On Google Books, I found a little gem from the Harvard College Library: the ‘Nieuwe en Naauwkeurige Verhandeling van den Tabak’ (or the ‘New and Precise Treatise on Tobacco’), a tobacconist’s handbook, published in Amsterdam in 1785. (Apparently, an older version from 1770 or 1776 exists.) The book (scanned and downloadable as a PDF) can be found here: http://books.google.nl/books?id=cqsUAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA1&lpg=PA1&dq=“nieuwe+en+naauwkeurige+verhandeling”&source=bl&ots=YVmBkhsM8I&sig=YorIIQRW9yWQpIJHgQpiQheYgzc&hl=nl&sa=X&ei=2gOJUaybGo3S4QSU5YDIBg&ved=0CDkQ6AEwAg (I suggest we all download a copy, lest it be lost someday…) Chapters 37 through 50 contain information about and recipes for snuff tobacco. The recipes are for: - Neapolitan snuff - Spanish snuff - Snuff with tonka beans - Bergamot or citron (cédrat) snuff - Neroli snuff - Pongibon snuff - Musk snuff - Spanish musk snuff - The Roman fragrance in snuff (I wonder whether one needs a Roman nose to savour the Roman fragrance?) - Maltese snuff - Amber snuff (I think what is meant is ambergris, basically a fragrant substance found in sperm whale vomit) - Thousand Flowers snuff (sounds like a Maoist recipe) - Very fine snuff - Civet snuff - Tuscan snuff - Italian snuff - New snuffs (bearing in mind, of course, that the book is 225 years old) - Pompadour snuff - St. Domingo snuff - Scented Spanish snuff - Seville snuff That’s an impressive range of historical snuff recipes to try out. It will not be easy to reproduce them, though, for a couple of reasons. To begin with, the Dutch language in the book is very archaic. This is not a problem in itself, but several of the units mentioned (grein, lood, ‘een weinig’ or ‘een beetje’) are either imprecise, or outdated. Other units may or may not be regional. (This was written some ten years before the introduction of the metric system in the low countries, alas.) Finally, the snuffs are supposed to be mixed in a mortar, until full, but so far I haven’t found any reference to the size of the mortar. (This said, I haven’t had the time to go through the whole text yet.) However, it does fuel dreams of snuffmaking (maybe some day I will acquire the tools of the trade - who knows?). I wonder whether @snuffmiller is aware of the existence of the book (I bet he is), and whether he’s actually using it? It would be fun to know.
@Matou: Yes I am and yes this is one the books I use to revive historical snuffs. We are still working on the St. Omer No. 1. And yes its coming, but don’t be impatient. The karotten method takes several years fermenting! Jaap Bes.
@snuffmiller : That’s really interesting to know and it’s a good thing that these old sources are still available to us, and (more importantly) being used. (Ik durf het bijna niet te vragen:) Are any of the other books you’re using available online? Or would you care to share the titles? Not that I’m thinking of becoming a competitor (unlike most Dutchmen I have no windmill), just genuinely interested in the recipes and the process of snuffmaking.
@Matou: Also on Google: De tabaks- en sigaren-fabrikant: leerrijke voorschriften omtrent de … Door Emanuel Schreiber (of Weimar.) =http://books.google.nl/books?id=QDgXAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA162&lpg=PA162&dq=snuif&source=bl&ots=UCJQP\_pLgE&sig=3HsfQitYo8Nn6Hehk\_nn1ZlF130&hl=nl&sa=X&ei=wtVQUPaTNYHA0QXmroHIDg&sqi=2&ved=0CFQQ6AEwBw#v=onepage&q=snuif&f=false Vollständige Tabak-Kunde, oder wissenschaftlich-praktische Anleitung zur … Door Johann Carl Leuchs = http://books.google.nl/books?id=M8c-AAAAcAAJ&pg=PA58&lpg=PA58&dq=schnupftabak&source=bl&ots=caB28dMW\_x&sig=df1OQKicitAG9BQnH50if38vTGY&hl=nl&sa=X&ei=utZQUM7SOqqS0QW5oYDACg&sqi=2&ved=0CDoQ6AEwAg#v=onepage&q=schnupftabak&f=false Not on google books as far as I know: Nog Nooit GEOPENBAARDE VOORSCHRIFTEN voor Tabaksfabrikeurs, Tabakshandelaars, Tabaksrokers en Tabaksnuivers, om Op de goedkoopstenben beste wyze idered Uit en Inlandsche soort van ROOK EN SNUIFTABAK te ververvaardigen, voornaamlijk zo als dezelve in Duinkerken en Holland bereid wordt, als mede hoe alle sausen daaraan te maken zijn, en welke Ingrediënten daartoe genomen worden Door een Man, die omtrent dertig jaarenin Duinkerken, Holland en andere Fabrieken als Faktoor geweest is. Uit het Hoogduitsch naar den tweeden druk vertaald. Uit gegeven in Zutphen 1805. en: Tabakkultur, Tabak= und Zigarrenfabrikation, sowie Statistik des Tabakbaues, Tabakhandels und der Tabakindustrie mit besonderer Berücksichtigung der im handel vorkommenden Tabaksorten, Zubereitung und chemischen Analyse, Verfälschungen un Toxikologie des Tabakes, nebst eine Angabe enthaltend das deutsche Tabaksteuergesetz von 16. Juli 1879 von Ladislaus Wagner en: De Tabak en Tabaksfabrikaten omvattend: De geschiedenis, De teelt, De aard en productie, DE behandeling, De chemie en indeeling , Het handelsverkeer, De wereldstatistiek, De beteekenis der tabak uit sociaal en hygiënisch oogpunt en ten opzichte der belasting, zowel als de bewerking van Tabak tot sigaren, sigaretten, rooktabak, pruimtabak en snuif. Met medewerking van verschillende vaklieden. door Jacob Wolf voor Nederland bewerkt door S.C.J. Bertram Leiden1913 en: Handbuch des Tabakshandels von H. Aschenbrenner und Dr. Günter Stahl Oldenburg 1950. For now enough literature I think. Jaap Bes.
That is really appreciated, @snuffmiller, thank you very much!