MATERIALS OF ANCIENT BOOKS.
No material for books has, perhaps, a higher claim to antiquity than the skin of the calf or goat tanned soft, and usually dyed red or yellow: the skins were generally connected in lengths, sometimes of a hundred feet, sufficient to contain an entire book, which then formed one roll or volume. These soft skins seem to have been more in use among the Jews and other Asiatics than among the people of Europe. The copies of the law found in the synagogues are often of this kind: the most ancient manuscripts extant are some copies of the Pentateuch on rolls of leather.
Parchment—Pergamena, so called long after the time of its first use, from Pergamus, a city of Mysia, where the manufacture was improved and carried on to a great extent, is mentioned by Herodotus and Ctesias as a material which had been from time immemorial used for books: it has proved to be of all others, except that abovementioned, the most durable. The greater part of all manuscripts that are of higher antiquity than the sixth century are on parchment; as well as, generally, all carefully written and curiously decorated manuscripts of later ages. The palimpsests are usually parchments: "It often happened," says Montfauçon, "that from the scarcity of parchment, the copyists, having erased the writing of ancient books, wrote upon them anew: these rewritten parchments were called palimpsests—scraped a second time, and often the ancient work was one of far greater value than that to which it gave place: this we have on many occasions had opportunity to observe in the MSS. of the king's library, and in those of Italy. In some of these rescripts, the first writing is so much obliterated as to be scarcely perceptible; while in others, though not without much labour, it may still be read."
The practice, still followed in the east, of writing upon the leaves of trees, was common in the remotest ages. The leaves of the mallow or of the palm were most used for this purpose: they were sometimes wrought together into larger surfaces; but it is probable that this fragile and inconvenient material was only employed for ordinary purposes of business, letter-writing, or the instruction of children.
The inner bark of the linden or teil tree, and perhaps of some others, railed by the Romans liber, by the Greeks biblos,[4] was so generally used as a material for writing as to have given its name to a book in both languages. Tables of solid wood called codices, whence the term codex for a manuscript on any material, has passed into common use, were also employed, but chiefly for legal documents, on which account a system of laws came to be called a code. Leaves or tablets of lead or ivory are frequently mentioned by ancient authors as in common use for writing. But no material or preparation seems to have been so frequently employed on ordinary occasions as tablets covered with a thin coat of coloured wax, which was readily removed by an iron needle, called a style; and from which the writing was as readily effaced by the blunt end of the same instrument.
But during many ages the article most in use, and of which the consumption was so great as to form a principal branch of the commerce of the Mediterranean, was that manufactured from the papyrus of Egypt. Many manuscripts written upon this kind of paper in the sixth, and some even so early as the fourth century, are still extant. It formed the material of by far the larger proportion of all books from very early times till about the seventh or eighth century, when it gradually gave place to a still more convenient manufacture.
The papyrus, or Egyptian reed, grew in vast quantities in the stagnant pools formed by the inundations of the Nile. The plant consists of a single stem, rising sometimes to the height of ten cubits; this stem, gradually tapering from the root, supports a spreading tuft at its summit. The substance of the stem is fibrous, and the pith contains a sweet juice. Every part of this plant was put to some use by the Egyptians. The harder and lower part they formed into cups and other utensils; the upper part into staves, or the ribs of boats; the sweet pith was a common article of food; while the fibrous part of the stem was manufactured into cloth, sails for ships, ropes, strings, shoes, baskets, wicks for lamps, and, especially, into paper. For this purpose the fibrous coats of the plant were peeled off, the whole length of the stem. One layer of fibres was then laid across another upon a block, and being moistened, the glutinous juice of the plant formed a cement, sufficiently strong to give coherence to the fibres; when greater solidity was required, a size made from bread or glue was employed. The two films being thus connected, were pressed, dried in the sun, beaten with a broad mallet, and then polished with a shell. This texture was cut into various sizes, according to the use for which it was intended, varying from thirteen to four fingers' breadth, and of proportionate length.
By progressive improvements, especially in the hands of the Roman artists, this Egyptian paper was brought to a high degree of perfection. In later ages it was manufactured of considerable thickness, perfect whiteness, and an entire continuity and smoothness of surface. It was, however, at the best, so friable that when durability was required the copyists inserted a page of parchment between every five or six pages of the papyrus. Thus the firmness of the one substance defended the brittleness of the other; and great numbers of books so constituted have resisted the accidents and decays of twelve centuries.
Three hundred years before the Christian era the commerce in this article had extended over most parts of the civilized world; and long afterwards it continued to be a principal source of wealth to the Egyptians. But at length the invention of another manufacture, and the interruption of commerce occasioned by the possession of Egypt by the Saracens, banished the paper of Egypt from common use. Comparatively few manuscripts on this material are found of later date than the eighth or ninth century; though it continued to be occasionally used long afterwards.
The charta bombycina or cotton paper, often improperly called silk paper, was unquestionably manufactured in the east as early as the ninth century, possibly much earlier; and in the tenth it came into general use throughout Europe. This invention, not long afterwards, became still more available for general purposes by the substitution of old linen or cotton rags for the raw material; by which means both the price of the article was reduced, and the quality improved. The cotton paper manufactured in the ancient mode is still used in the east, and is a beautiful fabric.
From this brief account of the materials successively employed for books, it will be obvious, that a knowledge of the changes which these several manufactures underwent will often serve, especially when employed in subservience to other evidence, to ascertain the age of manuscripts; or at least to furnish the means of detecting fabricated documents.
The preservation of books, framed as they are of materials so destructible, through a period of twelve, or even fifteen hundred years, is a fact which might seem almost incredible; especially as the decay of apparently more durable substances within a much shorter period, is continually presented to our notice. The massive walls of the monasteries of the middle ages are often seen prostrate, and fast mingling with the soil; while manuscripts penned within them, or perhaps when their stones were yet in the quarry, are still fair and perfect, glittering with their gold and silver, their cerulean and cinnabar.
But the materials of books, though destructible, are so far from being in themselves perishable that, while defended from positive injuries, they appear to suffer scarcely at all from any intrinsic principle of decay, or to be liable to any perceptible process of decomposition. "No one," says Father Mabillon,[5] "unless totally unacquainted with what relates to antiquity, can call in question the great durability of parchments; since there are extant innumerable books, written on that material, in the seventh and sixth centuries; and some of a still more remote antiquity, by which all doubt on that subject might be removed. It may suffice here to mention the Virgil of the Vatican Library, which appears to be of more ancient date than the fourth century; and another in the King's Library little less ancient; also the Prudentius, in the same library, of equal age; to which you may add several, already mentioned, as the Psalter of S. Germanus, the book of the councils, and others, which are all of parchment. Many other instances I might name if it were proper to dwell upon a matter so well known to every one who is acquainted with antiquity.
"The paper of Egypt, being more frail and brittle, may seem to be open to greater doubt; yet there are not wanting books of great antiquity, by which its durability may be established. To go no further, there is in the Royal Library a very old codex written upon the philyra (or bark of the linden tree) containing the homilies of Avitus, I mean the copy from which the celebrated Jac. Sirmundus prepared his edition; we have also seen two other codices of the same material in the Petavian Library, containing some sermons of S. Augustine, which, in the opinion of the learned, are about 1100 years old. Of the same kind is that rare and very ancient codex in the Ambrosian Library, mutilated indeed, but consisting of many leaves of Egyptian paper, which contain some portions of the Jewish history of Josephus. These examples are sufficient to demonstrate the durability of the Egyptian paper in ancient books." The author then goes on to mention several instances of deeds and chartas written upon the paper of Egypt, still extant, though executed in the fourth and fifth centuries.
Books have owed their conservation, not merely to the durability of the material of which they were formed, but to the peculiarity of their being at once precious, and yet not (in periods of general ignorance) marketable articles; of inestimable value to a few, and absolutely worthless in the opinion of the multitude. They were also often indebted for their preservation in periods of disorder and violence to the sacredness of the roofs under which they were lodged.—Taylor's History of the Transmission of Ancient Books to Modern Times.