History of Lead Pencils

The use of black lead pencils, both for writing and drawing, is of lead standing, traceable to the times of Greek and Roman antiquity.

Pliny refers to the use of lead for ruling lines on papyrus. La Moine cites a document of 1387 rules with graphite.

In ancient Rome, a pencil was a tiny brush called ‘penicillus’ or little tail – also a basis for the modern name ‘penicillin’.

Beginning in the Renaissance, pencils were called ‘dry pencils’ to distinguish them from brushes.

The application of the materials and especially lead as being soft and easily rubbed out, appears to have been in practice many centuries ago.

Gesner, in his book on Fossils, printed at Zurich in 1565, says that pencils for writing were used in his day, with wooden handles and pieces of lead. He credits England with the production.

Early pencils were merely solid chunks of black lead that were taken from earth. To make it easier to handle, black lead was wrapped in string or bound into a wooden holder.

The ‘ever-pointed’ or mechanical pencil dates from 1822 and ‘indelible’ pencils or ink pencils which contained dyes and whose writing could be covered to a permanent ink-like form by wetting, from 1866.

The lead pencil invention and introduction may deservedly be ranked with large number of technical innovations in which more especially the last three centuries have been so rich; nor can it be denied that pencils have played an important part in the diffusion of arts and sciences and in facilitating study and intellectual intercourse.
History of Lead Pencils