Early classicists and archeologists of the 19th and 20th centuries used paper in an interesting way: As they could not bring entire stone structures back to an epigraphist’s home institution, they used paper to make impressions of the inscriptions they wanted to study after leaving a cultural heritage site. This process is called making “squeezes.”
Charlie Harper, digital learning and scholarship librarian, and Andrew R. Mancuso, preservation officer, will lead a discussion and demonstration on this process, display historic squeezes from prominent Department of Classics faculty at CWRU held in the Special Collections and share new technologies that are being employed for preservation and research today. Attendees also are invited to take their newfound knowledge into the field for an optional workshop at the nearby Doan Brook walls to make their own squeezes.
The discussion and demonstration will take place Saturday, Oct. 20, from 11 a.m. to noon in Kelvin Smith Library, Hatch Reading Room. Afterward, participants who wish to go into the field can meet at the corner of North Park Boulevard and Bellfield Avenue in Cleveland Heights by 1 p.m. to create squeezes.
With any questions, contact Mancuso at labcoat@case.edu.
RSVP for the event through the Kelvin Smith Library CampusGroups page.