![]() Can I request parchments or leathers in special colors or types? This would be a vellum-over-boards binding. Parchment can also be attached to boards and then bound onto a text block. In this case, the parchment would be sewn onto the text block (the body) and would be considered a limp vellum binding. If it’s thick enough to remain rigid, parchment can be used as the cover of a book on its own. On the whole, though, leather still takes much longer, owing to the time necessary to tanning substances to penetrate all the way through a skin. We have modern chemicals and machinery to thank for this much swifter production period. Over the past millennium, the process of making parchment and leather shrunk months to a week or less. How long does it take to make parchment and leather? See the video below for a demonstration of how to flatten your parchment when ready to use it. This storage method will cause it to curl, but the curl will at least be predictable in that it will only be in one direction. We've found the best way to store parchment to keep problems to a minimum is to store it in a stable 55% humidity environment and to keep it gently rolled up from head to tail (along the spine direction of the skin). When the parchment warps, the entire surface will likely move in several directions. Likewise, too dry an environment will cause it to shrink and become stiffer. Too much environmental moisture and humidity will cause the fiber network to loosen and expand, ultimately warping the parchment until it won't lie flat. It was once wrapped around an animal, and it is only through tremendous stretching and drying of the skin under tension that it reorients the skin fibers into a very thin but very dense skin fiber lattice. There are many ways to tan a skin, and the resultant leather will vary in characteristics, but it will always stand up to moisture, heat, and mechanical action better than any untanned/raw skin. Leather refers to the same raw material - animal skin - chemically altered to render it impervious to rot. ![]() So here’s a simple formula: All vellum is parchment, but not all parchment is vellum. Historically, calfskin has been the finest parchment, so people have long referred to refined parchment as vellum. ![]() Meanwhile, vellum comes from the Old French word Velin, which means calfskin. These days, parchment generally refers to any animal skin turned into a paper-like material from physical action, including removing extraneous flesh, fat, and hair. We can reach back even further to the word Pergamon, from antiquity, which referred to the city in Asia Minor where the first records of parchment mass production occurred. Parchment arrived in the English language from the German Perkament, which in turn came from Pergamena in Italian (and before that, Pergamena in Latin). The roots of the words come from different sources. What is the difference between parchment, vellum, and leather?Īs far as parchment and vellum go, the difference is pretty much semantic at this point in history. Color ranges from light to dark cream, with a lot of character from hair and scars. Hides are procured from local hunters, meaning the skins often have pronounced slices or holes around the edges of the parchment due to poor butchering. It almost always has some sort of natural markings, like bites, scratches, scars, etc. > Deer: Deer parchment has a very smooth, fine-haired grain, but lacks the fat wrinkles of calf. These hides cannot be bleached to impact their color. ![]() ![]() Most skins come out in a gray/brown “antique” color, though some can be a light cream. Because sheep have more natural oils and grease in their skins than goat, their parchment tends to be much softer and rounder to the touch (meaning that it is easier to curve or roll than goat). The hide also usually has pronounced wrinkles located around the neck and spine, due to the much more pliable grain. >Sheep: Sheep parchment is very similar to goat, but has a slightly finer grain pattern. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |