This paper manuscript with parchment binding is an exemplar of the category “libri di ricordanze,” which were very popular among Florentine merchants. This “libro di ricordanze” belonged to the Grand Duke of Tuscany; it is probably comprised of the notes (and copies) of a certain Roberto di Pandolfo Pandolfini regarding the management of iron mines on the island of Elba. Included are lists presumably recording the price of iron (ore). — On the island of Elba, abundant deposits of iron ore, characterized by high iron content, were mined and were exported primarily to central Italy. — Following the actual notes, eight smaller-format attachments are pasted in (pp. 52a-d, pp. 54a-d, pp. 56a-b, p. 59, p. 61, pp. 62a-b, p. 65, p. 67), as well as numerous blank pages (pp. 68-288), which make up the main part of the volume. — The manuscript was purchased in Florence in 1957. (ruh)

Online Since: 10/08/2015

Mss 12 is a collected manuscript produced by several hands between the years 1553 and 1653. Mss 12,1, the first and most extensive section (pp. 1-147), details the mining regulations put in place in Lower Austria during the mid-16th century. It is a handwritten copy made from the official printed 'Bergk Ordnung', which was written at the court of the Archduke of Austria and printed by Hans Syngriener (Johann Singriener the Younger [? - 1562]) in Vienna in 1553 (Iron Library exemplar: EM/Cr 48). In a note after the index at the end of the manuscript Syngriener is mentioned by name (p. 147). Mss 12,1 begins with a statement establishing the authority of Ferdinand von Habsburg [1503-1564], who was then Archduke of Austria (pp. 1-2). There follows a series of 208 numbered articles which take into account a broad number of factors, from the manner in which mine pits and shafts were to be established, to the way in which older tunnels were to be treated and the employment of skilled labor (pp. 2-133). This section of the manuscript concludes with a closing statement (pp. 133-134) and a complete index of articles (pp. 135-147). Mss 12,2, the second section of the collected manuscript, provides a case study, describing the history and operation of iron mining and production in Upper Styria. The addendum to this report has marginalia produced in a distinctly different hand, providing supplementary comments. The manuscript was purchased in Vienna in 1956. (zol)

Online Since: 06/18/2020

In this magnificently illustrated manuscript of unusual content, the Italian architect and town planner Giuseppe Valadier (1762-1839) describes the casting of the Campanone, the largest bell in St. Peter's Basilica, in a text featuring 14 watercolored pen and ink drawings. The Vatican had commissioned the bell from the foundry of his father, Luigi Valadier, who passed away in 1785, before the work on the bell was completed. The son Giuseppe completed the commission and in 1786 prepared a manuscript about this work, pairing each drawing with a written explanation in the form of a legend. First Valadier shows the foundry building (2v-7r); then, in an almost photographic wealth of detail and in vivid colors, he shows the process of producing the bell including the technique of the false bell and the casting in bronze (8v-21r). Finally the finished bell (22v-23r) is transported through the streets of Rome on a wooden sled (24v-25r) and is blessed by Pope Pius VI (26v-27r). – The manuscript was purchased in Bern in 1948. (ruh)

Online Since: 10/08/2015

This manuscript by the Italian architect and town planner Guiseppe Valadier (1762-1839) vividly illustrates various aspects of architecture and technology. The manuscript contains 127 panels of pen and ink drawings in vivid colors that were created before 1828 (Tav. CI to Tav. CCXXXV, many panels are missing). Partly the panels are grouped thematically by material (e.g., wood (fol. 1r-8r), iron (fol. 9r-24r), copper (fol. 25r-31r), bronze (fol. 32r-58r)), partly by construction themes (e.g., construction of walls fol. 103r-117r). These drawings served as models for part of the total of about 320 panels presented in the two volumes of panels of Valadier’s work „L’architettura pratica dettata nella scuola e cattedra dell’insigne Accademia di San Luca“, printed in Rome in 1828-33 and based on lectures he had given at the Accademia di San Luca in Rome. The numbering of the panels in the manuscript corresponds to that in the printed work. — The manuscript was purchased in Italy in 1956. (ruh)

Online Since: 10/08/2015

This patent manuscript contains the details of the regulations put in place to manage the mining and forestry operations in the region of Carinthia in the year 1553. It begins with a statement establishing the authority of Ferdinand von Habsburg [1503-1564], who ruled over the Archduchy of Austria and ordered these regulations to be drawn together (fol. 1r-2v). There follows a series of 208 numbered articles. These take into account a broad number of factors concerning the manner in which mines were to be established, but also include the rights for fishing and hunting on lands designated for mining and forestry (fol. 4v), as well as arrangements for the processing of highly valuable mining products such as silver (fol. 81r). This section of the manuscript concludes with a closing statement (fol. 85v) and a complete reference list of articles (fol. 86r-91v). The manuscript was purchased in Rome in 1952. (zol)

Online Since: 06/18/2020

The 13th-century manuscript is composed of three parts. The first part contains Aristotelian and pseudo-Aristotelian works in Latin translation. The second part contains 'De mineralibus' and 'De natura loci' by Albertus Magnus. The third part consists of a commentary by Michael Scotus on Johannes de Sacrobosco's work about the heavenly spheres, an anonymous commentary on the Arithmetic of Boethius, and the commentary by Averroës on Aristotle's 'De longitudine et brevitate vitae'. This manuscript is among the finest examples of Italian secular book production from the last third of the 13th century, and it is one of the earlier illuminated Aristotelian manuscripts. (pil)

Online Since: 03/24/2006

This manuscript is a collection of notes, which were compiled by Hermann Wedding (1834-1908), later professor of ferrous metallurgy at the Bergakademie Berlin (mining academy), during his visits to the smelteries in Freiberg (Saxony) in 1856/57. The notes were taken while he was a student at the Freiberg mining academy and include his own observations of the procedures at the various silver and lead smelteries around Freiberg. The notes also contain copies of relevant scientific publications about metallurgical procedures that were used in Freiberg. (ham)

Online Since: 12/14/2017

This travel journal was kept by Hermann Wedding (1834-1908), later a professor of ferrous metallurgy, during his study tour in August and September of 1858. At this time, he was a student at the mining academy of Freiberg and Berlin. The objective of the trip was to visit the centers of the German mining industry that were emerging in the middle of the 19th century, especially in the region of the Saar and the Ruhr. Wedding’s daily entries document his visits to coal mines, smelteries and metal processing companies. He describes the operating facilities and production processes of the plants he visited. The journal reveals his deep scientific interest in the geological conditions in which the plants he describes are embedded. (ham)

Online Since: 12/14/2017

This manuscript documents several trips by Hermann Wedding (1834-1908), later a professor of ferrous metallurgy, to Great Britain in the years 1860 and 1862. Wedding undertook these trips as a referendary for the Prussian mining administration. On his way to Great Britain via Belgium, he noted his observations regarding operating facilities and production processes at smelteries and mining operations in daily entries. Among the plants he described are the ironworks at Seraing (Belgium), the metallurgical works in South Wales that were considered especially advanced in the middle of the 19th century, and the first steelworks that made use of the Bessemer process. The journal entries also reveal Wedding’s connections with contemporary specialists in his field. (ham)

Online Since: 12/14/2017

This paper manuscript contains copies of 70 notarial documents that have a relation to the city of Bollène in the Vaucluse department of Southern France. The thematic focus is on trip hammers. — The manuscript was purchased in Paris in 1955. (ruh)

Online Since: 10/08/2015

This paper manuscript, produced around 1700, mentions in its title Emperor Leopold (I, reigned 1658-1705). The identity of Giovanni Baptista Coene from Passau, named as author, remains obscure; no further information is available about him. — The names of metals and other materials that Coene used in experiments are not written out in the text, but are represented by alchemic symbols (planetary signs, etc.). Because these occur in large numbers, the text is not easily readable or understandable. Further evidence that the manuscript is rooted in alchemy comes from the fact that Coene refers to Paracelsus (1493/94-1541), e.g., in the short final chapter with the title “Che cosa il Balsamo Samech di Paracelso” (pp. 101-102). Coene also mentions the “Testamentum” (pp. 99-100) and names Raimundus Lullus (1232/33-1315/16) as its author; today it is considered a pseudo-Llull text. — Within the chapters, individual paragraphs are numbered, but in the last quarter of the manuscript this numbering seems to have been added later (pp. 81-102). At the end of the manuscript, the numbering is incorrect (instead from p. 70ff. it should read correctly p. 97ff.). — The manuscripts was purchased in Italy in 1952. (ruh)

Online Since: 10/08/2015

Produced either by the hand or name of Johann Nikolaus Freiherr von Grandmont [?-1689] (p. 11) in 1661, this manuscript summarizes the regulations that had been put in place for iron mining operations in Fricktal, between the Rhine and Jura mountains, then a part of Further Austria (Canton Aargau in present day). It describes the form and scope of the operation of a highly specialized industrial economic activity in an area that had been devastated in the preceding decades during the Thirty Years War. The document focuses upon eight regulations, put in place between 1629 and 1649, and also refers to regulations dating from July 1653. Included is a summary list of the regulations with their dates of implementation (pp. 27-28). The manuscript was donated to the Iron Library by Prof. Dr. K. Schib (Schaffhausen) in 1952. (zol)

Online Since: 06/18/2020

The author of this manuscript gives his name at the outset (p. 3): Wok Pňovsky von Eulenberg (Czech: Vok Pňovický ze Sovince) comes from the Moravian noble family von Eulenberg (Czech: ze Sovince), whose coat of arms is depicted in the manuscript (p. 130). Wok is documented between 1499-1531; from 1518-1525 he held the position of chief justice of Moravia. In 1526 with this manuscript he produced an early exemplar of a “Probierbuch” (assay book), which treats several procedures for analyzing and further processing various ores and metals. The first part of the manuscript is divided into 40 chapters (pp. 4-130); in the second part of the manuscript, the sections are not numbered (pp. 133-420). Added at the end is a later (17th century?) table of contents (pp. 429-444), which offers short summaries of the chapters. Assaying was of great importance to the practice of early modern mining and metallurgy. Near Eulenburg castle (Czech: hrad Sovinec), the ancestral home of the family in Northern Moravia, Wok himself was engaged in the mining of precious metals (Papajík 2005, pp. 198-200). In Wok, therefore, the mining entrepreneur and the assayer coincided in one person. Before 1924 the manuscript was part of the holdings of the library of the museum of the ‘Gymnasium’ or preparatory school (Czech: Knihovna gymnazijního muzea) in Troppau (Czech: Opava), a predecessor institution of the present library of the Silesian Museum (Czech: Knihovna Slezského zemského muzea). The manuscript has been lost since 1924. After a devastating fire in the spring of 1945, in which all accession books were destroyed, no documentation about the manuscript exists in the museum library today (information from 07-16-2015). David Papajík summarizes the current state of Czech research: “Vok also addresses theoretical aspects of mining. In 1526 he authored an extensive German language work of 420 pages on the topic, which, while it survived until the recent past and was held in the library of the museum of Opava, it was lost by 1924. We only know a description from 1881, produced by Josef Zukal. It is a great pity that this unique document about the understanding of mining of that time, has not survived into the present” (Papajík 2005, p. 200). The above-mentioned description from 1881 offers the following additional information “«Ms. chart. sec. XVI. Kl. Oct. bound in black leather without decoration, 420 pages […]. Mining flourished in the area of Eulenburg in the 15th and 16th century; thus the present work owes its creation to practical need. Without doubt it is Wok’s original manuscript and offers an interesting insight into the state of metallurgy of the time. The index in a different hand was added at a much later time; this fact as well as the great wear indicate that the book was in use for a long time (Zukal 1881, p. 15 f.). The manuscript was purchased in New York in 1955. (ruh)

Online Since: 03/17/2016

This large-format manuscript (the translation of the Russian title is “Bridge-building project across the Neva River to accommodate the passage of ships at all times, 1802”) presents a bridge-building project across the Neva River in St. Petersburg. Following the title page with a decorative frame in a gray color wash (fol. 2) and the table of contents (fol. 3), there are twelve panels of watercolored drawings that give an overview and a detailed view of the project. Seven illustrations are two-sided, one of them has a fold-out page. All texts in this manuscript are in Russian and in Cyrillic script. — The bridge was designed by Charles Baird (1766–1843), a Scottish engineer who had set up a business for metal casting, machine construction and shipbuilding in St. Petersburg and who had built a cast-iron bridge nearby in 1805/06. The manuscript’s bridge project, however, calls for a combination of a floating bridge and a drawbridge: the floating bridge, resting on pontoons, splits into two branches, which end in two drawbridges near the shore (fol. 4a-5), so that it is possible to cross the bridge even while a ship passes beneath it. Other panels show, for example, the lifting mechanism hidden in the pillars (fol. 14a, 16, 17) and one of the boat-like pontoons anchored in the bed of the Neva River (fol. 20a-21). – The manuscript was purchased in Copenhagen in 1978. (ruh)

Online Since: 10/08/2015