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History |
The history of conservation
at the National Archives of Scotland (NAS) goes back to the early days of Register
House. One of the most pressing problems facing Thomas Thomson, the first Deputy
Clerk Register (1806-1839), was the conservation of the records, many of which
had arrived in an atrocious condition. Repairing these was painstaking and costly
but Thomson wrote, "… I am not aware of any…expense that could
be so usefully bestowed on the Ancient Records of Scotland…" His problem
was finding skilled paper repairers who could train people in Register House.
Little is known about the people who carried out early repairs on the
records but we do know that between 1806 and 1808 a Mrs Maria Weir, a skilled
book and paper restorer, came from London "to repair, wash and mend the manuscripts
of the Society of Writers to the Signet, at a salary of a guinea a week".
Her husband David or Davy Weir (d.1792) had been an associate of Roger Payne,
the famous 18th century binder. Weir was said to be "so addicted to liquor
that he seldom began to work before Thursday".
Maria Weir specialised
in inlaying and ruling. She worked on paper and parchment, and tended to use purple
ink for her ruling. She had previously worked alongside Payne and her husband,
probably doing the sewing and headbanding but certainly also some binding. |  |
In 1811 she and her three lady assistants were employed in Register
House in mending and inlaying the register of the great seal, binding the volumes
in Russia leather imported at great expense.
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