TY - CONF A1 - Bonnerot, Olivier T1 - Are X-rays safe for manuscripts’ materials? N2 - In the last decade, applications of X-rays to the study of manuscripts significantly spread in both diversity and extent. They range from writing material analysis, mostly with X-ray fluorescence (XRF), permitting non-invasive characterization of inks and pigments used, to the investigation of the origin of writing supports. In addition, XRF mapping has proved to be an invaluable tool for recovering erased text. Finally, computed-tomography (CT) has shown potential in virtually unrolling rolls, making text readable without using-damaging mechanical methods. Despite their growing use, little attention has been paid to the side effects of such analytical tools. We observed irreversible parchment colour changes during some experiments on dead-sea scrolls with synchrotron radiation sources. Furthermore, partial photo-reduction of iron under high intensity beam during X-ray absorption near edge structure spectroscopy (XANES) measurements of iron-gall ink on paper has been reported several times [5,6]. Such phenomena have mostly been overlooked so far, although there is an increasing awareness of the necessity to study them. We conducted experiments at the Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron (DESY) facilities to investigate X-ray induced structural alteration of paper and parchment to see whether the presence of absorption centres (ink and pigments) has an impact. In addition to better understanding degradation processes, we are aiming to define an appropriate methodology of analysis of manuscripts with a tolerable risk of damage. The first results concerning X-ray induced damage of cellulose materials have already been presented at the Synchrotron Radiation and Neutrons in Art and Archaeology (SR2A). We are focusing here on the results on parchment materials. T2 - Cultural and Natural Heritage Workshop CY - Grenoble, France DA - 22.01.2020 KW - X-rays KW - Manuscripts KW - Parchment KW - Synchrotron PY - 2020 AN - OPUS4-50305 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER - TY - CONF A1 - Bonnerot, Olivier T1 - XRF Ink analysis of selected fragments from the Herculaneum collection N2 - Hundreds of papyrus rolls, carbonized during the 79CE eruption of Mount Vesuvius, were discovered in 1754 at Herculaneum. Sophisticated mechanical methods for unrolling the best-preserved scrolls have been applied, with varying success. However, such processes have been abandoned, to prevent risk from irremediable damage or loss and to preserve the integrity of the extremely fragile rolls. Following the development of X-ray based non-invasive techniques, attempts to virtually unroll the scrolls were made. The most common ink in Antiquity was carbon-based, and the main element of carbonized papyrus is carbon, making these investigations difficult. However, some attempts with synchrotron X-ray phase-contrast tomography (XPCT) were successful. Recently, the identification of antique inks containing metals raised hope that if some of the inks contain metal the rolls can be virtually unrolled using conventional CT- technique. We investigated the inks of a selection of partially unrolled fragments stored at the Biblioteca Nazionale di Napoli with X-ray fluorescence in order to select the best candidates for tomography. Despite the many difficulties (analysis of several layers sticking together, letters barely visible, difficulty to separate contribution from the ink and from the papyrus, inhomogeneity of the support, fragility of the fragments…), encouraging results were found, with a number of inks from Greek fragments found to contain additions to the soot (Fe, Pb, Cu P). T2 - International Symposium on Archaeometry CY - Online meeting DA - 16.05.2022 KW - XRF KW - Ink KW - Herculaneum KW - Papyrus PY - 2022 AN - OPUS4-54892 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Bonnerot, Olivier A1 - Del Mastro, G. A1 - Hammerstaedt, J. A1 - Mocella, V. A1 - Rabin, Ira T1 - XRF ink Analysis of some Herculaneum papyri N2 - Recent research has suggested that some of the inks used in Herculaneum papyri do not consist of pure carbon. Starting from this finding, in June 2018 a preliminary campaign of analysis by means of X-Ray fluorescence (XRF) of external portions removed mechanically from their original rolls in the eighteenth century (the so-called scorze) took place at the Biblioteca Nazionale at Naples. Also in this case, the aim of the survey was to investigate the ink composition in order to detect possible traces of metal. This article sums up the results of this survey. KW - Herculaneum papyri KW - Ink KW - XRF PY - 2020 SP - 50 EP - 52 AN - OPUS4-51193 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER - TY - CONF A1 - Bonnerot, Olivier A1 - Del Mastro, G. A1 - Hammerstaedt, J. A1 - Mocella, V. A1 - Rabin, Ira ED - Capasso, M. ED - Davoli, P. ED - Pellé, N. T1 - XRF Ink Analysis of Selected Fragments from the Herculaneum Collection of the Biblioteca Nazionale di Napoli N2 - Hundreds of papyrus rolls, carbonized during the 79CE eruption of Mount Vesuvius, were discovered in 1754 at Herculaneum. Sophisticated mechanical methods for unrolling the best-preserved scrolls have been applied, with varying success. However, such processes have been abandoned, to prevent risk from irremediable damage or loss and to preserve the integrity of the extremely fragile rolls. Following the development of X-ray based non-invasive techniques, attempts to virtually unroll the scrolls were made. The most common ink in Antiquity was carbon-based, and the main element of carbonized papyrus is carbon, making these investigations difficult. However, some attempts with synchrotron X-ray phase-contrast tomography (XPCT) were successful. Recently, the identification of antique inks containing metals raised hope that if some of the inks contain metal the rolls can be virtually unrolled using conventional CT- technique. We investigated the inks of a selection of partially unrolled fragments stored at the Biblioteca Nazionale di Napoli with X-ray fluorescence in order to select the best candidates for tomography. Despite the many difficulties (analysis of several layers sticking together, letters barely visible, difficulty to separate contribution from the ink and from the papyrus, inhomogeneity of the support, fragility of the fragments…), encouraging results were found, with a number of inks from Greek fragments found to contain additions to the soot (Fe, Pb, Cu P). KW - XRF KW - ink KW - Herculaneum KW - papyrus PY - 2022 UR - http://siba-ese.unisalento.it/index.php/29th_ICP/issue/view/1881 SN - 978-88-8305-177-7 DO - https://doi.org/10.1285/i99788883051760 SP - 200 EP - 213 PB - Centro di Studi Papirologici dell’Università del Salento CY - Lecce AN - OPUS4-54756 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Gordon, N. A1 - Bonnerot, Olivier A1 - Rabin, Ira ED - Friedrich, M. ED - Quenzer, J. T1 - Inks Used to Write the Divine Name in a Thirteenth-Century Ashkenazic Torah Scroll: Erfurt 7 (Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin, Ms. or. fol. 1216) N2 - The scribe of ‘Erfurt 7’, a thirteenth-century Torah scroll now kept in Berlin, initially left blank spaces for the divine appellations Elohim ( אלהים ) and YHWH Elohim ( ,(יהוה אלהים which were filled in during a second stage of writing. The appearance of the ink employed to write the appellations was significantly darker than that of the surrounding ink. X-ray fluorescence analysis (XRF) has shown that the light and dark brown inks had similar elemental compositions, but contained different ratios of iron to potassium, which could be explained by the use of different batches of ink. According to some medieval sources, the divine appellations were sometimes filled in during a second stage of writing in the presence of ten men from the Jewish community. In Erfurt 7, the two-stage procedure was only performed in the first 1.5 columns of the original sheets, suggesting it may have been part of a public ceremony inaugurating the writing of the divine names in the scroll. Erfurt 7 emerges from this study not only as a ritual object used for liturgy, but as a rallying point for the Jews of Erfurt to come together as a community to express their reverence for the written form of God’s name. The divine name YHWH ( יהוה ) was written in a smaller script than the surrounding text on three replacement sheets using the same two-stage procedure. The ink used on the replacement sheets contained zinc, which is characteristic of other Erfurt manuscripts as well. This suggests that Erfurt was the place where the scroll was used, cherished and eventually repaired. KW - Torah KW - Ink KW - Erfurt KW - 13th century PY - 2020 SN - 1867–9617 VL - 15 SP - 163 EP - 184 AN - OPUS4-52965 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Nehring, Grzegorz A1 - Bonnerot, Olivier A1 - Gerhardt, M. A1 - Krutzsch, M. A1 - Rabin, Ira T1 - Looking for the missing link in the evolution of black inks N2 - In the transition from carbon to iron-gall inks, the two documents from the Egyptian Museum and Papyrus Collection in Berlin with shelfmarks P 13500 and P 13501 discussed in this work present an important case. Their inks appear brownish, although they date back to the fourth and third century BCE, when carbon inks are believed to have been commonly if not exclusively used. Using imaging micro-X-ray fluorescence and infrared reflectography, we discovered that the inks in both documents contain a significant amount of copper in addition to carbon. Comparing the extant recipes for black writing inks and the experimental evidence, we suggest that these inks are a transition between the pure carbon and the iron-gall inks. Such inks may have been quite common before the production of iron-gall ink was clearly understood and established. KW - Black writing ink KW - Hellenistic KW - Papyrus KW - XRF imaging KW - NIR imaging PY - 2021 UR - https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:kobv:b43-523708 DO - https://doi.org/10.1007/s12520-021-01320-5 VL - 13 IS - 4 SP - Article 71 PB - Springer AN - OPUS4-52370 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Nehring, Grzegorz A1 - Bonnerot, Olivier A1 - Gordon, N. A1 - Rabin, Ira T1 - Writing and Correcting a Torah Scroll in Germany of the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Centuries N2 - Scientific material analysis of the elemental composition of inks from different strata of a manuscript has the potential to complement scholarly observations using palaeography and philology in reconstructing the history of the manuscript’s production, correction and repair. There are three typologically different classes of black writing inks: soot inks consist of carbon particles. KW - Manuscript studies KW - Hebrew studies KW - Ink analysis PY - 2021 UR - https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:kobv:b43-540658 DO - https://doi.org/10.25592/uhhfdm.9749 VL - Comparative Oriental Manuscript Studies Bulletin 7, 2021 IS - 7 SP - 2 EP - 20 PB - Centre for the study of manuscript cultures CY - Hamburg AN - OPUS4-54065 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER -