Antiquarian books as source of environment historical water data

Abstract

Historical environment considerations are inevitable also for modern environmental analysis. They alone allow evaluation of anthropogenic impact into the environment. To receive information about the historical environment situation in inhabited regions, we approached this task by examining historical well dated and locatable products of the Homo faber. The work introduced here uses books as a source of environment historical data specially for the environmental compartment of water. The paper of historical books, dated by their printing and allocated by their watermark¹ (Wasserzeichensammlung Piccard, Piccard online, Hauptstaatsarchiv Stuttgart, http://www.piccard-online.de) is a trap for traces of heavy metals contaminating their production water in historical times. Great amounts of water were brought into contact with the paper pulp in the historical paper mill process. The cellulose of the pulp acts as an ion exchange material for heavy metals, forming a dynamic equilibrium. A well defined pulp production process, starting with used clothes, allows estimation of the concentration of historical heavy metals (Cu²⁺, Pb²⁺, Zn²⁺, Cd²⁺) in the production water (river water). Ancient papers from well dated books are eluted without destruction of their paper and the resulting solution is analysed by ETAAS and inverse stripping voltammetry to determine the historical impact of metals. Afterwards in a flow system the eluted paper spot is equilibrated with different concentrations of heavy metals (Cu²⁺, Pb²⁺, Zn²⁺, Cd²⁺) to plot the adsorption isotherm of that very spot. Both data together allows a calculation of the heavy metal content of the historical river. For different waters of Germany and the Netherlands of the 16th–18th Century the heavy metal load could be estimated. The resulting concentrations were mostly similar to the level of modern surface waters, but in the case of the Dutch waters of the 17th Century, they were e.g. for Pb²⁺ significantly higher than modern values.