What is the ink for calligraphy made of? Is it coal?

Calligraphy ink is made of plant ash, animal glue and spices. , not coal.

China's calligraphy is very particular about pen and ink and has a long history. The process of ink-making workshops varies from place to place, but the principle is the same. A brief introduction is as follows:

Calligraphy and painting ink can be divided into "pine smoke" and "oil smoke". Pine smoke is based on the black ash (including charcoal black) produced by pine burning. The lampblack consists of tung oil, lard and raw lacquer. Burning lamp grass by "ignition" to obtain lamp ash as the main raw material.

Raw materials can be obtained in "kiln" and "furnace". Just give an example: a large factory building is in a semi-closed state, and there are many "lights" inside. Each "lamp" is covered with tiles, such as those in an old house or a thick porcelain bowl with its mouth facing down. Black smoke produced by lamps or burning pine nuts will accumulate black soot on it, and workers will sweep away the soot and collect it together, which is the basic raw material for making ink. Then make "black dough" with boiled animal glue, such as deerskin glue, Niu Pijiao, donkey hide glue, etc. And musk and other auxiliary materials. After many times of kneading, washing and other processes, it is finally pressed into Mo Ding with a mold and dried. If it is Zhu Mo (red) used by the emperor, the basic material is extremely fine cinnabar.

Modern ink making technology saves the process of making ink blocks and directly bottles the prepared "ink". Because the basic material of ink is "carbon", some ink is no longer extracted from soot. However, high-quality ink still depends on traditional technology. Otherwise, the so-called "colored ink" cannot be realized.