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

length of three palms "fila longa palmi très" were obtained [34]. The length of a palm could be, according to Larsen, about 74 mm long, thus the gold strip mentioned in the manuscript became 220-230 mm long. Theophilus Presbyter mentiones also fine, small strips, cut from longer strips in the 12th century [35]. It is possible that gold foils were assembled (for instance by hammering) and the longer bands obtained in this manner were cut to strips. It was also supposed that the gold strips were hammered of drawn wire. Â strip of average dimension, used for making metal threads at this time is cca. 0.25 mm in width and cca. 0.015 mm in thickness. This strip can be hammered from a wire having a diameter of cca. 0.040-0.050 mm, taking into consideration the elongation of the wire during the laminating. The diameter of the examined drawn wires of the 8th-10th centuries - though these wires adorned jewellery - is greater, nearly by an order of magnitude, 0.3-0.4 mm [36]. The technique used at that time probably did not render possible to drill a whole of a smaller diameter than this. The examination of draw-plates coming from this period, the measuring of the diameters of the wholes could clarify this problem. So, according to the pieces of data available by now, the strips used for the preparation of metal threads were most likely not made of drawn wire. In course of the micromorphological examination of the metal thread samples coming from the Hungarian coronation mantle, we found that the edges of some gold strips do not remind of the edges of cut strips, however, they do not show even the characteristics of hammered strips [37]. Rinuy, when examining a thread sample coming from a textile dated from the 10th century, has found that its edges (in high magnification) are very similar to the edges of the gold strips used for making the above mentioned metal threads of the Hungarian coronation mantle. Based on the results of the métallographical analysis, this thread was prepared from drawn wire by hammering [38]. The Feldhaus technical encyclopedia gives a drawing made in 1389, from the Manuscript of the Mendel brothers (Mendelschen Stiftungsbuch). On this picture a monk can be seen at the operation of wire-stretching [39] (Fig. 3). It is interesting to note that contrary to other similar illustrations [40] (Fig. 4), the draw-plate is missing, it is not depicted between the two spindles. It may be an error of the author-illustrator, however, it is more likely that the attenuation of the drawn wires was done like this.