During my days of historical re-enactments, we were warned of the dangers of lead poisoning. Most of us used pewter tankards and plates. It was a big no-no to polish them as this exposed more lead into the food and drink.
The drinking technique was to put both lips into the liquid, thus avoiding direct contact from the pewter with the mouth. Sometimes we gave demonstrations of making lead musket-balls, but only a few at a time and handling was kept to the bare minimum. They would be passed around for on-lookers to examine who would then wash their hands. Some of us had genuine musket-balls from the period, usually kept in a pouch and only handled with gloves. But we digress... Ron (UK) -----Original Message----- From: Jaroslaw Lipski [mailto:jaroslawlip...@wp.pl] Sent: Tuesday, February 24, 2009 6:45 PM To: lute@cs.dartmouth.edu Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre In general lead intoxication occurs after swallowing or inhalation of even small amounts of this element, however there are reports of ocupational intoxication as well: The major source of lead is occupational exposure from jobs dealing with lead and lead-based components; there is a high prevalence of lead toxicity in the population exposed to such activities. Occupational exposure of workers is seen in the manufacturing of lead batteries and cables, as well as rubber and plastic products. Soldering and foundry work, such as casting, forging, and grinding activities, are also associated with occupational exposures. Construction workers involved in painting or paint stripping, plumbing, welding, and cutting are also exposed to lead. So not only inhaling or swallowing is toxic but touching, rubbing, grinding activities as well. Even if we don't believe in skin penetration by small particules we still have a chance to rub our nose or touch unconciously our lips after some session of playing. If you have any doubts just read this: http://emedicine.medscape.com/article/410113-overview Best Jaroslaw ----- Original Message ----- From: "Alexander Batov" <alexander.ba...@vihuelademano.com> To: <lute@cs.dartmouth.edu> Sent: Tuesday, February 24, 2009 5:35 PM Subject: [LUTE] Re: Laurent de La Hyre > As compared to modern day's levels of mercury contamination in the air (in > particular in such big places like London where hundreds of thousands, if > not more, of strip lights and 'new generation' light bulbs are getting > replaced and simply chucked off in skips daily!) the effect from the > mercury / lead loaded strings would simply count next to nothing. > > By the way, I'm not a toxicologist :) So no responsibilities accepted ... > > AB > > Martyn Hodgson wrote: >> Regarding the use of mercury (or lead) to load a gut string: if it >> were >> a problem wouldn't we have seen at least some contemporary reports of >> professional lutenists with poisining symptoms - I'm not aware of any. >> But perhaps the amount of mercuric compound is so relatively small >> (unlike with the hatters who rubbed raw mercury into hats with their >> fingers) that there's no noticeable effect. Surely a toxologist should >> be able to inform us.... >> >> MH > > > > To get on or off this list see list information at > http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html >
