Fore Edge Friday
Our #Fore Edge Friday example this week is a 5-volume set of imperial Roman law, Digestum Vetu, bound in vellum over boards with blue-black sprinkled edges, published in Venice in 1592 by the mega-Florentine/Venetian Giunti family printing house. Since the early 17th century, the ‘sprinkle’ was the most common and cost-effective form of edge decoration.
According to Special Collections at the University of Adelaide, to make the sprinkle, a pigment was mixed with paste, oil, and water, and the book placed either in a lying press or on its side on a bench. The sprinkle was then applied in one of three main ways. Early binders dipped a small ‘finger-brush’ into the mixture and then drew their finger across its stiff bristles to spray the color onto the book edges. Alternatively, they may have used a larger ‘sprinkle-brush’ with hog hairs. Once dipped into the mixture, the excess was pressed out and the bristles tapped against an iron bar, making the colors fly onto the book edge. The third method involved the use of a ‘sprinkle frame’ made of interlaced copper. The binder simply took a short-bristled brush, similar to a nail brush, and rubbed it across the mesh of the frame to produce a very even sprinkle of color.