Annotation Plan
For Annotation Field Notes go to this page.
Annotation Plan #2 for Preserving Flowers is on Caitlyn Sellar's page
"For Cages" and Knowledge of Glassworking in Ms Fr. 640

Plan Draft #1

1. Participants:
Ana Matisse and Caitlyn Sellar

2. Recipe:
P006v
English: <head>For cages</head> <ab> You can embellish them with <m>thin</m> <m>enamel</m> <m>canes</m>[a][b][c] of various colors by covering the <m>yellow latten</m> or <m>iron</m> wire with said canes. These you will break neatly into the length that you want if you make a small notch with a cutting <tl>file</tl> at the point where you want to break them, and they will not break anywhere else. You can bend them with a <m>wood</m> en model over a brazier or by the heat of a <tl>lamp</tl>. A cane can be stretched out as long as you want in a small <tl>furnace</tl> made like a <tl>reverberatory oven</tl> but with openings on both sides. And once the large cane is red, they seize the hot end of it with <tl>small pincers</tl> that have long beaks, with one end of the beak inside the end of the cane, so that it may be stretched without becoming blocked[d]. The other end of the cane is held with the hand, as it is not hot. Once the cane is stretched enough, the one who is working seated with his <tl>stove</tl>, the size of a carnation pot, placed in front of him, breaks it off and carries on.
French: <head>Pour <del>ga cach</del> cages[a]</head> <ab>Tu les peulx embellir avecq des <m>canulles</m> d<m>esmail</m> de diverses<lb/> couleurs en revestant le <m>fil darchal</m> ou de <m>fer</m> desdictes canulles<lb/> Lesquelles tu rompras nettement a telle longueur que tu vouldras<lb/> si tu encoches un petit lendroict a rompre avecq une <tl>lime</tl> qui<lb/> couppe Et ne se rompront poinct en aultre endroict Tu les[b] peulx<lb/> courber avecq un modelle de <m>bois</m> sur un rechault ou bien a la<lb/> chaleur de la <tl>lampe</tl> Il se tire aussi si long que tu veulx da{n}s<lb/> un petit <tl>fourneau</tl> faict comme un <tl>four de reverberation</tl> qui<lb/> touteffois est perce des deulx costes Et quand la grosse canulle<lb/> est rouge ilz empoignent le bout chault avecq des <tl>pincettes</tl> a<lb/> long bec de sorte quune poincte du bec de la pincette entre deda{n}s<lb/> le bout de la canulle & par ainsy il salonge sans se boucher<lb/> & laultre bout de la canulle se tient avecq la main pourceque<lb/> elle nest poinct chaulde Quand la canulle est assez estiree<lb/> celuy qui travaille assis ayant son <tl>fourneau</tl> de la gra{n}deur<lb/> dun pot doeillets devant luy la rond & continue Cest pour<lb/> faire canulles pour cappes qui se couppent comme dict est avecq<lb/> la <tl>lime</tl> Les <pro>boutonniers aussi de verre</pro> saident dudit <tl>fourneau</tl></ab>

[AMDH] I have also made a list of recipes that mention glass EXCLUDING glassware (cups, vials, mortar&pestle, etc. - there are a lot of these), recipes for painting on glass (except when the nature of the material is explictly discussed), and looking-glass tin (which I think is the tin-alloy used to mirror glass, but more research on that process will be necessary for me to be sure). These will help us place glass in the author/practitioner's workshop as well as sort out the differences between "glass" and "enamel" in the author practitioner's understandings of vitreous materials.
We will also compile a list of the recipes involving the catching and care of lizards, snakes, and birds, as this may have been a potential use for these cages.

3. Research Plan:

IMG_20160914_132242.jpg
IMG_20160914_132242.jpg

Link to museum page and image


4. Materials:


5. Safety Data Sheets:


Towards a Finalized Annotation Plan (Draft #2)

Research Questions: To investigate the sources of the author/practitioner’s understanding of glassworking (particularly lampworking) techniques, vitreous materials, and tools. We will look at fol.6r, 36v, and 37v, which all describe glassworking techniques. The reconstruction will focus on re-creating the techniques he describes for pulling enamel canes, and comparing these to 16th century lampworking techniques from other sources.

Recipes:
6r:
See above.
36v:
<head><pro>Glassmakers</pro>' glass</head> <ab>It is said that in <pl>Lorraine</pl> and <pl>Flanders</pl> <m>linking glass</m> is made of <m>fern ashes</m> and <m>pebbles</m>. First they blow up a long still that another worker breaks off and cuts vertically with big shears. Then this long still expands by being placed on a stone or large platine in a furnace slightly colder than one for melting. Furthermore, they flatten it by rolling <sup>over</sup> it a big and long iron stick. Then they take it out of the annealing furnace. Similarly, they make some in <pl>England</pl> that are quite beautiful. Close to <pl>Rouen</pl> in <pl>France</pl>, flat glass is made with some <m>saltworth</m> and <m>pebbles</m> and is whiter and softer than the <pl>Lorraine</pl> one, because it can be melted with a candle, unlike the <pl>Lorraine</pl> one. This flat <m>glass</m> is blown up in a long still -- the end of which someone else cuts and blows up whilst turning it, then flattens it using a plane which is on the ground, and then reheats it. Thus the middle of the still, where it began, always stays the same.</ab> <ab><margin>left-middle</margin>The <m>glass</m>, when wet, can be broken again with the flame of a candle, but not as precisely as with hot iron.</ab> </div>
037v: <div> <id>p037v_2</id> <head><pro>Glass-maker</pro></head> <ab> Some do not lay <m>gris d'escaille</m> on the <m>glass</m> to work on it, but trace straight on the <m>glass</m> with <m>noir à huile</m>. However, it is important that the <m>wood</m> be <m>degreased</m>, because if it has even a little <m>grease</m> [on it], the color will not take at all. And even, if the working <pro>glass-maker</pro> has a stink from his nose or his mouth, and he breathes on the <m>glass</m>, the color will not take on it. Those who came up with the invention of working in small works of softened <m>enamels</m> use only <m>azure enamel</m>, which is blue, and <m>esmail colombin</m>, which is the color of purple, which they soften with <m>rocks</m> or <m>lead glass</m>. As for yellow, they make it from <m>silver</m>, red from <m>sanguine</m>, as is said elsewhere, black and gray and shadows from <m>scale black</m>, either strong or weak, carnation from light <m>sanguine</m>. Green is made first from yellow, then they overlay <m>azure enamel</m>, either strong or weak, depending on whether they want to make it bright or dark. </ab></div>


Hands-On Reconstruction Plan
Purpose: The reconstruction will focus on the second half of the recipe on fol. 6r, since it seems like the one that the author/practitioner most likely experimented with himself and the most feasible for us to do with the resources available.
Participants: Ana Matisse Donefer-Hickie and Caitlyn Sellar
Venue: Lab
Meeting Time(s): TBD

Materials
  1. “thin enamel canes”
    • We have decided to use pre-made Moretti soda-lime silica glass (or “soft” glass) canes.
    • Fol. 6v and fol. 37v seem to use the term enamel to refer to hard, vitreous enamel softened in the heat of a flame. Sources relating to sixteenth-century lampworking techniques are scarce, but the author-practitioner’s use of the term accords with a description of lampworking in Denis Diderot’s 1759 Encyclopedie. Diderot describes an “enameler” fusing “baguette[‘s] of solid enamel” onto “small structures of brass wire” to make small human or animal figures.
    • According to Greißer et. al. (2012), soda-lime silica glass is the same type (if not exact chemical composition) of the glass used in the late sixteenth-century lampworked objects from the collection of Ferdinand II.
    • According to Turgeon’s (2001) study of the 16th c inventories of Parisian beadmakers, most lampworking workshops lacked the equipment to make glass and enamel canes themselves, and would have ordered them ready-made from glass manufacturing houses. It is likely that the author/practitioner, if he did this himself, ordered the glass canes from somewhere else. It also seems like he is describing the process of making the canes, something that will hopefully become clearer as we carry on with the reconstruction.
    • I would like to go over the chemistry of this with Naomi to make sure.
  2. “yellow latten or iron wire”
    • It is likely that latten wire refers to wires made from cutting up sheets of latten, an alloy.
    • We will use iron wire, as it can be ordered from Amazon (I haven’t done this yet).

Tools/Equipment
  1. “a small furnace made like a reverberatory oven but with openings on both sides”
    • The author/practitioner mentions reverberatory furnaces in 16r, 115v, 124v, 127v, and 161r.
    • It seems that by “reverberatory” furnace he means a furnace with good airflow, an even heat, and at least marginally controllable temperature (he talks about them with reference to several kinds of heat - more research into the author/practitioner’s knowledge of heat would be interesting here).
    • I think we can make a similar one (with the help of the post-docs and perhaps Hunter from RISD) with the blowtorches and firebricks already in the lab. I haven’t completed a safety workflow for this yet because I have some questions for the team about what is possible in the space we have.
  2. “small pincers that have long beaks”
    • There are diagrams in fol. 167r of the manuscript depicting small pincers, and they are mentioned several times throughout for manipulating small animals for life casting.
    • I have obtained a pair of similar, but not identical, pincers. They are made particularly for lampworking, though I do not know their particular metal composition.
  3. “cutting file”
    • This is a technique familiar to me for cutting both glass and wire in a modern studio. A small metal file is used to make wires easier to cut. I will look into ordering one from Amazon, if the lab doesn’t already have one.
    • I also think modern wire cutters or a hardy nail file might suffice here, since this step is not integral to our questions.
  4. “wooden model”
    • Since I am more interested in his knowledge of the manipulation of glass, I have not thought extensively about the model. I think we could probably make one out of scraps of wood.
  5. “brazier” or “lamp”
    • From the breadmolding exercise we know that a brazier is a container for coals. This implies a strong, diffuse, stable heat. We could try to use an oven on high heat for this part.

Preliminary Recipe Analysis and Instructions Breakdown [and commentary]
  1. <ab>You can embellish them with <m>thin</m><m>enamel</m><m>canes</m> of various colors by covering the <m>yellow latten</m> or <m>iron</m> wire with said canes.
    • Here the author/practitioner is laying out the purpose of the whole recipe. This is essentially a description of the intended final product.
    • What does he mean by "covering"?
  2. These you will break neatly into the length that you want if you make a small notch with a cutting <tl>file</tl> at the point where you want to break them, and they will not break anywhere else.
    • It is not clear here whether the author/practitioner is talking about the wires or the canes. I think he is talking about the wires and not yet about the glass. This section seems to be instructions for how to make a cage out of stiff wire, the next instructions for how to make glass canes.
    • AMENDMENT: He is talking about the canes, since he re-iterates the point later in the recipe.
  3. You can bend them with a <m>wood</m>en model over a brazier or by the heat of a <tl>lamp</tl>.
    • Do wires need to be heated to bend? Is the glass already on the wires? The heat given off by a brazier would not be directed, it would be diffuse. Obviously it is cool enough to prevent the wooden model from catching fire but hot enough to bend something (wire? Glass-covered wire?).
    • Bending the canes? Is there wire in the canes?
  4. A cane can be stretched out as long as you want in a small <tl>furnace</tl> made like a <tl>reverberatory oven</tl> but with openings on both sides.
    • Here he switches from his description of how to form the cage-shape to his description of how to pull out canes. At first I thought that he meant the reader to pull out canes with wire already inside them, but now I think he means to simply lay the colorful cane on top of the pre-formed wire cage.
  5. And once the large cane is red, they seize the hot end of it with <tl>small pincers</tl> that have long beaks, with one end of the beak inside the end of the cane, so that it may be stretched without becoming blocked.
    • With this sentence, he switches from using “you” in his descriptions of the actions to be taken to using “they.” This suggests a switch from instruction to description. I think here he is describing the actions of glass artisans making hollow canes. He describes the actions of glassmakers at least twice more in the manuscript, in 36v and 37v.
    • Being stretched without becoming blocked implies that the canes are hollow when they are stretched.
  6. The other end of the cane is held with the hand, as it is not hot.
    • This completely accords with my knowledge of lampworking, where you manipulate the glass by holding the canes with just the end of the cane in the flame to be worked hot.
  7. Once the cane is stretched enough, the one who is working seated with his <tl>stove</tl>, the size of a carnation pot, placed in front of him, breaks it off and carries on.
    • So here is information on where the oven is located while the glass is being worked. It sounds like perhaps there are two people involved in this process, one holding the cane on one side of the furnace and one holding the cane on the other side of the furnace. The one who is seated hold the original cane because it is he that breaks it off, while the second artisan is the one that draws the end through the stove. What is odd here is that he describes and depicts them drawing the glass cane through the stove. I would think it would get too hot and melt into the furnace.
  8. This is for making canes for capes, which may be cut, as already mentioned, with a <tl>file</tl>.
    • I do not know what he means by cape here. Further research on this might help us determine what kind of canes he is talking about.
    • This part also suggests that what he is talking about cutting in the first part is the canes, not the wire.
  9. <pro>Glass-button makers</pro> also use the said <tl>stove</tl>.</ab>
    • He mentions both button-makers and enamel again on fol. 40r. In that recipe, however, he does not describe heating and working cold enamel rods but painting a crushed enamel paste onto silver gild lozenges and firing. This accords with the similarities between his descriptions of this furnace and his descriptions of using reverberatory furnaces for firing molds in fol. 115v, 124v, 127v, and 161r.
  10. Under the door is a grill that supports the burning <m>charcoal</m>. The <m>ash</m> is emptied by turning the <tl>stove</tl> upside down.</ab>
    • The recipe is accompanied by a marginal note including details on the furnace. It is clear from this that the furnace is heated with charcoal that is supported by a grill. I think the stove can be removed from the grate (turned upside down) and the ash brushed off the grate to be replaced with fresh charcoal.
    • This stove seems very similar to the pipe stove that Hunter built in the RISD Ruby Glass trials.

Summary of Breakdown and Plan for Iterations of Reconstruction Experiment

Research Plan
Ongoing research can be found in my research notes, which I have moved to another wiki page because it seemed like too much to keep all in one place:
AMDH's Research Notes Found Here.
I plan to undertake further research on:

M&K Team Notes:
lampwork guilds: in France? Lorraine; furnaces, furnace making

chalcedony glass; glass-related annotations by Zhao, Estrades,

mirror glass: See Student Reference Files on mirrors.

check folios around this one--surrounded by mirror, glass, frames for mirrors



Working Bibliography
Secondary Sources
Bellanger, Jacqueline. Verre d'usage et de prestige: France 1500-1800. Paris: Les Editions de l'Amateur, 1988.

Bray, Charles. Dictionary of Glass: Materials and Techniques. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2001.

Dussubieux, Laure. "Chemical Investigation of Some 17th-Century French Glass Personal Ornaments." In Journal of Glass Studies 51 (2009): 95-110.

Gaynor, Susan. "French Enameled Glass of the Renaissance." In Journal of Glass Studies 33 (1991): 42-81.

Greißer, Martina et al. "Scientific investigation and study of the sixteenth-century glass jewelry collection of Archduke Ferdinand II." In Contributions to the Vienna Congress 2012.DOI: 10.1179/2047058412Y.0000000027.

Icher, François. The Artisans and Guilds of France: Beautiful Craftsmanship Through the Centuries. New York: Harry N. Abrams Inc., 2000.

Lanmon, Dwight P with David B. Whitehouse. Glass in the Robert Lehman Collection. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1993.

McCray, W. Patrick. Glassmaking in Renaissance Venice: The Fragile Craft. Brookfield: Ashgate Publishing Company, 1999.

McNeil, Donald S, ed. Jewelers’ Dictionary. Radnor: Jewelers’ Circular-Keystone, 1947.

Meisterwerke der Sammlungen Schloss Ambras. Wien: Kunsthistorisches Museum, 2008. (image: Glasberg p. 151.)

O'Connor, Erin. Embodied knowledge in glassblowing: the experience of meaning and the struggle towards proficiency. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing, 2007.

Rossi-Wilcox, Susan M, Henri Reiling and Philip Bisaga. "The Blaschkas' Lampworking Tables." In Journal of Glass Studies 45 (2003): 167-176.


Scoville, Warren C. Capitalism and French Glassmaking, 1640-1789. Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1950.

Speel, Erika. Dictionary of Enamelling. Brookfield: Ashgate Publishing Company, 1998.

Tolaini, Francesca. “Technical Recipes for Glass in the So-called Mappae Clavicula.” In When Glass Matters. Edited by Marco Beretta. Firenze: Leo S. Olschki, 2004.

Turgeon, Laurier. "French Beads in France and Northeastern North America during the Sixteenth Century." Historical Archaeology 35:4 (2001): 58-9, 61-82.

Primary Sources
Anthony of Pisa [AMDH] - could someone clarify for me which source is meant by this? I think it was a note from our last annotation meeting. I tried searching for Anthony of Pisa in the Readings and Reference folder but I couldn't find anything and I'm not familiar with it.

Gnudi, Martha Teach, and Cyril Stanley Smith, trans. The Pirotechnia of Vannoccio Biringuccio. New York: The American Institute of Mining and Metallurgical Engineers, 1942.

Hawthorne, John G and Cyril Stanley Smith, trans. On Divers Arts: The Treatise of Theophilus. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1963.

Hawthorne, John G and Cyril Stanley Smith, eds. Mappae Clavicula: A Little Key to the World of Medieval Techniques. Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society, 1974.

Hoover, Herbert Clark and Lou Henry Hoover. Georgius Agricola De Re Metallica Translated from the First Latin Edition of 1556. New York: Dover Publications Inc., 1950.

Merret, Christopher. The Art of Glass Wherein Are Shown The Wayes To Make and Colour Glass, Pastes, Enamels, Lakes, and Other Curiosities / Written in Italian By Antonio Neri; And Translated into English, With Some Observations on The Author (1662). London: Printed by A.W. for Octavian Pulleyn, 1662. EEBO Editions, Reproduction of the original in the Yale University Library.

Grünhaldt Sisco, Anneliese and Cyril Stanley Smith. Lazarus Ercker's Treatise on Ores and Assaying translated from the German Edition of 1580. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1951.

Thompson, Daniel V. Jr, trans. Cennino D’Andrea Cennini The Craftsman’s Handbook: The Italian “Il Libro Dell’ Arte”. New York: Dover Publications, Inc, 1933.