USE OF SKINS.

429

CHAPTER LXXIII.

USE OF SKINS.

Herodotus-Iliad in a nutshell-Petrarch's vest of tanned skin-Preparation of skins-Parchment-" Palimpsestoi," or "rescripti."

It is well known how the ignorance of the earlier dark ages knew, for ages, of no substitute for the lost papyrus, and either covered over, crossed and recrossed ancient MSS. to the sad detriment of priceless works, or readily acquiesced in total abstinence from writing. It was not until the eighth century that a substitute was found in a material, used since time immemorial, the skin of animals. Already in the days of David, the Israelites had books written on skins, and the high-priest Eleazar sent a superb copy of the Pentateuch, written on the same material, to Ptolemaeus Philadelphus (Josephus, Antiq. 1. 2). Herodotus (v. 58) also informs his readers that the Ionians, of old, wrote on the skin of sheep and goats, from which merely the hair had been scraped off. How far from this rude form to the extreme delicacy of the parchment, containing the whole Ihad, which Cicero is said to have kept in a nut-shell, and how different from the famous vest of tanned skin, on which Petrarch wrote his thoughts and verses-a truly strange memorial of the sweet poet, which, covered with writing and erasures, was still shown in 1527 as a precious literary curiosity! The skin of

various animals seems originally to have been employed as a writing material; the Iliad and Odyssey are said to have been first written on the skin of serpents; but sheep and calves, goats, asses, and hogs have all furnished their tribute. The unprepared "pellis" was in Rome called "corium" after being tanned, and "membrana" when ready for writing. Pliny (XIII. 11) tells us that the town of Pergamum in Anadoli, about the year 300, under Eumenes, improved and furnished large quantities of such skins; hence their name of "Charta Pergamena," and the modern forms of "parchment." The white parchment was rarely employed, because too easily soiled and too dazzling for the eyes; it was more frequently stained with some mellow color, principally purple, as the renowned Codex Argenteus in Sweden, and numerous MSS. of the New Testament. The better to preserve it, the ancients often rubbed in some cedar-oil or stained it with the exudation of cedar-trees, from which circumstance the word "cedar" itself was often substituted for the literary part, as when Persius speaks of “et cedro digna locutus." Smoother and handsomer than paper, and capable of assuming all hues and colors, and even of being made transparent, the parchment is liable to suffer much from dampness and to have the writing effaced by brimstone. This latter facility it offers, has been the cause of fatal injury done to literature. When parchment became rare and costly, old and often invaluable writings, the most highly prized works of classic authors of antiquity, were erased to make room for psalms and copies of later church-writers. These are the so-called #aλíμþeσtoɩ or “rescripti”—from which our "rescript❞—the discovery of which has brought to light so precious treasures.

Already at the time of Augustus the same end was obtained by washing off the condemned writing with a sponge; afterwards, unfortunately, pumice-stone (rasorium) became an indispensable instrument of the copyist. The greatest ingenuity and considerable knowledge of chemistry are constantly employed to recover the older writing on such parchments and this persevering zeal has met with ample reward.

CHAPTER LXXIV.

Paper Of Cotton-Of Linen or Hemp.

THE use of cotton for the manufactory of paper, is of older date than is commonly supposed, although the first public documents on this material are a Bull of Pope Victor II. of the year 1057, and a Diploma of Henry IV. of Germany, of 1074. The Arabs are believed to have become acquainted with its use as far back as 704, in the Buchary, and brought it in the eleventh century to Spain, where water-mills were already known, and the introduction of paper-mills soon placed paper within the reach of all. About the year 1300 it found its way into France, Germany, and Italy, and is still extensively used, although it is looser and more easily broken than linen paper, and scarcely equal to the material which the Chinese prepare of rice, bamboo, or silk

Cocoons.

There is good reason to believe Casiris' accidental assertion, (N. 757) that the Arabs had a MS. of aphorisms of Hippo

crates, bearing the date of 1100, on linen, and were thus the first also who made paper of linen or hemp, at once the cheapest and the best material known for writing and printing. To have some kind of paper, of cotton, hemp, or linen, became an indispensable preparation at the time of the invention of the art of printing; it affected, at the same time, permanently the mode of writing, by substituting free, easy, and connected letters, on a smooth, clear surface, for the deep, angular painting on parchments. The oldest document on linen paper is probably a copy of the Fueros of Valencia, granted in 1251, by John the Conqueror; the paper was of Arabic manufacture. The material on which the Articles of Peace between Ildefonz II., of Aragon, and Alfonz IV., of Castile, were written, in 1178, at Barcelona, is doubtful. France has, in a letter of Joinville to St. Louis, a document on linen or hemp, as old as the year 1270, whilst in Germany an edict, issued by Frederick II., in 1243, is considered the oldest of the kind."

INSTRUMENTS OF WRITING.

433

CHAPTER LXXV.

INSTRUMENTS OF WRITING.

Cords and Knots-Chisels-"Stilus"-Reeds-Pens-Ink.

THE instruments by which the writing was engraven, varied necessarily with the material on which they were used. The simplest are here also the cords and knots of the Chinese, Mexicans, and Peruvians, which, by a kind of ancient Mnemotechnics, designated words and phrases. For stone inscriptions the usual instruments, the yλupeîov of the Greeks, and the "celtes" of the Romans, sufficed in antiquity as now; for waxed tables of wood the "orúλos" or "stilus," was commonly used. Suetonius (Jul. Caes. 82) already tells us how these "stili' resembled iron bodkins, with a sharp end for writing "incidere," and a flat one for effacing. This explains the meaning of "stilum vertere," which Horace uses instead of "blotting" out" or "correcting." They became occasionally dangerous weapons; schoolmasters were killed by these so-called "pugillares," in the hands of their own scholars, and Cæsar himself, it is believed, fell by a "stilus." Afterwards the laws of Rome prohibited the use of iron styles, and they were made of the bones of birds or other animals. Some of these instruments existed as late as the year 1642, when Naudé saw them in Italy, and their name survives in our "style."

For writings on parchment a "káλaμos," or "arundo,"