Some Recipes for Gilding

ABSTRACT

Recipes for edge gilding and gold tooling on bookbindings can be found in medieval alchemical, chemical, technical and medical manuscript tracts from the late fifteenth century onwards. Sixteenth-century printed books dealing with medicinal and “curious” subjects, with secrets and mysteries, as well as seventeenth and eighteenth century bookbinding manuals, include recipes for making gold leaf or gold paint and pigments and explain how to apply these to leather and parchment bindings. This article concentrates on descriptions of edge gilding and gold tooling in West European sources, dating from the late fifteenth to the late seventeenth centuries.

ZUSAMMENFASSUNG

Rezepte für Schnittvergoldungen und Handvergoldungen an Bucheinbänden finden sich in mittelalterlichen alchemistischen, chemischen, technischen und medizinischen Handschriften seit dem späten 15. Jahrhundert. Auch gedruckte Werke aus dem 16. Jahrhundert, die sich mit medizinischen und „kuriosen“ Themen, sowie mit geheimen Dingen und Mysterien befassen, sowie Handbücher zur Buchbinderei aus dem 17. und 18. Jahrhundert enthalten Rezepte zur Herstellung von Blattgold oder Goldfarbe und Pigmenten und erklären, wie diese auf Leder- und Pergamenteinbände aufzubringen sind. Dieser Artikel konzentriert sich auf Beschreibungen von Schnitt- und Einbandvergoldungen aus westeuropäischen Quellenschriften aus dem späten 15. bis späten 17. Jahrhundert.

Keywords:

• Gold tooling
• Recipes
• Leather gilding
• Edge gilding
• Sixteenth century

Schlüsselwörter:

• Handvergoldung
• Rezepte
• Ledervergoldung
• Schnittvergoldung
• Sechzehntes Jahrhundert

Notes

1 See Bosh (1961), Levey (1962), and Petherbridge et al. (1981: 44, 74).

2 This bookbinding manual has not been translated in a western language and it is unclear how the gold was applied.

3 References are to the English translation (Teofilo Lombardo et al., 1979) Book III, chapters 72, 74 and 78. Theophilus also gives a recipe for ‘Milling gold for Books’ (chapter 28) and discusses the use of gold and silver (over glair) in books (chapter 29), but in both cases the application is for painted letters or manuscript illumination.

4 See for example Gay (1887: 515); Thomas (1939: xviii, xix, xxvii); De Marinis (1960: 4–5); Laffitte (1989); Szirmai (1999: 202). John Dorne’s Day Book, of 1520 mentions two books as ‘deauratum’, possibly denoting gilt edges (Madan, 1885).

5 My translation. Bole (also ‘bole Armenicke’ or ‘Armenian bole’): an astringent earth from Armenia, fine, compact, earthy or unctuous clay, usually coloured yellow, red or brown. Guineau (2005) is a good, very detailed, reference work on colours and substances.

6 British Library, MS Sloane 345, fols. 23–34, especially fol. 26.

7 A copy is in the Royal Library in Brussels.

8 Two copies are known: in the Royal Library, The Hague and among the books in Peterborough Cathedral Library, now in the University Library, Cambridge.

9 The 1513 ed. has two or three times; the 1540 and 1544 editions say three times, while Mascall’s translation, where the recipe is headed ‘To gylde on Leather’, also recommends ‘thrise’(Mascall, 1583, fol. 43).

10 See Gullick (1979) and several of the works mentioned below.

11 This work was translated into French, Dutch and, a year after its first publication, in English by William Warde as The Secretes of the reverende maister Alexis of Piedmovnt (Warde, 1558); quotations are from this translation; see book 5, fol. 92^r; the pollen of lilies can be used instead of saffron.

12 ‘Aloehepaticke’ or ‘Aloe Epaticum’: hepatic aloes: a dark-brownish-red fragrant resin, fol. 94^r.

13 Fol. 96^r.

14 Fol. 96^r. The same recipe is given in Gullick (1979).

15 King’s yellow or yellow arsenic; trisulphide of arsenic.

16 For edge gilding see fols. 38^r-40^r; for gold-tooling on parchment see fols. 11^r-12^r and for gold-tooling on leather see fols. 40^r-43^r.

17 Facsimile K. van der Horst and C. de Wolf eds. (Bray, 1977). Tooling is described on fol. 33; rolls are illustrated on fol. 46; the chapter on edge gilding by Vermerck is on fols. 47-48.

18 A brown-red resin (latex) from the ivy plant; see p. 144; the recipe for gilding books is on pp. 275-6.

19 N.N., Sonderbare Historische und Politische Anmerckungen … über die Buchbinder-Philosophie, which follows J.G. Zeidler, Buchbinder-Philosophie (Zeidler, 1708) without a separate title-page, but with new pagination, p. 16.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Mirjam M. Foot

Mirjam Foot, D.Litt, FSA, former Director of Collections and Preservation at the British Library, is Emeritus Professor of Library and Archive Studies at University College, London, where she taught Historical Bibliography, Preservation as part of the Collection Management course, and Advanced Preservation. She has published extensively (books and articles) on the history of bookbinding, the history of decorated paper and on a number of preservation topics. She gives regular papers at conferences all over Europe and in the USA.