Recently we were in Johor Bahru, Malaysia, and walked past an abandoned storefront that has obviously been closed for a long time judging by its dilapidated exterior. The door handles had accumulated an inch of dust and there were thick cobwebs hanging off the ceilings and walls. This made me recall a traditional Malay black ink recipe documented in Razak et al. (2017). According to the authors, soot from oil lamps and old cobwebs found in kitchens that used firewood for burning was a common source of black pigments in the Malay region. Apparently using cobwebs would also add a good adhesive property to the inks!
The paper also included some very fascinating methods of making ink binders with the rinds of fruits, such as rambutans and mangosteens. Definitely on our experiments list!
After a conversation with our “nusantara otaku” friend Hafiz (IG:@geroda19) on Malay manuscripts, we began looking into the historical methods of producing blacks in our region, which turned out to be quite diverse. We chanced upon some interesting details of writing tools in a 1834 book “The Malayan Peninsula” by Begbie Peter James, a colonial official posted to Malacca -
Since black pigments are commonly used for writing, it also makes sense to use what is abundant in the environment. For us, the most accessible source of carbon has been prunings of our small trees.
We learned that trees that tend to grow straight and thin branches also make great charcoal sticks, such as the mulberry tree in our garden.
An observation was that not all blacks are made the same. Depending on their source, they can give different hues and textures.
Compared to charcoal black from carbonized prunings of annatto and mulberry, soot derived from oil gives a “warmer” glow. It is also much finer and has a slight oily feel when prepared. Annatto charcoal on the other hand, seems physically “lighter” and “fluffier” than mulberry charcoal, which leans on a “grittier” and “rigid” side - possibly due to difference in the density of the wood.
Black may initially present itself like a simple monolithic colour, but it certainly has much more personality than that!
Till next post,
Liz (and Shirin)
P.S. By the way, we started our masak-masak study group membership earlier this month. If you are interested to join this group on making natural colours, and get access to more membership perks, feel free to sign up here.
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