Lakes of Flowers

 

'The Miracle of the Immobility of Santa Lucia'

Leandro Bassano, painted using Florentine lakes.

In the final part of Antonio Neri's 1612 book on glassmaking, [1] he presents several recipes that are devoted to pigments for painting. His intention for including them is for their application on glass objects, but these were the same materials used in general by fine artists in the early seventeenth century. 

In his recipe #110, the Florentine priest gives a wonderfully simple method to extract the color from common flowers. The term for these pigments is "lakes." Once obtained, the pigments were often used to dye a powdered carrier material in order to give them more body and behave like other paint. From there they might be mixed into egg-tempera, varnish or oil depending on the application. It is likely that Neri used similar pigments for the illustrations in his 1598 manuscript.[2] Here is his recipe in its entirety: 

A Way to Extract the Lake [3] and Color for Painting, from Orange Blossoms, Red Poppies, Blue Irises, Ordinary Violets, Red Violets, Carnations, Red Roses, Borage Flowers, Day Lilies, Irises, and From Flowers of Any Desired Color and the Greens of the Mallow, the Pimpernel and All the Plants. 

Take whichever flower you want, of any color you want, or even a [green] plant. If it will rub green from a leaf onto white paper staining it with color, then it will be good. The plants and flowers that do not show this effect are no-good. Put ordinary aqua vitae into a glass urinal, with a cappello [alembic cap] for its cover, making sure the said crystallo cap is as wide as possible. 

Into this cap, pack the leaves [or petals] of any flower or plant from which you want to release and extract the tincture. Now lute the mouth joint of the cap. Fit a receiver to its snout and lute that joint. Give it a moderated fire so that the volatile part [alcohol] of the aqua vitae rises into the alembic, and falls down into its volume upon the petals of the flowers, extracting the tincture. 

In time, drops will run down the snout of the cap into the receiver, colored and charged with the tincture. Once all of the volatile part of the aqua vitae passes and becomes colored, distill this colored volatile part of the aqua vitae in a glass vessel. [The alcohol] will pass white and will be useable three more times. The dye will remain in the bottom, which you should not allow to dry too much, but just moderately. Then you will have the very best tincture or lake for painting from an abundance of flowers and plants.

The "aqua vitae" he refers to is simply a distilled alcohol such as grappa. The important point here is that it is a potent solution of ethanol and water; a well-known modern equivalent would be vodka. The chemical apparatus he describes is about as simple as it got for alchemists. It has three parts; the first is a base consisting of (in this case) a urinal—an inexpensive and convenient glass container with a wide mouth. The second piece is what Neri calls a "cappello"; it is a special glass cap featuring a long tubular snout leading from the top, angled slightly downward. When the cap is affixed to the base with the materials inside and gently heated, vapor will condense in the cap and run down the snout for collection in the third piece, a "receiver" vessel. 

The material he uses to seal the pieces together was called "lute," a mixture of mud, cloth fibers, egg and some other materials that stick to the glass and withstand the heat of the fire. Its only purpose was to keep the glassware sealed until the procedure was complete. [4] 

In the mid nineteenth century, Mary Merrifield made an extensive survey of Italian manuscripts with recipes for artists. She included this comment about Neri's home town:

Florentine lake must have had considerable reputation in Venice, since Leandro Bassano contracted to employ it in his picture of the 'Combat of the Angles,' painted for the church of S. Giorgio Maggiore at Venice in 1597. [5]

Today, this painting is known as 'The Miracle of the immobility of Santa Lucia' and is shown at the top of this post.

[1] L'Arte Vetraria, Neri 1612.
[2] Discorso, Neri 1598-1600.
[3] Neri uses the word "lacca," the equivalent of "lacha" in other manuscripts. For a specific reference to Neri in this regard, see Merrifield 1849, v. 1, p. clxxxi.
[4] A word to the wise: high proof alcohol in a confined glass container near an open flame is a good way to cause a minor explosion and a fireball featuring glass shrapnel.
[5] Merrifield 1849, v.1, p. clxxxiii. She references Cicogna  1824–1858, v. 4, p. 349 for this information. 

* This post first appeared here on 14 Oct 2014.

Lakes of Flowers

'The Miracle of the Immobility of Santa Lucia'

Leandro Bassano, painted using Florentine lakes.

In the final part of Antonio Neri's 1612 book on glassmaking, [1] he presents several recipes that are devoted to pigments for painting. His intention for including them is for their application on glass objects, but these were the same materials used in general by fine artists in the early seventeenth century. 

In his recipe #110, the Florentine priest gives a wonderfully simple method to extract the color from common flowers. The term for these pigments is "lakes." Once obtained, the pigments were often used to dye a powdered carrier material in order to give them more body and behave like other paint. From there they might be mixed into egg-tempera, varnish or oil depending on the application. It is likely that Neri used similar pigments for the illustrations in his 1598 manuscript.[2] Here is his recipe in its entirety: 

A Way to Extract the Lake [3] and Color for Painting, from Orange Blossoms, Red Poppies, Blue Irises, Ordinary Violets, Red Violets, Carnations, Red Roses, Borage Flowers, Day Lilies, Irises, and From Flowers of Any Desired Color and the Greens of the Mallow, the Pimpernel and All the Plants. 

Take whichever flower you want, of any color you want, or even a [green] plant. If it will rub green from a leaf onto white paper staining it with color, then it will be good. The plants and flowers that do not show this effect are no-good. Put ordinary aqua vitae into a glass urinal, with a cappello [alembic cap] for its cover, making sure the said crystallo cap is as wide as possible. 

Into this cap, pack the leaves [or petals] of any flower or plant from which you want to release and extract the tincture. Now lute the mouth joint of the cap. Fit a receiver to its snout and lute that joint. Give it a moderated fire so that the volatile part [alcohol] of the aqua vitae rises into the alembic, and falls down into its volume upon the petals of the flowers, extracting the tincture. 

In time, drops will run down the snout of the cap into the receiver, colored and charged with the tincture. Once all of the volatile part of the aqua vitae passes and becomes colored, distill this colored volatile part of the aqua vitae in a glass vessel. [The alcohol] will pass white and will be useable three more times. The dye will remain in the bottom, which you should not allow to dry too much, but just moderately. Then you will have the very best tincture or lake for painting from an abundance of flowers and plants.

The "aqua vitae" he refers to is simply a distilled alcohol such as grappa. The important point here is that it is a potent solution of ethanol and water; a well-known modern equivalent would be vodka. The chemical apparatus he describes is about as simple as it got for alchemists. It has three parts; the first is a base consisting of (in this case) a urinal—an inexpensive and convenient glass container with a wide mouth. The second piece is what Neri calls a "cappello"; it is a special glass cap featuring a long tubular snout leading from the top, angled slightly downward. When the cap is affixed to the base with the materials inside and gently heated, vapor will condense in the cap and run down the snout for collection in the third piece, a "receiver" vessel. 

The material he uses to seal the pieces together was called "lute," a mixture of mud, cloth fibers, egg and some other materials that stick to the glass and withstand the heat of the fire. Its only purpose was to keep the glassware sealed until the procedure was complete. [4] 

In the mid nineteenth century, Mary Merrifield made an extensive survey of Italian manuscripts with recipes for artists. She included this comment about Neri's home town:

Florentine lake must have had considerable reputation in Venice, since Leandro Bassano contracted to employ it in his picture of the 'Combat of the Angles,' painted for the church of S. Giorgio Maggiore at Venice in 1597. [5]

Today, this painting is known as 'The Miracle of the immobility of Santa Lucia' and is shown at the top of this post.

[1] L'Arte Vetraria, Neri 1612.
[2] Discorso, Neri 1598-1600.
[3] Neri uses the word "lacca," the equivalent of "lacha" in other manuscripts. For a specific reference to Neri in this regard, see Merrifield 1849, v. 1, p. clxxxi.
[4] A word to the wise: high proof alcohol in a confined glass container near an open flame is a good way to cause a minor explosion and a fireball featuring glass shrapnel.
[5] Merrifield 1849, v.1, p. clxxxiii. She references Cicogna  1824–1858, v. 4, p. 349 for this information. 

* This post first appeared here on 14 Oct 2014.

Lake of Flowers

'The Miracle of the Immobility of Santa Lucia'

Leandro Bassano, using Florentine lakes.

In the final part of Antonio Neri's 1612 book on glassmaking, [1] he presents several recipes that are devoted to pigments for painting. His intention for including them is for their application on glass objects, but these were the same materials used in general by fine artists in the early seventeenth century. 

In his recipe #110, the Florentine priest gives a wonderfully simple method to extract the color from common flowers. The term for these pigments is "lakes." Once obtained, the pigments were often used to dye a powdered carrier material in order to give them more body and behave like other paint. From there they might be mixed into egg-tempera, varnish or oil depending on the application. It is likely that Neri used similar pigments for the illustrations in his 1598 manuscript.[2] Here is his recipe in its entirety: 

A Way to Extract the Lake [3] and Color for Painting, from Orange Blossoms, Red Poppies, Blue Irises, Ordinary Violets, Red Violets, Carnations, Red Roses, Borage Flowers, Day Lilies, Irises, and From Flowers of Any Desired Color and the Greens of the Mallow, the Pimpernel and All the Plants. 

Take whichever flower you want, of any color you want, or even a [green] plant. If it will rub green from a leaf onto white paper staining it with color, then it will be good. The plants and flowers that do not show this effect are no-good. Put ordinary aqua vitae into a glass urinal, with a cappello [alembic cap] for its cover, making sure the said crystallo cap is as wide as possible. 

Into this cap, pack the leaves [or petals] of any flower or plant from which you want to release and extract the tincture. Now lute the mouth joint of the cap. Fit a receiver to its snout and lute that joint. Give it a moderated fire so that the volatile part [alcohol] of the aqua vitae rises into the alembic, and falls down into its volume upon the petals of the flowers, extracting the tincture. 

In time, drops will run down the snout of the cap into the receiver, colored and charged with the tincture. Once all of the volatile part of the aqua vitae passes and becomes colored, distill this colored volatile part of the aqua vitae in a glass vessel. [The alcohol] will pass white and will be useable three more times. The dye will remain in the bottom, which you should not allow to dry too much, but just moderately. Then you will have the very best tincture or lake for painting from an abundance of flowers and plants.

The "aqua vitae" he refers to is simply a distilled alcohol such as grappa. The important point here is that it is a potent solution of ethanol and water; a well-known modern equivalent would be vodka. The chemical apparatus he describes is about as simple as it got for alchemists. It has three parts; the first is a base consisting of (in this case) a urinal—an inexpensive and convenient glass container with a wide mouth. The second piece is what Neri calls a "cappello"; it is a special glass cap featuring a long tubular snout leading from the top, angled slightly downward. When the cap is affixed to the base with the materials inside and gently heated, vapor will condense in the cap and run down the snout for collection in the third piece, a "receiver" vessel. 

The material he uses to seal the pieces together was called "lute," a mixture of mud, cloth fibers, egg and some other materials that stick to the glass and withstand the heat of the fire. Its only purpose was to keep the glassware sealed until the procedure was complete. [4] 

In the mid nineteenth century, Mary Merrifield made an extensive survey of Italian manuscripts with recipes for artists. She included this comment about Neri's home town:

Florentine lake must have had considerable reputation in Venice, since Leandro Bassano contracted to employ it in his picture of the 'Combat of the Angles,' painted for the church of S. Giorgio Maggiore at Venice in 1597. [5]

Today, this painting is known as 'The Miracle of the immobility of Santa Lucia' and is shown at the top of this post.

[1] L'Arte Vetraria, Neri 1612.
[2] Discorso, Neri 1598-1600.
[3] Neri uses the word "lacca," the equivalent of "lacha" in other manuscripts. For a specific reference to Neri in this regard, see Merrifield 1849, v. 1, p. clxxxi.
[4] A word to the wise: high proof alcohol in a confined glass container near an open flame is a good way to cause a minor explosion and a fireball featuring glass shrapnel.
[5] Merrifield 1849, v.1, p. clxxxiii. She references Cicogna  1824–1858, v. 4, p. 349 for this information. 

* This post first appeared here on 14 Oct 2014.

Lake of Flowers

'The Miracle of the Immobility of Santa Lucia'

Leandro Bassano, using Florentine lakes.

In the final part of Antonio Neri's 1612 book on glassmaking, [1] he presents several recipes that are devoted to pigments for painting. His intention for including them is for their application on glass objects, but these were the same materials used in general by fine artists in the early seventeenth century. 

In his recipe #110, the Florentine priest gives a wonderfully simple method to extract the color from common flowers. The term for these pigments is "lakes." Once obtained, the pigments were often used to dye a powdered carrier material in order to give them more body and behave like other paint. From there they might be mixed into egg-tempera, varnish or oil depending on the application. It is likely that Neri used similar pigments for the illustrations in his 1598 manuscript.[2] Here is his recipe in its entirety: 

A Way to Extract the Lake [3] and Color for Painting, from Orange Blossoms, Red Poppies, Blue Irises, Ordinary Violets, Red Violets, Carnations, Red Roses, Borage Flowers, Day Lilies, Irises, and From Flowers of Any Desired Color and the Greens of the Mallow, the Pimpernel and All the Plants. 

Take whichever flower you want, of any color you want, or even a [green] plant. If it will rub green from a leaf onto white paper staining it with color, then it will be good. The plants and flowers that do not show this effect are no-good. Put ordinary aqua vitae into a glass urinal, with a cappello [alembic cap] for its cover, making sure the said crystallo cap is as wide as possible. 

Into this cap, pack the leaves [or petals] of any flower or plant from which you want to release and extract the tincture. Now lute the mouth joint of the cap. Fit a receiver to its snout and lute that joint. Give it a moderated fire so that the volatile part [alcohol] of the aqua vitae rises into the alembic, and falls down into its volume upon the petals of the flowers, extracting the tincture. 

In time, drops will run down the snout of the cap into the receiver, colored and charged with the tincture. Once all of the volatile part of the aqua vitae passes and becomes colored, distill this colored volatile part of the aqua vitae in a glass vessel. [The alcohol] will pass white and will be useable three more times. The dye will remain in the bottom, which you should not allow to dry too much, but just moderately. Then you will have the very best tincture or lake for painting from an abundance of flowers and plants.

The "aqua vitae" he refers to is simply a distilled alcohol such as grappa. The important point here is that it is a potent solution of ethanol and water; a well-known modern equivalent would be vodka. The chemical apparatus he describes is about as simple as it got for alchemists. It has three parts; the first is a base consisting of (in this case) a urinal—an inexpensive and convenient glass container with a wide mouth. The second piece is what Neri calls a "cappello"; it is a special glass cap featuring a long tubular snout leading from the top, angled slightly downward. When the cap is affixed to the base with the materials inside and gently heated, vapor will condense in the cap and run down the snout for collection in the third piece, a "receiver" vessel. 

The material he uses to seal the pieces together was called "lute," a mixture of mud, cloth fibers, egg and some other materials that stick to the glass and withstand the heat of the fire. Its only purpose was to keep the glassware sealed until the procedure was complete. [4] 

In the mid nineteenth century, Mary Merrifield made an extensive survey of Italian manuscripts with recipes for artists. She included this comment about Neri's home town:

Florentine lake must have had considerable reputation in Venice, since Leandro Bassano contracted to employ it in his picture of the 'Combat of the Angles,' painted for the church of S. Giorgio Maggiore at Venice in 1597. [5]

Today, this painting is known as 'The Miracle of the immobility of Santa Lucia' and is shown at the top of this post.

[1] L'Arte Vetraria, Neri 1612.
[2] Discorso, Neri 1598-1600.
[3] Neri uses the word "lacca," the equivalent of "lacha" in other manuscripts. For a specific reference to Neri in this regard, see Merrifield 1849, v. 1, p. clxxxi.
[4] A word to the wise: high proof alcohol in a confined glass container near an open flame is a good way to cause a minor explosion and a fireball featuring glass shrapnel.
[5] Merrifield 1849, v.1, p. clxxxiii. She references Cicogna  1824–1858, v. 4, p. 349 for this information. 

* This post first appeared here on 14 Oct 2014.

Lake of Flowers

'The Miracle of the Immobility of Santa Lucia'

Leandro Bassano, using Florentine lakes.

In the final part of Antonio Neri's 1612 book on glassmaking, [1] he presents several recipes that are devoted to pigments for painting. His intention for including them is for their application on glass objects, but these were the same materials used in general by fine artists in the early seventeenth century. 

In his recipe #110, the Florentine priest gives a wonderfully simple method to extract the color from common flowers. The term for these pigments is "lakes." Once obtained, the pigments were often used to dye a powdered carrier material in order to give them more body and behave like other paint. From there they might be mixed into egg-tempera, varnish or oil depending on the application. It is likely that Neri used similar pigments for the illustrations in his 1598 manuscript.[2] Here is his recipe in its entirety: 

A Way to Extract the Lake [3] and Color for Painting, from Orange Blossoms, Red Poppies, Blue Irises, Ordinary Violets, Red Violets, Carnations, Red Roses, Borage Flowers, Day Lilies, Irises, and From Flowers of Any Desired Color and the Greens of the Mallow, the Pimpernel and All the Plants. 

Take whichever flower you want, of any color you want, or even a [green] plant. If it will rub green from a leaf onto white paper staining it with color, then it will be good. The plants and flowers that do not show this effect are no-good. Put ordinary aqua vitae into a glass urinal, with a cappello [alembic cap] for its cover, making sure the said crystallo cap is as wide as possible. 

Into this cap, pack the leaves [or petals] of any flower or plant from which you want to release and extract the tincture. Now lute the mouth joint of the cap. Fit a receiver to its snout and lute that joint. Give it a moderated fire so that the volatile part [alcohol] of the aqua vitae rises into the alembic, and falls down into its volume upon the petals of the flowers, extracting the tincture. 

In time, drops will run down the snout of the cap into the receiver, colored and charged with the tincture. Once all of the volatile part of the aqua vitae passes and becomes colored, distill this colored volatile part of the aqua vitae in a glass vessel. [The alcohol] will pass white and will be useable three more times. The dye will remain in the bottom, which you should not allow to dry too much, but just moderately. Then you will have the very best tincture or lake for painting from an abundance of flowers and plants.

The "aqua vitae" he refers to is simply a distilled alcohol such as grappa. The important point here is that it is a potent solution of ethanol and water; a well-known modern equivalent would be vodka. The chemical apparatus he describes is about as simple as it got for alchemists. It has three parts; the first is a base consisting of (in this case) a urinal—an inexpensive and convenient glass container with a wide mouth. The second piece is what Neri calls a "cappello"; it is a special glass cap featuring a long tubular snout leading from the top, angled slightly downward. When the cap is affixed to the base with the materials inside and gently heated, vapor will condense in the cap and run down the snout for collection in the third piece, a "receiver" vessel. 

The material he uses to seal the pieces together was called "lute," a mixture of mud, cloth fibers, egg and some other materials that stick to the glass and withstand the heat of the fire. Its only purpose was to keep the glassware sealed until the procedure was complete. [4] 

In the mid nineteenth century, Mary Merrifield made an extensive survey of Italian manuscripts with recipes for artists. She included this comment about Neri's home town:

Florentine lake must have had considerable reputation in Venice, since Leandro Bassano contracted to employ it in his picture of the 'Combat of the Angles,' painted for the church of S. Giorgio Maggiore at Venice in 1597. [5]

Today, this painting is known as 'The Miracle of the immobility of Santa Lucia' and is shown at the top of this post.

[1] L'Arte Vetraria, Neri 1612.
[2] Discorso, Neri 1598-1600.
[3] Neri uses the word "lacca," the equivalent of "lacha" in other manuscripts. For a specific reference to Neri in this regard, see Merrifield 1849, v. 1, p. clxxxi.
[4] A word to the wise: high proof alcohol in a confined glass container near an open flame is a good way to cause a minor explosion and a fireball featuring glass shrapnel.
[5] Merrifield 1849, v.1, p. clxxxiii. She references Cicogna  1824–1858, v. 4, p. 349 for this information. 

* This post first appeared here on 14 Oct 2014.

Lake of Flowers

'The Miracle of the Immobility of Santa Lucia'

Leandro Bassano, using Florentine lakes.

In the final part of Antonio Neri's 1612 book on glassmaking, [1] he presents several recipes that are devoted to pigments for painting. His intention for including them is for their application on glass objects, but these were the same materials used in general by fine artists in the early seventeenth century. 

In his recipe #110, the Florentine priest gives a wonderfully simple method to extract the color from common flowers. The term for these pigments is "lakes." Once obtained, the pigments were often used to dye a powdered carrier material in order to give them more body and behave like other paint. From there they might be mixed into egg-tempera, varnish or oil depending on the application. It is likely that Neri used similar pigments for the illustrations in his 1598 manuscript.[2] Here is his recipe in its entirety: 

A Way to Extract the Lake [3] and Color for Painting, from Orange Blossoms, Red Poppies, Blue Irises, Ordinary Violets, Red Violets, Carnations, Red Roses, Borage Flowers, Day Lilies, Irises, and From Flowers of Any Desired Color and the Greens of the Mallow, the Pimpernel and All the Plants. 

Take whichever flower you want, of any color you want, or even a [green] plant. If it will rub green from a leaf onto white paper staining it with color, then it will be good. The plants and flowers that do not show this effect are no-good. Put ordinary aqua vitae into a glass urinal, with a cappello [alembic cap] for its cover, making sure the said crystallo cap is as wide as possible. 

Into this cap, pack the leaves [or petals] of any flower or plant from which you want to release and extract the tincture. Now lute the mouth joint of the cap. Fit a receiver to its snout and lute that joint. Give it a moderated fire so that the volatile part [alcohol] of the aqua vitae rises into the alembic, and falls down into its volume upon the petals of the flowers, extracting the tincture. 

In time, drops will run down the snout of the cap into the receiver, colored and charged with the tincture. Once all of the volatile part of the aqua vitae passes and becomes colored, distill this colored volatile part of the aqua vitae in a glass vessel. [The alcohol] will pass white and will be useable three more times. The dye will remain in the bottom, which you should not allow to dry too much, but just moderately. Then you will have the very best tincture or lake for painting from an abundance of flowers and plants.

The "aqua vitae" he refers to is simply a distilled alcohol such as grappa. The important point here is that it is a potent solution of ethanol and water; a well-known modern equivalent would be vodka. The chemical apparatus he describes is about as simple as it got for alchemists. It has three parts; the first is a base consisting of (in this case) a urinal—an inexpensive and convenient glass container with a wide mouth. The second piece is what Neri calls a "cappello"; it is a special glass cap featuring a long tubular snout leading from the top, angled slightly downward. When the cap is affixed to the base with the materials inside and gently heated, vapor will condense in the cap and run down the snout for collection in the third piece, a "receiver" vessel. 

The material he uses to seal the pieces together was called "lute," a mixture of mud, cloth fibers, egg and some other materials that stick to the glass and withstand the heat of the fire. Its only purpose was to keep the glassware sealed until the procedure was complete. [4] 

In the mid nineteenth century, Mary Merrifield made an extensive survey of Italian manuscripts with recipes for artists. She included this comment about Neri's home town:

Florentine lake must have had considerable reputation in Venice, since Leandro Bassano contracted to employ it in his picture of the 'Combat of the Angles,' painted for the church of S. Giorgio Maggiore at Venice in 1597. [5]

Today, this painting is known as 'The Miracle of the immobility of Santa Lucia' and is shown at the top of this post.

[1] L'Arte Vetraria, Neri 1612.
[2] Discorso, Neri 1598-1600.
[3] Neri uses the word "lacca," the equivalent of "lacha" in other manuscripts. For a specific reference to Neri in this regard, see Merrifield 1849, v. 1, p. clxxxi.
[4] A word to the wise: high proof alcohol in a confined glass container near an open flame is a good way to cause a minor explosion and a fireball featuring glass shrapnel.
[5] Merrifield 1849, v.1, p. clxxxiii. She references Cicogna  1824–1858, v. 4, p. 349 for this information. 

* This post first appeared here on 14 Oct 2014.

Lake of Flowers

'The Miracle of the immobility of Santa Lucia'

Leandro Bassano, using Florentine lakes.

In the final part of Antonio Neri's 1612 book on glassmaking, [1] he presents several recipes that are devoted to pigments for painting. His intention for including them is for their application on glass objects, but these were the same materials used in general by fine artists in the early seventeenth century. 

In his recipe #110, the Florentine priest gives a wonderfully simple method to extract the color from common flowers. The term for these pigments is "lakes." Once obtained, the pigments were often used to dye a powdered carrier material in order to give them more body and behave like other paint. From there they might be mixed into egg-tempera, varnish or oil depending on the application. It is likely that Neri used similar pigments for the illustrations in his 1598 manuscript.[2] Here is his recipe in its entirety: 

A Way to Extract the Lake [3] and Color for Painting, from Orange Blossoms, Red Poppies, Blue Irises, Ordinary Violets, Red Violets, Carnations, Red Roses, Borage Flowers, Day Lilies, Irises, and From Flowers of Any Desired Color and the Greens of the Mallow, the Pimpernel and All the Plants. 

Take whichever flower you want, of any color you want, or even a [green] plant. If it will rub green from a leaf onto white paper staining it with color, then it will be good. The plants and flowers that do not show this effect are no-good. Put ordinary aqua vitae into a glass urinal, with a cappello [alembic cap] for its cover, making sure the said crystallo cap is as wide as possible. 

Into this cap, pack the leaves [or petals] of any flower or plant from which you want to release and extract the tincture. Now lute the mouth joint of the cap. Fit a receiver to its snout and lute that joint. Give it a moderated fire so that the volatile part [alcohol] of the aqua vitae rises into the alembic, and falls down into its volume upon the petals of the flowers, extracting the tincture. 

In time, drops will run down the snout of the cap into the receiver, colored and charged with the tincture. Once all of the volatile part of the aqua vitae passes and becomes colored, distill this colored volatile part of the aqua vitae in a glass vessel. [The alcohol] will pass white and will be useable three more times. The dye will remain in the bottom, which you should not allow to dry too much, but just moderately. Then you will have the very best tincture or lake for painting from an abundance of flowers and plants.

The "aqua vitae" he refers to is simply a distilled alcohol such as grappa. The important point here is that it is a potent solution of ethanol and water; a well-known modern equivalent would be vodka. The chemical apparatus he describes is about as simple as it got for alchemists. It has three parts; the first is a base consisting of (in this case) a urinal—an inexpensive and convenient glass container with a wide mouth. The second piece is what Neri calls a "cappello"; it is a special glass cap featuring a long tubular snout leading from the top, angled slightly downward. When the cap is affixed to the base with the materials inside and gently heated, vapor will condense in the cap and run down the snout for collection in the third piece, a "receiver" vessel. 

The material he uses to seal the pieces together was called "lute," a mixture of mud, cloth fibers, egg and some other materials that stick to the glass and withstand the heat of the fire. Its only purpose was to keep the glassware sealed until the procedure was complete. [4] 

In the mid nineteenth century, Mary Merrifield made an extensive survey of Italian manuscripts with recipes for artists. She included this comment about Neri's home town:

Florentine lake must have had considerable reputation in Venice, since Leandro Bassano contracted to employ it in his picture of the 'Combat of the Angles,' painted for the church of S. Giorgio Maggiore at Venice in 1597. [5]

Today, this painting is known as 'The Miracle of the immobility of Santa Lucia' and is shown at the top of this post.

[1] L'Arte Vetraria, Neri 1612.
[2] Discorso, Neri 1598-1600.
[3] Neri uses the word "lacca," the equivalent of "lacha" in other manuscripts. For a specific reference to Neri in this regard, see Merrifield 1849, v. 1, p. clxxxi.
[4] A word to the wise: high proof alcohol in a confined glass container near an open flame is a good way to cause a minor explosion and a fireball featuring glass shrapnel.
[5] Merrifield 1849, v.1, p. clxxxiii. She references Cicogna  1824–1858, v. 4, p. 349 for this information. 

* This post first appeared here on 14 Oct 2014.

Lake of Flowers

'The Miracle of the immobility of Santa Lucia'
Leandro Bassano, using Florentine lakes.

In the final part of Antonio Neri's 1612 book on glassmaking, [1] he presents several recipes that are devoted to pigments for painting. His intention for including them is for their application on glass objects, but these were the same materials used in general by fine artists in the early seventeenth century. 

In his recipe #110, the Florentine priest gives a wonderfully simple method to extract the color from common flowers. The term for these pigments is "lakes." Once obtained, the pigments were often used to dye a powdered carrier material in order to give them more body and behave like other paint. From there they might be mixed into egg-tempera, varnish or oil depending on the application. It is likely that Neri used similar pigments for the illustrations in his 1598 manuscript.[2] Here is his recipe in its entirety: 

A Way to Extract the Lake [3] and Color for Painting, from Orange Blossoms, Red Poppies, Blue Irises, Ordinary Violets, Red Violets, Carnations, Red Roses, Borage Flowers, Day Lilies, Irises, and From Flowers of Any Desired Color and the Greens of the Mallow, the Pimpernel and All the Plants. 

Take whichever flower you want, of any color you want, or even a [green] plant. If it will rub green from a leaf onto white paper staining it with color, then it will be good. The plants and flowers that do not show this effect are no-good. Put ordinary aqua vitae into a glass urinal, with a cappello [alembic cap] for its cover, making sure the said crystallo cap is as wide as possible. 

Into this cap, pack the leaves [or petals] of any flower or plant from which you want to release and extract the tincture. Now lute the mouth joint of the cap. Fit a receiver to its snout and lute that joint. Give it a moderated fire so that the volatile part [alcohol] of the aqua vitae rises into the alembic, and falls down into its volume upon the petals of the flowers, extracting the tincture. 

In time, drops will run down the snout of the cap into the receiver, colored and charged with the tincture. Once all of the volatile part of the aqua vitae passes and becomes colored, distill this colored volatile part of the aqua vitae in a glass vessel. [The alcohol] will pass white and will be useable three more times. The dye will remain in the bottom, which you should not allow to dry too much, but just moderately. Then you will have the very best tincture or lake for painting from an abundance of flowers and plants.

The "aqua vitae" he refers to is simply a distilled alcohol such as grappa. The important point here is that it is a potent solution of ethanol and water; a well-known modern equivalent would be vodka. The chemical apparatus he describes is about as simple as it got for alchemists. It has three parts; the first is a base consisting of (in this case) a urinal—an inexpensive and convenient glass container with a wide mouth. The second piece is what Neri calls a "cappello"; it is a special glass cap featuring a long tubular snout leading from the top, angled slightly downward. When the cap is affixed to the base with the materials inside and gently heated, vapor will condense in the cap and run down the snout for collection in the third piece, a "receiver" vessel. 

The material he uses to seal the pieces together was called "lute," a mixture of mud, cloth fibers, egg and some other materials that stick to the glass and withstand the heat of the fire. Its only purpose was to keep the glassware sealed until the procedure was complete. [4] 

In the mid nineteenth century, Mary Merrifield made an extensive survey of Italian manuscripts with recipes for artists. She included this comment about Neri's home town:

Florentine lake must have had considerable reputation in Venice, since Leandro Bassano contracted to employ it in his picture of the 'Combat of the Angles,' painted for the church of S. Giorgio Maggiore at Venice in 1597. [5]

Today, this painting is known as 'The Miracle of the immobility of Santa Lucia' and is shown at the top of this post.



[1] L'Arte Vetraria, Neri 1612.

[2] Discorso, Neri 1598-1600.

[3] Neri uses the word "lacca," the equivalent of "lacha" in other manuscripts. For a specific reference to Neri in this regard, see Merrifield 1849, v. 1, p. clxxxi.

[4] A word to the wise: high proof alcohol in a confined glass container near an open flame is a good way to cause a minor explosion and a fireball featuring glass shrapnel.

[5] Merrifield 1849, v.1, p. clxxxiii. She references Cicogna  1824–1858, v. 4, p. 349 for this information. 

A Painterly Inclination

The Conversion of Mary Magdalen
Reverse painted glass
French (?) 1660-75

The seventh and final part of Antonio Neri's 1612 book, L'Arte Vetraria, contains miscellaneous recipes, a number of which are devoted to making paints. Initially, this might seem an odd choice of subjects for the first printed book devoted to glassmaking. We think of fine artists of the seventeenth century working on fresh plaster, on wood panel covered in gesso, or on canvas – the medium that had recently become the new favorite for oil painting – but not on glass.  

On second thought, painters did labor over stained glass windows destined for churches, and any number of smaller glass objects were decorated with paint. To be clear, glass "painting" could take two forms; the first, enameling, was done with pigments that could withstand furnace temperatures, a subject Neri covers in the sixth part of his book. A finished glass object or pane was decorated and then fired a second time either in a furnace or over an oil lamp, Neri specifically mentions his "good friend, Mr. Niccolò Landi," as an expert in this technique. The second form of glass painting is our current focus. This involved traditional paint pigments, which were applied cold and not reheated. These were available in a wider range of colors, but are less permanent. 

This second technique was applied to vessels that contained holy water, delicate "cristallo" showpieces, perfume bottles and a range of ornamental trinkets. The enhancement of glass objects with brushwork was traditionally a female occupation. Glass factories employed teams of women and girls to decorate finished pieces. "Reverse" painting is a technique that dates to the middle ages, in which a picture is built up by applying paint to the back side of a piece of clear glass. In the hands of a talented artist, quite refined images were achieved with this method.

In his book, Neri shows how to extract the color of common flowers to make a variety of pigments called "lakes." He shows two different methods. In the first, he uses the example of broom flowers to make a yellow pigment, the flower petals are gathered and steeped over a low fire in a solution of glassmaker's soda and lime. After a time the color transfers into the liquid. "You will know this [state] when you take the flowers out and see that they have turned white, and become thoroughly uncolored, and the lye is as yellow as a fine Trebbiano wine."

The liquid is moved to glazed terracotta pots and boiled. Alum is added until no more will dissolve, which forces the pigment out of solution. 

[T]hen remove it, and empty the lye into a vessel of clear water. The yellow color will settle to the bottom. Leave it to rest, and then decant off all the water. Again, pour more fresh water over it, decant again and let it rest. As before, the dye will go to the bottom. This way, you will extract all the lye salts and the dose of alum out of the dye.

Finally, the pigment is collected and dried, ready for use.

In the second method, the flower petals are packed into an alembic and saturated with grappa – the strongly alcoholic distillation of white wine. As the alembic is heated the grappa extracts the color from the petals.

These methods emphasize Neri's broad experience and the cross pollination that took place between the various arts. It is not clear if he learned these techniques in Florence, or in Antwerp (or Rome or Venice for that matter); none of these cities had a shortage of talented painters, and Neri must have crossed paths with them. Where there were painters, there was a demand for pigments and for the knowledge to produce them. Even as a twenty-two year old, freshly ordained Catholic priest, Neri exhibited the signs of his own instruction in drawing and watercolor. His earliest manuscript on alchemy is replete with color illustrations, perhaps the very colors he teaches how to make in the glass book.