Forty Centuries of Ink Part 4

It was the so-called "vitriolic" ink, which is said to have "corroded the delicate leaves of the papyrus and to have eaten through both parchment and vellum."

These deductions, however, do not agree with some of the historians and scholars like Noel Humphreys, author of the "Origin and Progress of the Art of Writing," London, 1855, a recognized authority on the subject of ancient MSS., who but repeats in part the text of earlier writers, when he says, p. 101:

"Examples of early Greek MSS. of the last century previous to the Christian era are not confined to Egyptian sources; the buried city of Herculaneum, in Italy, partially destroyed about seventy- nine years before the Christian era, and injured by subsequeut eruptions, till totally destroyed by the most violent eruption of Vesuvius on record, that of the year 471 A. D. having yielded several specimens."

The MSS. examples mentioned in the citation, must of necessity refer to specimens of writing made with "vitriolic" and even more ancient inks. They are to be considered in conjunction with the historical fact that these cities were buried for more than sixteen hundred years, counting from the first eruption, before they were brought to light (Herculaneum was discovered A. D. 1713 and Pompeii, forty years later); also that they must have been subjected to intense heat and a long period of decay which could only operate to rob them of all traces of natural ink phenomena.

Furthermore, the information Mr. Humphreys seeks to convey, dates contemporaneously with the first eruption of Vesuvius, which occurred seventy-nine years AFTER the Christian era and not seventy-nine years BEFORE it.

This stupendous blunder involves a period of one hundred and fifty-eight years; if it is rectified, the "early Greek MSS." are shown to emanate from the second half of the first century following the birth of Christ and confirming to some extent the deductions hereinbefore made, although the probabilities are that they belong to later periods, included in the third and fourth centuries.

It is affirmed that the eruption of Mt. Vesuvius A. D. 79, did not entirely destroy the cities of Herculaneum and Pompeii, and that they emerged from their ruins in the reign of the Emperor t.i.tus. They are also mentioned as inhabited cities in the chart of Peutinger, which is of the date of Constantine.

The next eruption, A. D. 471, was probably the most frightful on record if we exclude the volcanic eruption of Mt. Pelee, which occurred in Martinique, West Indies, in 1902, destroying thirty thousand human beings in fifteen minutes and devastating nearly the entire island. From Marcellinus we learn that the ashes of the Vesuvius volcano were vomited over a great portion of Europe, reaching to Constantinople, where a festival was inst.i.tuted in commemoration of the strange phenomenon. After this, we hear no more of these cities, but the portion of the inhabitants who escaped built or occupied suburbs at Nola in Campania and at Naples. In the latter city, the Regio Herculanensium, or Quarter of the Herculaneans, an inscription marked on several lapidary monuments, indicates the part devoted to the population driven from the doomed city.

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 ma.n.u.scripts 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 a.s.signed.

"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 ma.n.u.script 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 t.i.tles 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 ma.n.u.script 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 "c.u.m imaginabus." Varro is related by the younger Pliny to have ill.u.s.trated his works by pictures of more than seven hundred ill.u.s.trious 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 princ.i.p.al 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 ill.u.s.trations 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 cla.s.s of books in a well-known pa.s.sage 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 doc.u.mentary 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 cla.s.sical 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 fas.h.i.+on; till at last Stilicho burnt them all under Honorius (a son of Theodosius the Great), for which he is so severely censured by the n.o.ble poet Rutilius, in his ingenious itinerary."

Not only Roman Arms the Wretch betrayed To 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 thrown The 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 ma.n.u.script books princ.i.p.ally 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 heard No 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 wors.h.i.+pper-- 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 l.u.s.trous 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 cry Of exultation, pealed along the sky!

Science came forth in richer robes arrayed She trod a pathway ne'er before essayed; Up the steep mount of fame she fleetly pressed, And hung her trophies on its gilded crest."

CHAPTER IV.

CLa.s.sICAL INK AND ITS EXODUS (CONTINUED).

DESTRUCTION OF THE PERGAMUS LIBRARY OF ALEXANDRIA-- SOME OBSERVATIONS BY SIR THOMAS ASTLE --COMPARISON OF HIS STATEMENTS WITH THOSE OF PROFESSOR ANTHON RELATIVE TO FRAGMENTS OF ANTIQUITY WHICH REMAIN--AUTHENTICITY OF THEM NOT DISTURBED IF THEY ARE OF PROPER AGE --TAYLOR'S VIEWS ON THIS SUBJECT.

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 a.s.siduous 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, ma.n.u.scripts, 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 pa.s.sed 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 ent.i.tled, 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 ma.n.u.scripts 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 b.l.o.o.d.y 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 "Cla.s.sical 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: