What is the ink used to write China's calligraphy?

Ink has a history of about 4700 years in China. According to legend, ink was made after punishing foreigners at the end of the Western Zhou Dynasty. Natural graphite was used before Qin Dynasty, and artificial ink was made after Qin Dynasty. The key producing area of Chinese ink is Hanyang, Shaanxi, which was called "Rubidium" in ancient times. By the Tang Dynasty, Kuaimo was famous not only in China, but also in Huizhou ink circle at that time. There are many famous Mohists in the past dynasties, such as Wei Zhiwei's birthday, Li Tinggui in the southern Tang Dynasty, Pangu in the northern song Dynasty, Fang in the Ming Dynasty and Qing Dynasty, etc. Mo Bao of Li Tinggui, in particular, was very popular with people at that time and had the reputation of "gold is easy to get, but Li Mo is hard to find".

(1) The main raw materials for making ink are soot, animal glue and antiseptic additives.

1. Carbon ink smoke:

It is formed by collecting smoke from incomplete combustion of organic hydrocarbons. Due to the different combustion materials, it can be roughly divided into four types: pine smoke, oil fume, lacquer smoke and industrial carbon black. Pine smoke is made from burning pine branches. At first, the method of taking smoke was "vertical kiln", and later it was "horizontal kiln", with smoke removal as the first priority. Generally speaking, Song Yanmo is dark and lacks luster. Cooking with oil fume began in the Southern Tang Dynasty and became popular in the world in the Song Dynasty. The ancients smoked ink with vegetable oil, soybean oil, lard, soap green oil, sesame oil and tung oil, among which tung oil was used as ink, and the ink was black, shiny and enduring. In Song Dynasty, lacquer smoke was made by soaking Gu Song in lacquer residue. The lacquer smoke ink in Cheng Junfang in the Ming Dynasty has the best texture, which is made of tung oil and a certain amount of lacquer. Its handwriting is particularly shiny and quite popular. Industrial carbon black is extracted by burning mineral oil or industrial smoke, and its quality is poor.

2. Animal glue:

Animal glue is a kind of protein, which is hydrolyzed from collagen. There are many kinds of glue, such as bone glue and skin glue. The processing methods of outsole include taking materials, washing with water, soaking in lime, removing non-stick protein, pickling, boiling in water and filtering. Antler glue, swim bladder glue, Niu Pijiao, etc. It has been used throughout the ages, and its function is to make the particles of carbon ink stick together, which is convenient to make into blocks and make writing firm.

3. Anti-corrosion additives:

Its function is to prevent animal glue from mildewing and improve smell, color or viscosity. There are nearly a thousand kinds of anti-corrosion additives used by famous artists in past dynasties. Borneolum Syntheticum, Musk, Clove, Sandalwood, Gan Song, Pogostemon, Linglingxiang, etc. are commonly used for antisepsis and odor improvement. There are cinnabar, orpiment, pearl powder, gold foil, silver foil, copper sulfate, cinnabar, cortex fraxini, Sanguisorba officinalis, radix Arnebiae, madder, konjac, black beans, gallnut, walnut, cortex moutan, lavender beans, pomegranate peel, etc. It is different to add orange peel, protein and pomegranate peel to improve the viscosity and make the ink firm and not crack.

(2) the traditional ink-making procedure

Can be divided into 1. Soak in oil 2. Tobacco bowl 3. Burning tobacco. Screening tobacco. Glue 6. Drug therapy 7. Search tobacco 8. Steam agent 9. Casting 10. Weighing agent 1 1. Tempering 12. Pilling The thinner and lighter the cigarette, the better, and the older the cigarette, the more it needs to be washed and screened. Glue mixing and pestle grinding are important ink-making processes, and the proportion of glue mixing often varies with construction methods, additives and environmental climate. Should not be too heavy or too light. Too much glue is beneficial to molding and coloring, and too much glue will lead to pen lag. In ancient times, there was a saying that "100,000 pestles were too light", but the glue was too light and the pestle work was more complicated.

(3) The main raw materials of ink

The main raw materials of ink are soot, rubber, additives and solutions, which are generally machined. There are many kinds of soot, including various mineral plants and animal raw materials, which are formed by combustion or thermal decomposition. In addition to animal glue, vegetable gum (Arabic gum) or various synthetic gums such as acrylic gum and polyol resin are also used as glue. Additives include various stabilizers, penetrants, wetting agents, preservatives, essences, etc.

In contrast, the convenience of using ink is better than that of Mo Ding. However, due to the extensive use of various synthetic materials to prevent deterioration, precipitation and corruption, whether it will have adverse effects on human beings and paper cultural relics will be a problem to be further evaluated and discussed. On the other hand, China ink stick ingot is characterized by black and shiny, stable ink quality and lasting ink color. It can still be seen in ancient books and paintings for thousands of years, far from the ink of other ancient civilizations such as Egypt, Greece and Rome. The quality of China ink stick is very special, and it has been copied by other countries. /kloc-in the 7th century, French missionary Lacott said, "China ink stick is of excellent quality, and legal persons cannot copy it repeatedly. Du Hald also claimed in 1735 that Europeans tried to imitate China ink stick but failed. Therefore, China's ink is an important invention of past dynasties. It is not only used for writing and painting, printing rubbings, decorating and dyeing palaces and thrushes for women, but also used as a medicine for treating blood diseases and eye diseases. Its main feature is that it does not change color and does not fade. Whether it is the classics written by the Tang people in the Six Dynasties or the first edition of the Five Dynasties, it will still shine after 1000 years or 15,600 years. The main factor is that the chemical properties of carbon are very stable at room temperature, and the traditional gluing process has accumulated many methods, so the written handwriting is heat-resistant, water-resistant and light-resistant, and is not easy to fade, which is suitable for long-term preservation.

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