Identinkty Theft

After the fiasco with the Diamine Sepia recorded in the previous post, I recently set out to buy a genuinely new ink. I bravely fought through the Christmas crowds in Bristol to reach a little stationery shop that stocks Mont Blanc Sepia. I'd heard good things about this new colour, so I was delighted to see a box of it upon the shelf. Back home several hours later (we got lost somewhere near Clifton Downs, taking what I thought was a short cut, but that's another story), I eagerly opened the package, filled a pen with my new acquisition, and put nib to paper ... only to discover that I apparently already own this ink as well.

Allow me to explain. (The unconscious, I'm happy to report, was not at work on this occasion.) What came out of the nib flowed very nicely, but immediately reminded me of Herbin Terre de Feu ink. While the latter is a colour that's very dear to me, I already own a fairly full bottle, and I really don't need another at the moment. Worried that I was imagining things, I inked up another pen with Terre de Feu and wrote a few lines underneath the Mont Blanc Sepia sample. The colours could have been separated at birth. The game was up.

I have no problem at all with one company getting another to make its ink for it (if, of course, that is what has happened here), but I do resent not being informed about the practice. How many other clones are out there pretending to be unique? Which, moreover, are the fakes, and which are the originals? How deep does this thing go? Is a Lone Penman involved? Have I stumbled across Inkgate?

There was eventually a happy ending, though. Several days after my traumatic run-in with the impostor, I obtained a bottle of Conway Stewart Brown, and, following extensive interrogation and high-level security checks, I can officially report that it seems genuinely to be who it claims to be.

There is, perhaps, an easy solution to this problem. We're regularly told in the UK at present that a compulsory ID card scheme would prevent, among other things, identity theft. Why stop with humans? Why not extend the requirement to ink? I want to know the true identity of what's being smuggled in my bottles. I want to be able to open a box and inspect papers before putting pen to paper.

Inks in use today: Noodler's Black, Conway Stewart Brown.