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Dyeing Fabrics in Sixteenth-Century Venice Author(s): Sidney M. Edelstein Reviewed work(s): Source: Technology and Culture, Vol. 7, No. 3 (Summer, 1966), pp. 395-397 Published by: The Johns Hopkins University Press on behalf of the Society for the History of Technology Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3101938 . Accessed: 27/11/2011 08:20

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http://www.jstor.org The CoverDesign

DYEING FABRICS IN SIXTEENTH-CENTURY VENICE

The cover illustrationshows the dyeing of fabrics in a heated dyebath,as practicedin Venice in the sixteenthcentury. It is one of two woodcut illustrationsin the very rare first edition of Plictho de Larte de Tentori Che Insegna Tenger Pani Telle Banbasiet Sede si per Larthe Magiore come per la Comune, written by GioanventuraRosetti and publishedin Venice in 1548.The meaningof the word "Plictho"hither- to has been an enigma.However, recent studiesby me, as well as those by Rodon Y Font,' have indicatedthat the word is directly related to the modernItalian word plico and can be loosely translatedas "a collec- tion of papers"or "instructions."The book thus becomes "Instructions In the Art of the Dyers Which Teaches the Dyeing of Woolen Cloths, , and by the Great Art as Well as by the Common." This woodcut appearsat the beginning of the section titled "Quivi Scrivero per Ordine Tutte le Maniere che sie Die Tenir per Tenger Panni per Larte Maggiore,"or "HereinWill I Write in Order All the Mannersthat One Must Keep to Cloths by the Great Art." The other woodcut in the Plictho depicts the dyeing of in- //, stead of cloth and appearsat the beginning of the section on the dyeing of silk. The illustration shows the simplebut basic operationsused in dyeing most fabrics.The dye solutionis madein a copper ves- , t sel which is and the kept heated, i cloth is constantly moved through the bath and pushed down under the liquor in order to obtain uniform results.Until =- -! the last part of the nineteenth 1 C. Rodon Y Font, "SguardoIntorno Ad Alcune Antiche Raccolte Di Secreti Di Tintura," Bullettino Dell'Associazione Italiana Di Chimica Tessile E Coloristica, No. 1 (1933), 11-27. 396 Sidney M. Edelstein century, the sametypes of apparatusand dyeing processwere used;even today the modernbatch processof dyeing textile fabricsemploys essen- tially the samesystem. The Plictho was the first technical book on dyeing to be published. Its writer, Rosetti, superintendentof the armoryin Venice, gatheredto- gether dyeing recipes and processes as used at that time in Venice, Genoa, Florence, and in other Italian cities. Practically nothing is known aboutRosetti other than the fact that he was born in Venice and that he was connected with the armory. There have been controversiesover the date of publicationof the first edition. There is an edition of the Plictho with a printed date of 1540 which containsthe same title page and the same woodcuts as the 1548 edition. On the other hand, studiesby Rodon Y Font2 and me indicate that the so-called 1540 edition could not have been publishedin that year and must have been published sometime after the 1548 edition. The printed date given as "MDXL" was possibly a misprint for "MDLX." The importanceof Rosetti'sbook is indicated by the fact that later editionswere publishedin Venice in 1565, 1611,and in 1672,and a fac- simile of the 1548 edition was published in Turin in 1911. Only the "1548"and "1540"editions contained the two woodcut illustrations. Some scholarswho have examinedthe Plictho only in a cursoryman- ner claim that it was written in the Venetian dialect. Actually, the text is written in Florentine Italianwith various modificationsin style and with the additionof Venetian dialect words in certain sections.Appar- ently the recipes as collected by Rosetti were originally in the local dialects;he then translatedthem into the Italianof Florence, which by that time had become the accepted literarylanguage. A French edition of the Plictho appearedin 1716,and later editionsin 1747and 1771.The French translationsare not accurate and give false ideas concerning many of the recipes. Rosetti'sPlictho is a basicwork in the history of dyeing and coloring. It contains a full discussionof the art as used in Italy in the sixteenth century and, in addition, describesmany techniquesused in the Near East. It is to be noted that the first printed book containing dyeing recipes was The Allerley Matkel printedin Mainzin 1532.3As pointed out by this writer, the Allerley Matkel was written mainly for the housewife or non-professionalworker and was devoted mostly to spot 2 C. Rodon Y Font, "Algo Mas Todavia Acerca El 'Plictho De Larte De Tentori,"' La Bibliofilia, XXXVIII (Florence, 1937), 267-75. 3 Printed in facsimile with English translation and notes by Sidney Edelstein in Technology and Culture,V (1964), 297-321. The Cover Design 397 removing.The Plictho is completely differentin that it was written for the professionalcraftsman and containsfull and detailedinstructions for all types of dyeing on all the importantfibers and dyeable materialsof the time. It ranksin importancein the history of technology with such works as Biringuccio'sPirotechnia, published in Venice in 1540, and with Agricola'sDe Re Metallica,also publishedin the mid-sixteenthcen- tury. An English translationof the Plictho has never appeared.Also, no complete and detailed study of the work in the original Italian exists, althoughmany paperson the Plictho have been published.In collabora- tion with Mr. Hector Borghetty I have been studying and translating the Plictho into English during the last four years. A facsimile of the extremely rare 1548 edition together with an exact English translation, edited and fully annotatedby us, is scheduled for publication by the M.I.T. Pressduring this coming year. SIDNEY M. EDELSTEIN* * DR. EDELSTEIN,president of the Dexter Chemical Corp. (New York), was for many years secretary of the Division of History of the American Chemical Society. He is a collector of rare books and is the author of many articles in the history of chemistry. Technology and Culture

The InternationalQuarterly of the Societyfor the Historyof Technology

SUMMER I966, VOLUMEVII, NUMBER 3