Kapronczay Károly szerk.: Orvostörténeti Közlemények 206-209. (Budapest, 2009)

KISEBB KÖZLEMÉNYEK —COMMUNICATIONS - Strasser, Gerhard F.: Az első „töltőtolltól" a golyóstollakig - írószerszámok orvosoktól és orvosok számára

210 Comm. de //ist. Artis Med. 206- 209 (2009) time after 1610. Daniel Schwenter (1585-1636), professor of orientál languages and mathematics at the Altdorf Academy near Nuremberg, described such an invention under a pseudonym in the earliest German handbook on secret communication

2 (ILL. 1). In a section devoted to Secret Writing by Means of Special Arts he presented his invention "to fashion a quill / which retains the ink / so that one can write on an entire sheet of paper or more without ever dipping (into an inkwell)"

3 Since the material was part and parcel of a cryptological handbook, Schwenter enciphered the entire description — making it more diffícult for the average reader to profit írom it. Itt. 1: Daniét Schwenter (1585-1636). Steganologia d Steganographia NOVA (after 1610): "quill / which retains the ink [for writing] without ever dipping [into an inkwell], " Schwenter's invention — ironically not encrypted in the subsequent editions of this handbook and a collection of curiosities and stories that was published by his children immediately after his death in 1636

4 — still uses feathers stems as quills, a total of seven, to be precise. They are cut in a way so that what one could call the handle (or "Hat, as Schwenter calls it in German) of the actual writing quill (feather to no. 2) accepts a separate nib part, a segment cut from a feather (nos. 6-7) that has to fit snugly inside the quill handle (2). In it he inserted another well-fitting piece with a small hole (8). The feather stem is then removed at (2), ink is sucked into the bottom part (2-5), and the "Hat or upper, supposedly airtight part is joined with the lower segments, thereby supposedly creating a vacuum — a term Schwenter only uses in his 1636 collection. Pressure on the small hole in the 2 Eule, W.: Mit Stift und Feder. Leipzig 1955, chapter Der Füllfederhalter, 113-122., and other more recent overviews of the history of writing Utensils are not aware of this early publication of Schwenter's. His Steganologia cfr Steganographia NOVA. Geheime Magische / Natürliche Red vnd Schreibkunst appeared in Nuremberg somé time after 1610 and in 2 expanded editions over the next decade. 3 Schwenter, D.: Steganologia [...] nova. 298-299. 4 Schwenter:, D. Steganologia [...] aucta (after 1621), 359-361., and even more accessibly presented in his last work, Deliciae Physico-Mathematicae. Oder Mathemat. vnd Philosophische Erquickstunden. Nuremberg, 1626. Part XIV, "[...] die Schreibkunst betreffend", 519-520.