INVESTIGATION OF THE INFLUENCE OF WATER TREATMENT IN BOOK CONSERVATION PROCESSES ON THE COLOUR CHARACTERISTICS OF PAPERS

The conservation and restoration of books, documents and manuscripts is aimed at prolonging the life of our written cultural heritage, mainly written on paper, leather and parchment. The main aim of conservation is to preserve the integrity of the object and to prolong its life. In the present experiment, a study was conducted to evaluate the effect of water treatment in the conservation treatment of books on the colorimetric characteristics of paper. Unrestored books were selected from the archive of the Bulgarian National Library "St. St. Cyril and Methodius", and the study was conducted in the restoration center of the library. Water treatment of all pages of the book have been done and the colorimetric characteristics before and after water treatment have been measured with a spectrophotometer. Color difference - ∆E, lightness difference - ∆L and hue difference - ∆h, between samples before and after water treatment have been calculated. From the obtained results, the effects and changes of the all investigated colorimetric parameters were determined. These results are important from a practical and scientific point of view. The results could be used as valuable information for restoration centers worldwide