Origins . Identical for Indian ethnic groups like
chhipi,
chhimba,
chhapola Printing patterns on textile is closely related to other methods of fabric manipulation, such as by painting, dyeing, and weaving. Woodblock printing on textiles can be traced back to the ancient use of stone blocks and wood, carved to make impressions on various materials. Ancient civilizations such as those in
China,
Egypt, and
Assyria likely used printing on textiles alongside other materials from a very early period. For example, there is direct evidence that people in
South Asia, including some from Punjab and
Mumbai, extensively used printing for textile decoration from early on. Beginning in the 16th century, European, particularly Dutch merchants, bought printed and painted
calico for trade. Despite the great skill displayed by the Chinese in ornamental weaving and other branches of
textile art, there seems to be no direct evidence of their using printing for textile decoration as extensively as in India. In the nineteenth century, woodblock printing in Europe was developed and modified through the use of machinery, stereotypes, and engraved metal plates.
Ancient world As in the case with weaving and embroideries, specimens of printed stuffs have of recent years been obtained from disused cemeteries in Upper Egypt (
Akhmim and elsewhere) and tell us of Egypto-Roman use of such things. A few of these are now lodged in European museums. For indications that early Egyptians, Greeks and Romans were acquainted with the process, one has to rely upon less evidence. Of textiles painted by Egyptians there are many actual examples. Apart from these there are wall paintings, e.g., those of
Beni Hasan (c. 2200–1800 BC), which depict Egyptian people wearing costumes irregularly patterned with spots, stripes and zigzags, which may have been more easily stamped than embroidered or woven. A more complicated and orderly pattern well suited to stamping occurs in a painting about 1320 BC, of
Hathor and King
Meneptha I.
Herodotus also referred to the garments of the inhabitants of the
Caucasus, describing representations of various animals. When Alexander invaded India in 327 BC, there were reportedly block-printed textiles produced there.
Pliny the Elder describes a process employed in Egypt for the coloring of cloth. After pressing the material, which is white at first, they saturate it, not with colors, but with mordants intended to absorb color. He does not explain how this saturation is done. But as it is clearly for the purpose of obtaining a decorative effect, stamping or brushing the mordants into the material may be inferred. When this was finished the cloth was plunged into a cauldron of boiling dye and removed the next moment fully colored. It is a singular fact, too, that although the dye in the pan is of one uniform color, the material when taken out of it is of various colors according to the nature of the mordants that have been respectively applied to it. Egypto-Roman bits of printed textiles from Akhmim exhibit the use, some three hundred years later than the time of Pliny, of boldly cut blocks for stamping figure-subjects and patterns onto textiles. Almost concurrent with their discovery was that of a fragment of printed cotton at
Arles in the grave of St Caesarius, who was bishop there about AD 542. Equal in archaeological value are similar fragments found in an ancient tomb at
Quedlinburg. These, however, are of comparatively simple patterns.
Medieval Europe Museum specimens establish the fact that more important pattern printing on textiles had become a developed industry in parts of Europe towards the end of the 12th and the beginning of the 13th century. According to Forrer (Die Kunst des Zeugdrucks, 1898), medieval
Rhenish monasteries were the cradles of the craft of ornamental stamp- or block-cutting, although it is now recognised that some of the examples he relied on are modern forgeries. In rare monastic manuscripts earlier than the 13th century, initial letters (especially those that recurred frequently) were sometimes stamped from hand-cut blocks, and German deeds of the 14th century bear the names of block cutters and textile stampers as witnesses. Amongst the more ancient relics of Rhenish printed textiles are some thin silken fabrics, impressed with patterns in gold and silver foil. Specimens of these, as well as of a considerable number of later variously dyed stout linens with patterns printed in dark tones or in black, have been collected from reliquaries, tombs, and old churches. The first written reference to printed textiles in Europe is found in
Florentine trade regulations from the fifteenth century. In 1437,
Cennino Cennini published a treatise describing the technique.
Early modern Europe Augsburg, famous in the 17th century for its printing on linens, etc., supplied Alsace and
Switzerland with many craftsmen in this process. After the revocation of the
edict of Nantes, French refugees took part in starting manufactories of both painted and printed cloths in
Holland,
England and Switzerland; some few of the refugees were allowed back into France to do the same in
Normandy: manufactories were also set up in Paris, Marseilles, Nantes and Angers; but there was still greater activity at Geneva, Neuchâtel, Zurich, St Gall and Basel. The first textile printing works in Great Britain are said to have been begun towards the end of the 17th century by a Frenchman on the banks of the Thames near Richmond, and soon afterwards a more considerable factory was established at Bromley Hall in Middlesex; many others were opened in Surrey early in the 18th century. At Mulhouse the enterprise of Koechlin, Schmatzer and Dollfus in 1746, as well as that of Oberkampf at
Jouy, led to a still wider spread of the industry in Alsace. In almost every place in Europe where it was taken up and followed, it was met by local and national prohibitions or trade protective regulations and acts, which, however, were gradually overcome. ==Technique==