A History of Inventions, Discoveries, and Origins, Volume 1 (of 2)Beckmann, Johann
History
A History of Inventions, Discoveries, and Origins, Volume 1 (of 2)
Beckmann, Johann
Inventions -- History
white; but it is not liable to spoil by lying in warehouses. Large
quantities of bolting-cloth are made also by a company in the duchy of
Wurtemberg. At what time this art was introduced there I cannot say;
for every thing I know of it I am indebted to a friend, who collected
for me the following information in his return through that country.
The cloth is not wove in a manufactory, but by eighteen or twenty
master weavers, under the inspection of a company who pay them, and
who supply all the materials. The company alone has the privilege of
dealing in this cloth; and the millers must purchase from their agents
whatever quantity they have occasion for[440]. The millers however
choose rather, if they can, to supply themselves privately with foreign
and other home-made bolting-cloth, as they complain that the weavers
engaged by the company do not bestow sufficient care to render their
cloth durable: besides, the persons employed to carry about this cloth
for sale, often purchase secretly cloth of an inferior quality in other
places, and sell it as that of the company. Bolting-cloth is made also
at Gera, as well as at Potsdam and Berlin; at the latter of which there
is a manufactory of it carried on by the Jews.
For some years past the French have so much extolled a manner of
grinding called _mouture économique_, that one might almost consider
it as a new invention, which ought to form an epoch in the history of
the miller’s art. This art, which however is not new, consists in not
grinding the flour so fine at once as one may wish, and in putting the
meal afterwards several times through the mill, and sifting it through
various sieves. This method, which in reality has nothing in it either
very ingenious or uncommon, was known to the ancient Romans, as we
may conclude from the account of Pliny, who names the different kinds
of meal, such as _similago_, _simila_, _flos_, _pollen_, _cibarium_,
&c.; for these words are not synonymous, but express clearly all the
various kinds of meal or flour which were procured from the same corn
by repeated grinding and sifting. In general, the Romans had advanced
very far in this art[441]; and they knew how to prepare from corn more
kinds of meal, and from meal more kinds of bread, than the French
have hitherto been able to obtain. Pliny reckons that bread should be
one-third heavier than the meal used for baking it; and that this was
the proportion in Germany above a hundred years ago, is known from
experiments on bread made at different times, which, however uncertain
they may always have been, give undoubtedly more bread than meal[442].
In latter times the arts of grinding and of baking have declined very
much in Italy; and sensible Italians readily acknowledge that their
bread is much inferior to that of most parts of Europe, and that in
this respect the Germans are their masters[443]. Rome indeed forms
an exception; for one can procure there as good bread as in Germany;
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account