Paper & paper making, ancient and modern

by Richard Herring

The mode of preparation, after cutting into strips of the length and width required, is simply to soak them for a short time in boiling water, after which they are rubbed backwards and forwards over a smooth piece of wood to make them pliable, and then carefully dried. The letters or characters being written or rather engraved thereon with an iron style, which, piercing the outside covering, makes indelible letters; and by afterwards rubbing the writing over with some dark coloured substance, such as soot or charcoal, the parts etched or scratched, have greater relief imparted to them: and the writing is more easily read.

Notwithstanding many paper mills have been erected in India, the natives, I understand, frequently prefer this method, not only for the ordinary purposes of correspondence and accounts, but even in some quarters for government documents of importance.

I must here express my sense of the kind assistance which has on several occasions been afforded me by the Rev. Benjamin Bailey, late of Cottyam, Allepie, Madras, who has not only given to the world a translation in Malayalim of the entire Bible, but has also compiled two voluminous dictionaries, for rendering assistance in the study of that language. This gentleman has recently afforded me an opportunity of inspecting many great curiosities of the kind: indeed, before me is now lying a very neat little specimen written in Malayalim by him (St. Paul’s Second Epistle to Timothy), which shows, in a remarkable degree, the astonishing distinctness which may be produced by this singular mode of writing.

The style with which the letters are engraven upon the leaf is usually worn in the girdle as a prominent ornament of dress. The case which protects it containing also a small knife, employed in preparing the slips, and likewise a little instrument which is used for piercing the leaves, in order that cords may be passed through them for the purpose of securing the manuscript, as may be seen in the instance of various documents both in the East India Company’s Museum, and also in the Library of the British Museum.

A work which I possess, termed the Kammavakyam, written in the Pali language, in Burmese character, upon palm leaf, is thus secured between very handsome covers. It is a Catechism of Sacred Rites, used by the Buddhist priesthood in the examination of a candidate for admission to that order. A translation of it here, however, would be no more consistent in point of matter contained, than it would be in reference to the subject I am treating. Its character and language throughout are truly humiliating to human nature.

In the British Museum there are many very singular documents of the kind, one in particular, which is written upon 390 leaves, bound, as it were, in a frame of gilt copper in the form of a tortoise, screws being passed through the strips instead of cords, the fastenings, with some addition, representing the limbs of the animal. And in the East India Museum may be seen a smaller one, protected by stout wooden covers, which has been carved to represent some animal, apparently a pig. The custom of writing upon leaves of trees, appears to have given rise to the adoption also of the interior bark; the outer being seldom made use of, in consequence of its extreme coarseness. When employed, it is customarily folded over, to admit of its being written upon both sides. The only documents of this kind, which have come under my notice, have been Batta manuscripts, from the island of Sumatra.

Before the art of making paper was known to the Chinese, they appear to have cut pieces of silk to such sizes as they wished to make their books, and thereupon painted the letters with pencils; the silk being first steeped in a kind of size, to prevent the colour from running. But such material being liable to decay, various animal substances were afterwards employed, as being of a more durable nature. Of course the skins were principally used, after being tanned; but their bones, and even entrails, were also made use of for the like purpose. Thus, in the “History of Mahomet,” we read that the Arabians used the shoulder bones of sheep, on which they carved remarkable events with a knife, when, after tying them with a string, they hung those chronicles up in their cabinets. And in the library of Ptolemy Philadelphus, which is said to have contained 700,000 volumes, were the works of Homer, written in golden letters, on the skins of serpents. I might mention, that the term volume here, should not be understood in the sense which it is now customary to receive it, but in its derivation from the Latin; signifying simply a roll, which was the most ancient form of book.

Parchment, or the skins of beasts, dressed and prepared in a manner rendering them fit for writing upon, appears to have been employed at a very early period. Diodorus Siculus informs us, that the Persians of old wrote all their records on skins; and Herodotus also alludes to sheep skins, and goat skins, as in general use among the Ionians about 440 years before the Christian Era. The word Parchment is a corruption of the Latin Pergamena, from Pergamus, which some allege to have been the place of its invention. But it is very probable that in the time of Eumenes, who was king of Pergamus, (about 200 years before Christ,) the circumstance of increased consumption merely occasioned the discovery of a better method of dressing the skins; from which fact alone, and perhaps with sufficient reason, the origin of the present term was derived. Eumenes, about that period, appears to have endeavoured to form a library at Pergamus, which should surpass that of Ptolemy Philadelphus at Alexandria, and in so doing enraged Ptolemy to that degree, that he immediately prohibited any further exportation from Egypt, of the papyrus which by that time was coming into very general use, and thus effectually put a stop to Eumenes’ emulation in that particular. It may be, however, that this prohibition was not solely occasioned by jealousy, but by Ptolemy’s fearing that his dominions, which were so much improved in arts, sciences, and civilization, since the discovery and adoption of the papyrus, (of which we shall presently speak), would be again reduced to a state of ignorance for want of it; the plant sometimes failing in unfavourable weather, while the supply invariably proved unequal to the demand. The people of Pergamus, therefore, were obliged to devise other means, and the improved manufacture of parchment would seem to have been the result. But, that Eumenes on this occasion invented the art of making parchment is exceedingly dubious; for in the books of Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and other parts of Scripture, we find mention made of rolls of writing: in all probability rolls of parchment.