Identifying Hazards

Anyone who examines written artefacts from a materials-science perspective will discover that the range of materials that was used for the production and reuse is huge – and not all of them are harmless. Some pigments used for colouring, for example, are toxic, which is why the manuscripts in question must be treated with caution, not only out of consideration for the object itself, but also for the health of today’s users. The exact substances we are dealing with and their distribution on the writing support can be analysed using methods such as XRF spectroscopy.