lampblack

Ingredients

lampblack, gum

Preparation Steps

Original Recipe Text

The lampblack was produced by collecting the soot deposited on an inverted earthenware bowl from a lamp burning hemp oil. Baking the collected soot in the center of a dough ball extracted oil residues and resulted in a pigment consisting largely of amorphous carbon, a deep black powder (p. 135). This was then combined with a gum in addition to other ingredients to prepare the black ink (p. 135).

Evidence

"the ink sample examined was lampblack."

Remarks

Black pigments are discussed in Section 3.2.5. Although charcoal was the predominant black pigment identified in paint layers for underdrawings, the ink sample itself was confirmed as lampblack. The particles resulting from lampblack are tiny and round, whereas those from ground charcoal are larger and more fractured (p. 135-136).