account of their Sufferings."
Palgrave asserts that reading and writing were no longer mysteries after the pagan age, but were still acquirements almost wholly confined to the clergy.
The word "clericus" or "clerk," became synonymous with penman, the sense in which it is still most usually employed. If a man could write, or even read, his knowledge was considered as proof presumptive that he was in holy orders. If kings and great men had occasion to authenticate any document, they subscribed the "sign" of the cross opposite to the place where the "clerk" had written their name. Hence we say, to sign a deed or a letter.
Books (MSS.) were extremely rare amongst the Scandinavian and northern nations. Before their communication with the Latin missionaries, wood appears to have been the material upon which their runes were chiefly written: and the verb "write," which is derived from a Teutonic root, signifying to scratch or tear, is one of the testimonies of the usage. Their poems were graven upon small staves or rods, one line upon each face of the rod; and the Old English word "stave," as applied to a stanza, is probably a relic of the practice, which, in the early ages, prevailed in the West. Vellum or parchment afterwards supplied the place of these materials. Real paper, manufactured from the pellicle of the Egyptian reed or papyras, was still used occasionally in Italy, but it was seldom exported to the countries beyond the Alps; and the elaborate preparation of the vellum, upon which much greater care was bestowed than in the modern manufacture, rendered it a costly article; so much so, that a painstaking clerk could find it worth his while to erase the writing of an old book, in order to use the blank pages for another manuscript. The books thus rewritten were called "codices rescripti," or "palimpsests." The evanescent traces of the first layer of characters may occasionally be discerned beneath the more recent text which has been imposed upon them.
In Ireland, first known as the Isle of Saints, was founded in the seventh century a great school of learning which included writing and illuminating, which passed to the English by way of the monasteries created by Irish monks in Scotland. Their earliest existing MSS. are said to belong to that period. In the Irish scriptoriums (rooms or cells for writing) of the Benedictine monasteries where they were prepared, so particular were the monks that the scribes were forbidden to use artificial light for fear of injuring the manuscripts.
Most interesting and entertaining are the observations of Falconer Madan, a modern scholar of some repute. Of the history of writing in ink during the "Dark Ages" he says:
"In the seventh and eighth centuries we find the first tendency to form national hands, resulting in the Merovingian or Frankish hand, the Lombardic of Italy, and the Visigothic of Spain. These are the first difficult bands which we encounter; and when we remember that the object of writing is to be clear and distinct, and that the test of a good style is that it seizes on the essential points in which letters differ, and puts aside the flourishes and ornaments which disguise the simple form, we shall see how much a strong influence was needed to prevent writing from becoming obscure and degraded. That influence was found in Charles the Great.
"In the field of writing it has been granted to no person but Charles the Great to influence profoundly the history of the alphabet. With rare insight and rarer taste he discountenanced the prevalent Merovingian hand, and substituted in eclectic hand, known as the Carolingian Minuscule, which way still be regarded as a model of clearness and elegance. The chief instrument in this reform was Alcuin of York, whom Charles placed, partly for this purpose, at the head of the School of Tours in A. D. 796. The selection of an Englishman for the post naturally leads us to inquire what hands were then used in England, and what amount of English influence the Carolingian Minuscule, the foundation of our modern styles, exhibits.
"If we gaze in wonder on the personal influence of Charles the Great in reforming handwriting, we shall be still more struck by the spectacle presented to us by Ireland in the sixth, seventh and eighth centuries. It is the great marvel in the history of writing. Modern historians have at last appreciated the blaze of life, religions, literary, and artistic, which was kindled in the 'Isle of Saints' within a century after St. Patrick's coming (about A. D. 450); how the enthusiasm kindled by Christianity in the Celtic nature so far transcended the limits of the island, and indeed of Great Britain, that Irish missionaries and monks were soon found in the chief religious centres of Gaul, Germany, Switzerland, and North Italy, while foreigners found their toilsome way to Ireland to learn Greek! But less prominence has been given to the artistic side of this great reflex movement from West to East than to the other two. The simple facts attest that in the seventh century, when our earliest existing Irish MSS. were written, we find not only a style of writing (or indeed two) distinctive, national, and of a high type of excellence, but also a school of illumination which, in the combined lines of mechanical accuracy and intricacy, of fertile invention of form and figure and of striking arrangements of colour, has never been surpassed. And this is in the seventh century—the nadir of the rest of Europe!
"It is certain that Alcuin was trained in Hiberno- Saxon calligraphy, so that we may be surprised to find that the writing which, under Charles the Great, he developed at Tours, bears hardly a trace of the style to which he was accustomed. En revanche, in the ornamentation and illumination of the great Carolingian volumes which have come down to our times, we find those constant, persistent traces of English and Irish work which we seek for in vain in the plainer writing.
"This minuscule superseded all others almost throughout the empire of Charles the Great, and during the ninth, tenth, and eleventh centuries underwent very little modification. Even in the two next centuries, though it is subject to general modification, national differences are hardly observable, and we can only distinguish two large divisions, the group of Northern Europe (England, North France, Italy, and Spain). The two exceptions are, that Germany, both in writing and painting, has always stood apart, and lags behind the other nations of Western Europe in its development, and that England retains her Hiberno-Saxon hand till after the Conquest of 1066. It may be noted that the twelfth century produced the finest writing ever known—a large, free and flowing form of the minuscule of Tours. In the next century comes in the angular Gothic hand, the difference between which and the twelfth century hand may be fairly understood by a comparison of ordinary German and Roman type. In the thirteenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth centuries the writing of each century may be discerned, while the general tendency is towards complication, use of abbreviations and contractions, and development of unessential parasitic forms of letters.
"The Book of Kells, the chief treasure of Trinity College, Dublin, is so-called from having been long preserved at the Monastery of Kells, founded by Columba himself. Stolen from thence, it eventually passed into Archbishop Ussher's hands, and, with other parts of his library, to Dublin. The volume contains the Four Gospels in Latin, ornamented with extraordinary freedom, elaboration, and beauty. Written apparently in the seventh century, it exhibits, both in form and colour, all the signs of the full development and maturity of the Irish style, and must of necessity have been preceded by several generations of artistic workers, who founded and improved this particular school of art. The following words of Professor Westwood, who first drew attention to the peculiar excellences of this volume, will justify tile terms made use of above: 'This copy of the Gospels, traditionally asserted to have belonged to Columba, is unquestionably the most elaborately executed MS. of early art now in existence, far excelling, in the gigantic size of the letters in the frontispieces of the Gospel, the excessive minuteness of the ornamental details, the number of its decorations, the fineness of the writing, and the endless variety of initial capital letters with which every page is ornamented, the famous Gospels of Lindisfarne in the Cottonian Library. But this MS. is still more valuable on account of the various pictorial representations of different scenes in the life of our Saviour, delineated in a style totally unlike that of every other school.' "
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.