The name ink is derived from the Latin tincta or tincta aqua : colored water. Ink was or is applied with quills, the predecessors of fountain pens and modern fountain pens, and with brushes. We buy and sell toner cartridge if you want to sell then visit us.
Today, ink is sprayed onto the paper with inkjet printers, among other things, creating very fine droplets that create the overall picture.
What is ink
Ink is a liquid in which pigments or dyes are dissolved and allow color to be applied. Indian ink is also a type of ink. The pigments or dyes are dissolved in water or other solvents.
Types of ink with pigments that do not dissolve but are bound in the liquid are so-called dispersions .
Depending on the composition and recipe, ink can be lightfast, which was and is particularly important for archiving.
How is ink made? – A journey through time
The history of ink goes back a long way and is closely linked to the question: “How is ink made?” We take you on a journey through time that not only inspires children, about the production of ink from its beginnings to the industrial production of inks , more precisely of printer ink for inkjet printers. Specifically, in the final section, we look at how ink is made for inkjet printers.
How is ink made – Antiquity
The cradle of ink lies in ancient Egypt and China and dates back to around 3000 BC. back . For writing on papyrus, a predecessor of paper, the Egyptians and Chinese made their ink from a mixture of carbon black as a dye, water and binding agents. Gum arabic (sap from acacia trees) was often used as such a binding agent. Today we call this mixed ink soot ink , a black ink.
A further development of the ink recipe and a new type of ink was Indian ink , which was invented around 1000 BC. BC is also of Far Eastern origin. Ink is also called Indian ink . The dye used for ink was also soot, although softwood charcoal was actually used. Ink was made by mixing the dye with lamp oil and glue, gelatin dissolved in water. However, this mixture was pressed and dried in bar form. If necessary, this ink could be dissolved with water and the opacity of the ink could even be determined by the amount of water added. Children know this principle – the name even gives it away – from the paint box (water color box). Another advantage of ink is its lightfastness.
How is ink made – Ancient
In the 3rd century B.C. From around 300 BC, scholars set about making even better ink and developed a permanent, durable ink – the iron gall ink that was used for a long time. Because this ink was indelible due to its iron-based property and, to a certain extent, lightfast . It is still used today (albeit with a more modern recipe and composition) for hand writing methods.
The original recipe for iron gall ink included ferrous sulfate and gallic acid (obtained from dried, mashed, and cooked galls; galls are an anomaly of plant growth; a gall can grow on the underside of an oak leaf in the fall.)
The gallic acid from the gall nuts was mixed with iron sulphate and gum arabic as binding agents. The special thing about iron gall ink: During the writing process, the color is very pale and difficult to see, which is why a dye was added for simplified use (methyl blue). However, this dye quickly faded – for good reason: the iron in the iron gall ink reacts with the air on the paper, the iron oxidizes and the black color only develops within a day. Basically, you observe the same as when iron rusts – the iron oxidizes on the paper.
Although iron gall ink can fade – albeit very, very slowly – it is considered permanent and was used for archival purposes at the time it was created. Fun fact: After many years, you can make faded iron gall ink on paper visible again with potassium hexacyanoferrate dissolved with hydrochloric acid. It even has a little something of secret ink that inspires children in the past as well as today. 😉
How is ink made – Middle Ages
“How is ink made?” sometimes leads to the octopus as a child’s answer . And in fact, it has been proven that a brown-black dye for ink, called sepia, was extracted from the ink sacs of squid. Sepia is documented around 1780 as a dye used for the production of ink, but also Cicero, a Roman consul who died in 42 BC. Chr. died, already mentioned an ink recipe with sepia.
Over the centuries, scholars have experimented with different dyes for ink. Gold ink, for example, was produced from mercury in the Middle Ages, and silver ink was also available for elaborate church books.
In the Middle Ages, however, the so-called thorn bark ink was predominantly used. Thorn bark ink was applied to paper with quills. According to a document from 1100 AD, this ink was made from the bark of dried sloe branches . The ink was made with water, which turned reddish brown within days. This water-bark mixture was then boiled again and again until the bark gave off no more color pigments. Finally, the mixture was boiled down with wine and thickened with tree resin and then left to dry in parchment bags. This resulted in a powder that was first dissolved in warm winewhen ink is needed. Very advantageous, because freshly mixed ink could always be made available in no time and the powder did not spoil.
