| Pen and ink |
| Although brushes have long been widely used for painting, drawing, and writing, both draftsmen and scribes recognized early that a single, somewhat flexible tube could be sharpened to a point to transfer a liquid medium to the support in fine, precisely defined lines. Feathers (quills) and reeds provided the most useful tools, offering the right combination of flexibility and stiffness, as well as durability. By the eighteenth century the metal pen emerged, a manufactured imitation of its natural predecessors. |
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by Michael Miller |