Historical Painting Techniques, Materials, and Studio Practice

into a glass, and put in a bit of well ground alum, of about the size of a
chickpea. Then take a piece of white linen and sieve the verzino and put it
{ 13r} in a glazed bowl and put it to dry in a place where there is no sun,
until it is dry. With the verzino you can make red. When you work with it,
put a little bit of it in the shell and add a little bit of clear water (16).
[16] How to make green. Take arzica and grind it and then you add pale azurite
blue, so much that it takes the color you want. Know that the greens that are
made with arzica need only a little bit of medium.
[17] To make "p urpurina. " Take similar amounts of mercury and tin and have
them amalgamated together and when they thus are thoroughly combined,
let it cool down and grind it together. But first take "caschina" [?], which is
separately ground very well (17). Then take an oven with red hot coals and
put [the ingredients] in a bottle or pot on the lit coals, and let it stand until
smoke comes off, and make sure that mouth of the bottle stays open.
[18] To take letters off from the parchment. Take one pound of saltpeter, one
pound of vitriol, and distill it. Then take a sponge, dip it into this water, rub
it on the parchment and the letters will disappear (18).
[19] To make "origno" (19). Take lead and sulfur and nitric salt and mercury
in the same quantities together and put it in a bottle of which the mouth is
wide (20, 21). Put it on a moderate fire and when it starts to look glittery
like gold on the mouth of the bottle, take it off the fire and it will be done
(22).
[20] To make red. Take very well ground eggshells, treat them on the stone
and put them in a new, hollow brick. And take verzino and boil it with a
little bit of roche alum and pour it on the eggshells. Mix it and of this you
add until is becomes as light as you wish (23). {13v}
[21] To make the yellow "arzicha. " Take very well ground eggshells and put
them in the hollow of a new brick. Take the weld herb of the textile dyers
and let it boil in water with a little bit of alum. Pour it on the eggshells and
thus make it as light or as dark as you wish (24).
[22] To make green. Take arzicha and azurite blue and mix it together and if
you want to make a darker green, you must add more blue. Distemper it
with gum water.
[23] To make shades on the arzicha. Take saffron, tempered with white of egg.
[24] To make gold ground. Take lead white and Armenian bole, some earwax
and saffron. Temper it with white of egg a little bit of saffron and a bit of
"bandoli"(?). Grind it with water.
[25] To make letters in gold with the pen. Take lead white, and make eight parts
of it, and take an amount of honey of one of these eight parts and grind it
with white of egg and a pinch of saffron.
[26] To lay bole on gesso. You want to mix it with glair and then grind it with
clear water.
[27] To make gold letters. Take a bit of bole and some burned chalk, about
half the amount of the bole and take three or four times as much slaked
gypsum and grind it with glair.
[28] To make lines in gold. Take slaked gypsum, ground with glair in a bit of
honey, a little bit of earwax, and a bit of glue. Let it dry. Then huff on it, lay
the gold leaf on it and burnish it (25).
[29] To make gold you can apply with the pen. If you want to prepare gold that
you can work with the pen, take beaten gold leaves-Praise God.
End. {15v}
The following text is from folios 15v-20v, one page of which is shown in
Figure 3:
Wallert 41