TY - JOUR A1 - Cohen, Zina A1 - Hahn, Oliver A1 - Rabin, Ira ED - Lattuati-Derieux, Agnès ED - Ribeyrol, Charlotte ED - Heginbotham, Arlen T1 - Black Carolingian inks under examination. Part 1: recipes and literature survey N2 - Black writing materials of different types and compositions have varied in use over time and different geographical regions. With this paper, we would like to contribute to their study by listing and reviewing recipes for black writing inks that were in circulation in the Carolingian Empire as well as by referencing the archaeometric analyses of the black inks used in the manuscripts. The studies presented here that involved the humanities and natural sciences provide new insights into how the scholars of the early Medieval Ages organized manuscripts. N2 - L’emploi des differents types de materiaux d’ecriture noirs et leurs compositions ont varie selon les epoques et les regions. Nous souhaitons ici contribuer a leur etude en repertoriant et en analysant les recettes d’encres de calligraphie noires en circulation dans l’Empire carolingien, ainsi qu’en procedant au referencement des analyses archeometriques des encres noires utilisees dans les manuscrits. Faisant appel aux sciences humaines et aux sciences naturelles, ces analyses apportent un eclairage nouveau sur la maniere dont les savants du haut Moyen Age organisaient les manuscrits. KW - Ink KW - Manuscript KW - Middle Ages KW - Recipes KW - Ink analyses KW - Carolingian PY - 2023 SN - 1254-7867 VL - 2023 IS - 55 SP - 90 EP - 95 PB - Centre de Recherche et de Restauration des Musées de France CY - Paris AN - OPUS4-58839 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 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 - 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 - 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 - JOUR A1 - Ghigo, Tea A1 - Rabin, Ira A1 - Buzi, P. T1 - Black Egyptian inks in Late Antiquity: new insights on their manufacture and use N2 - We present here our methodological approach applied to the study of Egyptian inks in Late Antiquity. It is based on an interdisciplinary strategy, bringing together a variety of disciplines from humanities and natural sciences, and it aims at systematically collecting a statistically relevant amount of data regarding the composition of the inks. The application of a wellestablished, non-invasive protocol that includes near-infrared imaging and X-ray fluorescence spectroscopy for in situ measurements enables the identification and characterisation of inks dating from the end of Late Antiquity onwards. However, sometimes this method limits our understanding when characterising more ancient inks. Trying to overcome these limitations, the potential of a new device for the characterisation of organic compounds is here explored by conducting preliminary tests on mock samples. In this work, we present the results from 77 codicological units that include some of the earliest manuscripts of our corpus that presently lists 159 units. KW - Ink KW - Archaeometry KW - Manuscripts KW - Coptic KW - Egypt PY - 2020 U6 - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:kobv:b43-503893 VL - 12 IS - 3 SP - 1 EP - 14 PB - Springer AN - OPUS4-50389 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER - TY - CONF A1 - Rabin, Ira A1 - Hahn, Oliver A1 - Kaska, K. ED - Uhlirz, T1 - Why Do We Need to Study Inks? N2 - While studying the socio-geographic history of inks, division 4.5 (Analysis of cultural artefacts and assets) of the BAM (Bundesanstalt für Materialforschung und -prüfung) in Berlin together with the Centre for the Study of Manuscript Cultures in Hamburg has developed a protocol for ink analysis. It consists of a primary screening to determine the type of the ink, and a subsequent in-depth analysis using several spectroscopic techniques. Using this protocol, scientists can assist scholars in addressing a rather broad range of historical questions that cannot be answered unequivocally through scholarly research alone. Among these are investigations on collaboration between scribes and scriptoria, on the usage and annotation of manuscripts and on their path through time and space in general. This research can thus help to reconstruct the circumstances of the production of written heritage as well as their history and transmission. To facilitate the dialogue between the scholars and the scientists a simple optical tool was developed to allow the scholars to perform preliminary ink analysis required for formulation of the question that in turn can be answered by scientific in-depth investigations. In this paper, ink types and their identification method is accompanied by examples of the recent work conducted on parchment manuscripts in the Austrian National Library. T2 - Congress Visual Heritage, CHNT 23 CY - Vienna, Austria DA - 15.12.2018 KW - Ink KW - Parchment PY - 2020 SP - 1.1 EP - 1.9 CY - Wien AN - OPUS4-50242 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER - TY - CONF A1 - Rabin, Ira T1 - Analyzing historic inks: From antiquity to the Middle Ages. N2 - While studying the socio-geographic history of inks, division 4.5 of the Bundesanstalt für Materialforschung und Prüfung (BAM) together with the Centre for the Study of Manuscript Cultures (CSMC) in Hamburg has developed a non-invasive protocol for ink analysis. It consists of a primary reflectographic screening to determine the type of the ink (soot, tannin or iron-gall) and a subsequent in-depth analysis using several spectroscopic techniques: X-ray fluorescence (XRF), Infrared and Raman spectroscopies. The first of them, XRF elemental analysis aims at establishing the unique fingerprints of inks containing metals or trace elements in carbon inks. In addition, we use Raman analysis to identify so-called mixed inks, an ink category that received little attention so far. Finally, with the help of IR spectroscopy we obtain information about the ink binders. T2 - Coptic Literature in Context. The Contexts of Coptic Literature Late Antique Egypt in a dialogue between literature, archaeology and digital humanities CY - Rom, Italy DA - 25.02.2019 KW - Ink PY - 2019 AN - OPUS4-48135 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER - TY - CONF A1 - Rabin, Ira T1 - Evolution of writing black inks N2 - The evolution and socio-geographic distribution of writing inks from Late Antiquity to the Middle Ages are one of the foci of our investigative work at the Bundesanstalt für Materialforschung und -prüfung (BAM) in Berlin and the Centre for the Study of Manuscript Cultures, Hamburg University. This presentation will examine the inks used by Jews in the in different geographical zones try to correlate the results of the material analysis with written records and existing traditions. We will compare the inks proposed by Maimonides, who lived in 12th-century Egypt, with the considerations of Rashi, who lived in 11th-century northern France, and see that they both advocated use of the inks commonly known and produced in their respective regions. It is Maimonides who proposes to add tannins to the soot inks, but rejects the metallic salt, both of which were practices that were well attested in contemporary Arabic recipes for making ink. In contrast, Rashi was favourable to employing the plant inks in use in contemporary Northern Europe. T2 - Jewish-Christian Relations from the Mediterranean to the Indian Ocean: Evidence from Material Culture CY - Bochum, Germany DA - 26.03.2019 KW - Ink KW - Jewish cultures PY - 2019 AN - OPUS4-48136 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER - TY - CONF A1 - Rabin, Ira A1 - Hahn, Oliver T1 - Inks and pigments N2 - The writing materials used in various cultures and epochs can be divided into two groups. The first comprises materials that write themselves, producing script by rubbing their own material off onto the writing surface. It includes charcoal, graphite, chalk, raddle, and metal styluses. Depending on the material and consistency, these are cut or pressed to make styluses and then used for writing. The second group comprises all coloring liquids that are applied to the writing surface with a quill, pen, or printing block. It includes inks made from dye solutions (for example, tannin inks) and those made from pigment dispersions (for example, sepia, soot, and bister inks). The latter are sometimes also rubbed as pastes into letters incised into the writing surface, where they increase visual contrast. Due to the variety of recipes and the natural origin of raw materials, there is a wide range of different components and impurities in writing materials. Soluble inks (Tinten) Soluble inks are based mainly on dyes forming a water solution. Colored inks were manufactured with different plant or insect dyes (e.g. Brazil wood, kermes). To stabilize the volatile material, the dyes were mixed with a mordant (e.g., alum). Brown plant inks – best-known as blackthorn or Theophilus’ inks – are usually produced from the blackthorn bark and wine. In the early European Middle Ages, inks of this kind were widely used in the production of manuscripts in monasteries. Usually, they are light brown, so sometimes small amounts of iron sulfate were added, which led to what was called an “imperfect” iron gall ink. The difference between “classic” iron gall ink and such imperfect ink is therefore not clear: the distinction is not possible, especially with the naked eye. Dispersion inks (Tuschen) According to its generic recipe, one of the oldest black writing materials is produced by mixing soot with a binder dissolved in a small amount of water. Thus, along with soot, binders such as gum arabic (ancient Egypt) or animal glue (China) are among the main components of soot inks. From Pliny’s detailed account of the manufacture of various soot-based inks, we learn that, despite its seeming simplicity, producing pure soot of high quality was not an easy task in Antiquity. Therefore, we expect to find various detectable additives that might be indicative of the time and place of production. One such carbon ink requires the addition of copper sulfate . The experimental discovery of this ink in 1990 led to a misleading expression “metal ink” that is sometimes found in the literature. Colored dispersion inks based on pigments such as orpiment, cinnabar, or azurite have been known since Antiquity. Natural or artificially produced minerals are finely ground and dispersed in a binding medium. As in soot inks, water-soluble binders such as gum arabic or egg white were used. Iron gall ink (Eisengallustinten) Iron gall inks are a borderline case between these two groups. They are produced from four basic ingredients: galls, vitriol as the main source of iron, gum arabic as a binding media, and an aqueous medium such as wine, beer, or vinegar. By mixing gallic acid with iron sulfate, a water-soluble ferrous gallate complex is formed; this product belongs to the type “soluble inks”. Due to its solubility, the ink penetrates the writing support’s surface, making it difficult to erase. Exposure to oxygen leads to the formation of insoluble black ferric gallate pigment, i.e., “dispersion ink”. Natural vitriol consists of a varying mixture of metal sulfates. Since for ink making it was obtained from different mines and by various techniques, inks contain many other metals, like copper, aluminum, zinc, and manganese, in addition to the iron sulfate. These metals do not contribute to color formation in the ink solution, but possibly change the chemical properties of the inks. T2 - Summer School Manusciences 19 CY - Frejus, France DA - 10.03.2019 KW - Ink KW - Material science KW - Cultural heritage PY - 2019 AN - OPUS4-48139 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 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 are presenting here the first results of a preliminary analysis, which aimed at identifying scrolls whose ink contains metals. T2 - Konferenz: 29th International Congress of Papyrology CY - Lecce, Italy DA - 28.07.2019 KW - Herculaneum KW - Papyrus KW - Tomography KW - XRF KW - Ink PY - 2019 AN - OPUS4-48615 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER -