Acta Musealia

Blue Print Dies from the Workshops of Rožnov Dyers in Museum Collections

The contribution presents the results of a two-year research mapping the existence of dies for manual printing from the workshops of Rožnov dyers of blue print textiles in the collections of investigated museums in Moravia and Bohemia. The research was carried out in Wallachian Open Air Museum in Rožnov pod Radhoštěm in the years 2017 - 2018 and is a thematic continuation of cataloguing the Rožnov collection of blue print dies in the previous period. Archive sources record existence of blue print dying in Wallachia as early as 18th century. At the time of the biggest heyday of the trade, which took place in the 19th century, there were several dyers working in Rožnov. Relatively intensive expansion of this industry was influenced by the price availability of cotton fabric, imported dye and other consumables needed for production of blue print. Blue print fabrics became very popular in rural clothing and were in high demand. General business expansion in the second half of the 19th century and modernisation of production even in the textile industry resulted in increased production of cheaper factory produced items. Printing machinery started to be used even in small dye-works, which consequently reduced the proportion of manual production. Accumulation of these factors resulted, at the end of the 19th and the beginning of 20th centuries, in gradual decline and closing of the dye-works. After discontinuation of their existence, some parts of the trade equipment and blue print products became a part of museum collections and today they represent precious material documents of manual trade production in textile industry. The research set as its objective to find information on these material documents supporting the existence of Rožnov dye-works deposited in collections of the other museums. Research of the collections discovered items pertaining to blue print dye-works in Rožnov pod Radhoštěm in four out of the twenty four researched museums. Namely, one comprehensive collection and two individual pieces of dies for manual printing, die wheel and a notebook with recipes of dye reserve material. The origin of these is supported by evidence records in the concerned museums. Collected data enrich the existing documentation in the Wallachian Open Air Museum and contribute towards an integral view of the production, concerning mainly Černoch dye-works. The results of the research published on the web pages of Wallachian Open Air Museum can be used by persons interested in blue print production, both specialists and laics.

Keywords: Wallachian Open Air Museum, Rožnov pod Radhoštěm, Wallachia, dye trade, manual textile print, printing dies