Endrei Walter szerk.: Textilipari Múzeum Évkönyve 8. 1995 (Budapest, 1995)

dr. Márta Járó: Manufacturing technique of gold threads and their imitations on museum textiles - chronology of the preparation of metal threads. Results of the scientific investigations

resp. on metal threads - except for a few - do not mention this change, or the significance of it is neglected. But if the change of technique can be connected to a period, the results of the analysis of the gilt silver strips can contribute to the datation of the textile. Theophilus Presbyter mentions the strips cut from gold-plated silver foil, i.e. of gilt silver foil as "the gold thread of the poor people" in the 12th century [35]. In a book of recipes dated not later than from 1478, the unknown author writes already of a gilt silver wire, as a "basic material" of metal threads [43], Biringuccio mentions both varieties in his book published in 1540 [44]. From the 18th century onward, the contemporary sources describe the use of strips made only of gilt silver wire in metal thread making, however, the Dictionnaire Universel du Commerce edited in 1748 mentiones also the silver strip plated on one side with gold [45]. On basis of contemporary sources the date of the technical change, more precisely the appearance of the strip flattened from gilt silver wire, can be put between the 12th and the 15th century. Based on the results of scientific examninations, the history of preparation technique of the gilt silver threads can be outlined more precisely. Hoke examined nine gilt silver threads which were dated back to the 8-9th century, and though he does not emphasize it in his article, one can conclude from the text that these threads had been made of silver plated with gold on one side [46]. The earliest one side gilt silver thread examined by myself [20] comes from a relic repository purse, dated by Wilckens back to the 10th century [47]. The metal thread on the textile fragment coming from the Hungarian royal graves of Székesfehérvár (Anne of Antiochia, 12th century) was also of this type [22]. (Fig. 5) Seventeen metal threads from the 12-13th century, analyzed by Hoke [42] and one from the 13-14th century, analyzed by Rinuy [48] are also made of silver plated with gold on one side. Montegut has identified one side gilt silver on three textiles ascribed to the 15th century [49]. I have identified silver strips plated on one side with gold on further twenty seven textiles, dated from the 13-16th centuries [65], I am not aware of the existence of a greater number of analysis data concerning the position of the gold layer on the silver strip on gilt silver threads coming from 17-19th century textiles. The cca. thirty thread samples analyzed by myself, coming from this epoch, are plated with gold on both sides, they were made by flattening of gilt silver wire [65].