Ink Paste for Seals (Yinni)
 The
ink paste used for the imprinting of seals
is called yinni in Chinese, which
means literally "seal clay". It stems from
the clay that was used in ancient times to seal official documents and
which, like the modern sealing wax, was stamped by a seal. Later on
the word yinni began to refer to the traditional equivalent of the inking
pad the paste, usually red which gives the seal its colour
before it is stamped on paper.
High quality inking paste is made of eight ingredients, some very precious:
cinnabar, pearl, musk, coral, ruby, moxa, castor oil and a red pigment.
Called the I "paste of eight treasures",
it produces brilliantly red prints. Paste of a still higher I grade
may contain pure gold and other rare I materials and is so finely made
that it may I remain unchanged in hundreds of years. It also emits a
faint perfume, and its oil neither oozes in summer nor congeals in winter.
Ink paste of this description is greatly valued by painters and collectors.
To make a seal imprint, let the cut face of the seal
touch lightly the inking pad several times, take a
look and see that it is evenly coloured, place the paper to be stamped
on a desk. cushioned beneath with some other paper, and then use the
seal lightly on it, holding it for a little while and increasing the
pressure of the hand toward the end. An impression made this way, whether
of characters or patterns, will be clear, well-defined and nice-looking.
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