would seem dull and gray. The microscopic examination of any early ink will show that the black is not fine and not thoroughly mixed with proper drying oil. But this imperfection is comparatively unimportant. It is a graver fault in some early inks that they are not firmly fixed to the paper.[1]
| Ingredients of Printing Ink used by the Ripoli Press. | |||
| Ingredients. | Tuscan Currency. |
American Currency. | |
| Linseed Oil, bbl. | lir. 3 10 0 | $3. 17 | |
| Turpentine, lb. | 4 0 | .18 | |
| Pitch, Greek | 4 0 | .18 | |
| Pitch, Black | 1 8 | 7 | ½ |
| Marcassite | 3 0 | .13 | ½ |
| Vermilion | 5 0 | .22 | ¾ |
| Rosin | 3 0 | .13 | ½ |
| Varnish, hard | 8 0 | .36 | |
| Varnish, liquid | 12 0 | .54 | |
| Nutgalls | 4 0 | .18 | |
| Vitriol | 4 0 | .18 | |
| Shellac | 3 0 | .13 | ½ |
There is no trustworthy account of the invention of printing ink, but the types and the inks were undoubtedly invented together. One was the proper complement of the other. It may be supposed that Gutenberg acquired the knowledge of the newly found properties of boiled linseed oil[2] from German painters. It is certain that he used oil as the basis of his ink, and that it was also used by his pupils and successors. And it has been in use ever since, for there is no substitute.
We have not been told how the ink was compounded. Our nearest approach to this knowledge is through the Cost Book of the Ripoli Press for 1481, which specifies and prices the materials. As no
- ↑ Mr. Ticheborne, a recent contributor to Chambers' Journal, says that the older printing inks are more easily saponified and washed off by alkalies than those of the last century. Some of the old inks he found so sensitive, that on introducing them to a weak solution of ammonia, the printed characters instantly floated off the surface of the pages. His explanation, that the oil had not been properly prepared by boiling, and was not changed into an insoluble varnish, and "resinfied," is, no doubt, correct. A practical ink-maker, in a series of papers to L'imprimerie (vol. I, p. 129), says that in many books of the fifteenth century, the adhesion of the color to the paper is very weak, and that the ink can be made pale or washed off with a moist sponge.
- ↑ Lanzi refers to an Italian manuscript of 1437 in which it is asserted that the new method of painting in oil, as practised by the Germans, must begin with the process of boiling linseed oil. History of Painting in Italy. Bohn's edition, 1852, vol. I, p. 86.
