Phase 1 of the Parchment Making Project is dedicated to cleaning the animal hide by removing the hair and any excess tissues attached to the skin. Understandably, this part of the process is often skipped today by people who try their hand at recreating medieval parchment making practices because not only is it time consuming, labor intensive, and required handling of toxic chemicals, but it is also incredibly messy and smelly. We decided to follow the medieval recipe as close as possible in order to observe how this part of the process works and how the details of this process effect various components of the end goal of parchment leaves.

Phase 1 consists of 7 steps which we have divided into 3 parts:

[Part 1]
Step 1. Water bath for “a day and a night” (24 hours)
Step 2. Wash until water runs clear
Step 3. Make a new bath and “place therein old lime (calcem non recentem) and water mixing well together to form a thick cloudy liquor.” Place skins into the lime bath “folding them on the flesh side” (133).
Step 4. Move them with a pole two or three times each day, leaving them for eight days. Twice as long in the winter [*Note: we’re following the “summer” time schedule since we are doing the processing of the skin indoors inside a climate controlled laboratory at UT set at 72 degrees F] (8 days).
[Part 2]
Step 5. Next take out the skin for dehairing.
[Part 3]
Step 6. Dispose of the old bath and repeat the lime bath instructions listed in steps 3 and 4 (8 days).
Step 7. Take the skin out and wash it until water runs clear.
Step 8. Place into another bath with clean water and let sit for 2 days (48 hours).