Credit: © The Royal Society
Image number: RS.10115
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Scutching of hemp plant fibre
Date
1804
Creator
Richard Reeve (1780, British) , Printmaker
Object type
Library reference
Tracts/X99/4
Material
Technique
Dimensions
height (print): 210mm
width (print): 270mm
width (print): 270mm
Subject
Content object
Description
Illustration of the process of scutching [beating] hemp fibres to remove impurities such as leaves, weeds and dust and to separate the fibres. Once beaten by the scutch on a scutching-frame, the hemp was tied into bundles for heckling and would go on to be used in rope-making and cloth production . The scene shows workmen processing the plant and this is surmounted by a decorative border with hemp plants Cannabis sativa, heckling combs and other equipment.
Plate 4 in the monograph On the cultivation and preparation of hemp; as also of an article produced in various parts of India...by Robert Wissett (London, 1804).
Inscribed “Pl.4. Etch’d by Reeve. Scutching. ”.
Robert Wissett (d.1820), Clerk to the Committee of Warehouses of the East India Company, was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1801.
Plate 4 in the monograph On the cultivation and preparation of hemp; as also of an article produced in various parts of India...by Robert Wissett (London, 1804).
Inscribed “Pl.4. Etch’d by Reeve. Scutching. ”.
Robert Wissett (d.1820), Clerk to the Committee of Warehouses of the East India Company, was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1801.
Associated place