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Celtic Pigments

The pigments used by the scribes came from various sources, plants, animals, minerals and so on. For example, indigo was obtained from the roots of a plant from India; black was made from the soot of burned bones; raw sienna and yellow ochre came from natural earths. In the main, pigments were used by the monks because of their brilliance and luminous quality; they were easy to apply by quill or brush and the colours lasted, apart from ground malachite (green) and azurite (blue), which would fade or discolor unless enclosed within a suitable acid-free binding. The scribes learned these facts over the centuries and many references to the appropriate tempering of different pigments occur in their `recipe’ books. Vermilion red, for example, is a compound of mercury and sulphur. It is of a brilliant hue and was favored by the scribes because of its good opaque qualities, although it was not used next to emerald green, because it would blacken the red. Some pigments from the earth - for example, iron oxide - did not fade in light. Genuine ultramarine blue - lapis lazuli, a semiprecious stone from Persia and Afghanistan - was the most prized of the pigments used by the scribes. Second to this was azurite blue (azzurro della magna). Both were ground down to make the pigment and mixed with a medium of egg

yolk and water. If properly prepared, the colour was neither too green nor too purple but a deep deep blue, and very opaque. Scribes throughout the centuries have used malachite green. It is carbonate of copper and becomes luminous on the page when tempered with size. Yellows and browns such as yellow ochre, raw sienna and burnt umber, were obtained from earth pigments and were very permanent on the page. The basic colours used in illumination were red, blue and green. For lettering purposes oak galls and iron were used; they were never blotted on the page but were allowed to dry naturally, to obtain a deep black colour.

Extract from “Celtic Ornament-The art of the scribes” Illustration and text by Courtney Davis

First published by Blandford Press (1988) PB ISBN 0-304-35962-9