TOOLS AND EQUIPMENT

295

Holder (see Crayon Holder).

Inkpot. Primarily the property of scribes,, the inkpot, ink-horn, or inkstand,
simply a vessel for holding fluid ink, was doubtless also a regular part of the
furnishings of the painter's studio, even in those times when writing was com-

FIGURE ii. Modern easels: (a) the studio type with screw adjustment of height and of
tilt; (£) a folding easel for sketching; (c) a tilt board or table easel.
paratively rare. As illustrated in Renaissance painting, the inkpot is apt to be
either a kind of well like the modern ink-well or a simple, cylindrical vial with a
flange at the top. The latter is perhaps slightly more common. It frequently ap-
pears on the desk of St Luke, set into a board at the edge (figure 14, #), the flange
or lip of the vial catching on the wood, and the main part going through a hole.
As a rule, a number of vials, probably for different colored inks, are seen together.
Classical scribes, it appears, were in the habit of using inkstands or inkpots, and
many of these in bronze and terra-cotta and in various shapes are still preserved.
At the Niya site in Chinese Turkestan were found oval, trough-shaped pieces of
horn which Stein thought to be probably inkstands (Serindia, I, 225 and 256).
Kolinsky, the name usually given to the hair from which the fine sable brushes
are made. Furriers apply the name to the red sable or tartar sable or any of several
Asiatic minks. The tail is used for brush making and that of the Putorius siMricus
is said to be the most favored for this purpose.