Analyzing ancient Chinese handmade Lajian paper exhibiting an orange-red color

Yanbing Luo,Yifan Huang,Cheng Yang,Jiali Chen

doi:10.1186/s40494-019-0306-6

Abstract

The ancient technique employed to produce Lajian paper—a very famous Chinese traditional handmade paper—has been lost. However, widespread restoration of the traditional skills used in the paper’s production is emerging in China. A small piece of orange-red Lajian paper dating from the Qing dynasty and decorated with flecked Ag and Au was chosen as the subject of this study to investigate the paper’s composition and structure using optical microscopy (OM), SEM–EDS, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), Raman spectroscopy, and FTIR spectroscopy. The results revealed that the raw materials constituting the Lajian paper were bast and bamboo fibers. Each of the two paper layers was treated differently. First, the upper orange-red layer was treated with kaolinite and organic turmeric. Next, inorganic minium nt was used to obtain an orange-red color. Animal glue was used as a binding medium. Finally, the dyed surface was waxed with Chinese insect wax and then polished with small stones to form a smooth coating. The same treatment, except for the intentional use of inorganic pigment, was applied to the backing layer. Turmeric dye, minium, and wax coating protected Lajian paper from humidity and mold growth while maintaining the stability of the paper.

Highlights

An old Chinese saying states, “Paper lasts one millennium.” As the birthplace of papermaking, China is the nation with the longest history of making traditional handmade paper
For a deeper understanding of both the manufacturing process and the materials used in Lajian paper manufacturing, we examined a small piece of orange-red Lajian paper with silver and gold flakes (Fig. 1)
In this study, a small piece of orange-red Lajian paper dating from the Qing dynasty was evaluated by combining SERS microanalysis with non-destructive and microdestructive SEM, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), micro-Raman, and attenuated total reflectance (ATR)-FTIR techniques

Summary

Introduction

An old Chinese saying states, “Paper lasts one millennium.” As the birthplace of papermaking, China is the nation with the longest history of making traditional handmade paper. The results of our previous analysis in which a piece of single-layered pink Lajian paper was examined revealed We analyze the structure and composition of the Lajian paper using non-invasive and micro-destructive multi-analytical approaches, such as optical microscopy, SEM, XPS, Raman, ATR-FTIR, and SERS spectroscopy.

Results

Conclusion