Ivory Black

Natural organic pigment known since prehistoric times

Pigments sorted by Colour | Type | First date of use | Elements | Pigment timelines

Composition and Properties of Ivory Black

Ivory black is finely ground material obtained by carbonizing (charring) ivory and containing around 10 to 20% carbon. The rest of the material consists of organic phosphates containing sizable proportion of carbonate ions.

The term ivory black is sometimes used synonymously with bone black which is a similar pigment made by charring animal bones. The modern ivory black is almost always actually bone black due to the scarcity of ivory.

The pigment is very stable as are all carbon blacks, it is absolutely lightfast and compatible with all other pigments.

Pigment

Painted swatch

Video: 'The Different Blacks' by CITY STATIONERY GROUP SAL

Names

Color Index

PBk 9, CI 77267

Word origin

Anglo-French ivorie, from Old North French ivurie (12c.), from Medieval Latin eborium “ivory,” noun use of neuter of Latin eboreus “of ivory,” from ebur (genitive eboris) “ivory,” probably via Phoenician from an African source
From Online Etymology Dictionary

Elfenbeinschwarz

German

Noir d’ivoire

French

Nero d’avorio

Italian

Negro de marfil

Spanish

Preparation

Genuine ivory black can be prepared by charring scrapes of ivory.

History of Use

Ivory black has been in use since prehistoric times.

Examples of use

Édouard Manet, ‘Music in the Tuileries Gardens’ 1862

Black clothes of the men: principal pigment is ivory black with the incorporation of cobalt blue and orange-brown ochre and in some areas even a little white.

Manet, Music-in-the-Tuileries-Gardens-pigments-3a

Identification

Fiber optics reflectance spectra (FORS)

Spectra by A. Cosentino, Cultural Heritage Science Open Source (CHSOS)

IR Spectrum

IR-Spectrum of ivory black at Pigment Database of Inorganic Pigments (University of Tartu, Estonia)
IR-spectrum of ivory black mixed with linseed oil by S. Vahur, Database of ATR-IR spectra of materials related to paints and coatings, University of Tartu, Estonia

Raman Spectrum

Spectrum by Ian M. Bell, Robin J.H. Clark and Peter J. Gibbs, Raman Spectroscopic Library
University College of London

(1) Eugenia P. Tomasini, Emilia B. Halac, María Reinoso, Emiliano J. Di Liscia and Marta S. Maier, Micro-Raman spectroscopy of carbon-based black pigments, Journal of Raman Spectroscopy, Special Issue: Raman spectroscopy in art and archaeology, Volume 43, Issue 11, pp. 1671–1675, November 2012.

(2) Alessia Coccato, Jan Jehlicka, Luc Moens and Peter Vandenabeele, Raman spectroscopy for the investigation of carbon-based black pigments, Journal of Raman Spectroscopy, Special Issue: 11th International GeoRaman Conference, Volume 46, Issue 10, pages 1003–1015, October 2015. DOI: 10.1002/jrs.4715. Available as pdf.

X-Ray Fluorescence Spektrum (XRF)

XRF Spectrum in the Free XRF Spectroscopy Database of Pigments Checker, CHSOS website.

References

(1) Fortunato, D. F. and G. (n.d.). Tracing White: A Study of Lead White Pigments found in Seventeenth-Century Paintings using High Precision Lead Isotope Abundance Ratios.

(2) V. Gonzalez, T. Calligaro, G. Walleza, M. Eveno, K. Toussaint, M. Menu, Composition and microstructure of the lead white pigment in Masters paintings using HR Synchrotron XRD, Microchemical Journal, Volume 125, March 2016, Pages 43-49