Alum faces; an unusual Medieval Ingredient

In period known as alumen faecis, alom de fece, lume di fecca, lume de fezza - alum feces is an often mentioned medieval chemical ingredient which, surprisingly, has nothing to do with alum. Alum of lees (alumen faecis) is potassium carbonate and made by burning the sediments of wine, called lees. During the fermentation of grape juice harmless crystalline deposits separate in wine as crude tartar and are deposited in wine casks. These deposits consist mostly of tartar, the potassium salt of tartaric acid,  with small amounts of cream of tartar and of pulp debris, dead yeast, and tannins; impurities which contaminate the potassium tartrate. Tartrates separate from new wines because they are less soluble in alcohol than in non-alcoholic grape juice. Approximately half of the tartrate soluble in grape juice is insoluble in wine, and in white wines the sediment can look alarmingly like shards of glass.  Crude tartar was well known in our time of study and is used as an ingredient in many books of secrets dealing with medicinal recipes, fabric cleaning, dyeing, &c. This is what Ruscello Girolamo, author of the Alexis, has to say on tartar: "Note: Tartar signifieth dried leyes of wine, in English is called Argill, wherof be .ij. sorts, white and red." Unfortunately, while recipes using the ingredients are plenty, instructions on acquiring and purifying chemical ingredients including tartar and its derivatives are rare, up until  the late 17th to 18th century as attested by the 1842 A Dispensatory “the pure salt was first prepared during the last [18th] century, and its constitution was unknown [before]”.

My impression is that the craftspeople worked things out very well by trial and error, but did not know why certain combinations worked. This could show in the inclusion of superfluous items, ingredients with no apparent use; for instance juice of celandine has no cleaning properties as far as modern chemistry is aware. And in the addition of specific combinations of ingredients (chemicals) which would react with each other (chemistry) to create a new ingredient, which would significantly boost the workings of the recipe, without knowing why it worked more effectively. For instance, the combination of alum feces (potassium carbonate) with crude tartar (dipotassium tartrate) would chemically react and precipitate cream of tartar (potassium bitartrate), a more effective stain cleaner than tartar itself. While it is not difficult to crystallize cream of tartar out of crude tartar and use as a straight ingredient, the question is: were the medieval craftsmen aware of this chemical and did they find it easier to produced it in situ, or did they use the round-about way as they did not know, aside from, this works?
 

Naturally occurring winestone from white wine, untreated.

From working with soap recipes I had come across the mentions of tartar, alum feces and alum catini multiple times, and as part of my soap research I wanted to learn how to make these from scratch. While it took me about two years to find a reference to alum feces to mean burnt lees of wine by way of a Pennsic workshop on laundry (I tracked down the bibliography), I only recently found the final piece of the puzzle.

Alum feces and alum catini are often mentioned in the same context in similar or the same recipes. I assumed them to be of a similar background and when I found that alum feces was burnt tartar I made a leap and assumed alum catini to be the ashes of burnt cream of tartar. It made sense at the time! Unfortunately, after doing lots of digging into the chemistry of tartar and finding out that ashing tartar and cream of tartar ends up with the same chemical (but they might not have known that! my little devil went…) I finally found a reference in the wonderful book The Art of Dyeing in the History of Mankind which translates alum catini - and mentions quite a number of other alums which are also not, technically, alum - to soda, or soda ash. Which makes perfect sense, as alum feces actually is potash… With my background in soap making I could have anticipated this, but it never even occurred to me. What I did wonder about is why I did not find any mention to soda ash in any of my medieval soap recipes… Now, not only did I solve one small mystery of identification, I actually ended up solving a much larger one on technique.

For more background & chemistry on Tartrates, please check my IceDragon documentation at:
https://www.academia.edu/32370309/Alumen_faecis_An_unusual_Medieval_Ingredient._Includes_some_thoughts_on_the_production_of_Tartar_and_Cream_of_Tartar

The word alumen faecis occurs in many books of secrets written in the sixteenth century on chemical technology and is described as the burnt remains of tartar, indicating potassium carbonate. An exact translation of this word would mean the dregs or refuse of alum. In the French The secrets of the master Alexis of Piemont it appears as "alum de fece"; in the English Alexis as "alumen fecis," and, of course, in the German Alexis as "alun de feta." Cesalpino, the well known authority of the sixteenth century in his De Metallicis, Rome, 1596, says, “Alumen faecis, quae fex vini est combusta” or "Alumen faecis is the dregs of wine that is burned."  Gargiolli in L’Arte Della Seta in Florence, 1868, says of allume di feccia that “Cotesto allume non e altro che cenera cavata dale vinacce bruciate” – “This alum is nothing other that the ashes derived from burnt wine lees.” 

The word tartar comes to English via Medieval Latin from the Medieval Greek tartaron.  This crude form of tartar, also known as winestone, argol and beeswing, is collected and purified to produce the white, odorless acidic powder known as cream of tartar, or potassium bitartrate. As a food additive, tartar shares the E number E336 with cream of tartar, which does not help the confusion between dipotassium tartrate (tartar) and potassium bitartrate (cream of tartar).  Alum feces or potassium carbonate can be made by igniting and ashing tartrates (natural winestone or commercial cream of tartar) to produce pearl ash. This salt (alkali) of tartar was deemed stronger than almost any that is obtained from other matters.  Potash could also be purified by baking it in a kiln or oven until all the carbon impurities are burned off, which would also resulting in pearl ash (sometimes called fly ash, as it easily blows away). The same technique works to make alum catini by ashing calcined marine plants in a kiln - or you could buy a box of washing soda, which is also pure sodium carbonate. The production of potash and pearl ash from wood were of such importance to Britain that these commodities could not be exported by the American Colonies to ports outside of the British Realm.  High quality potassium carbonate was used in glass making, soap making, fiber cleaning & dyeing and as a medicinal ingredient. Tartrates were used in fiber cleaning & dyeing and as a medicinal ingredient.

The different chemicals made from natural winestone.

Wine stone is crude tartar.
Refined crude tartar becomes tartar or argol (dipotassium tartrate).
Refined tartar becomes cream of tartar (potassium bitartrate).
Burnt tartar & cream of tartar becomes alum feces (potassium carbonate)


In cleaning solutions and recipes, tartrates and carbonates have specific functions:

Tartrates are buffering agents.
Tartar (sometimes in the form of wine lees), was a common ingredient in both lye-based and non-lye-based cleaning solutions. Tartar’s acidic qualities somewhat neutralize the harshness of an alkaline solution , which greatly helps protein based fabrics like woolen cloth.

Tartrates are acidic, and act as sequestrants.
As well as providing buffering action, the acidity of tartar and cream of tartar makes these substances useful in removing inorganic stains. They have some ability to act as sequestrants,  by interrupting the oxidation of metals, making it possible to dissolve and removing metal and iron oxidation. It is taken from the Latin word “sequestrare” meaning to remove from use.  Cream of tartar is an effective and still in use household remedy against iron stains and fruit stains on linen.

Carbonates are alkalis.
In solution with water carbonates (CO3) react to produce hydroxides (OH); for instance potassium carbonate (K2CO3) plus water (H2O) produces potassium hydroxide (KOH), which is alkaline. Alkaline solutions are common cleaning agent of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. Alkalis are best at removing stains of a fatty nature and some proteins. When applied to grease and oil stains, the saponification that occurs is an additional aid to stain removal.  Alkaline solutions were also made from boiling potash (including hearth ashes), a common source of potassium carbonates, but depending on the quality of the source is often significantly less pure (due to incomplete burn) than burnt tartar, or alum feces.

A near period mention on the making of tartar and cream of tartar, from The charitable physitian with the Charitable apothecary, 1639:

CHAP. XL. To make Creame and Salt of Tartar.
TAke a pound of Tartar, beate it in a morter and searce it through a course sieve, then put it into a pipkin, and cover it with water, and make it boyle a walme or two, then passe it two or three times through a hippocras bagge with a bason underneath to receive the liquor, then set it to settle the space of twenty foure houres, at the end of which, you shall take of the Creame which swimmeth one the top, with a trencher or silver spoone, and poure the water softly away by inclination, and scrape the salt away which sticketh one the sides with a spoone, and make it fall to the bottome, then wash them, dry them, and prepare them, and keepe them by themselves.

This would indeed make both tartar and cream of tartar, although with only one cycle of heating it would not produce very much cream of tartar.


Photo Essays on how to make Tartar and Alum faces can be found here:
https://bookeofsecretes.blogspot.com/2017/06/photo-essay-to-make-alumen-faecis.html
https://bookeofsecretes.blogspot.com/2017/06/photo-journal-to-make-tartar.html


Bibliography: 
-- (1771) Encyclopedia Brittanica. Vol. II. Edinburgh: Colin Macfarquhar, Society of Gentlemen in Scotland.

Brunello, Franco. The Art of Dyeing in the History of Mankind. Neri Pozza, 1973.

Edelstein, Sidney M. (1964) The Allerley Matkel (1532) Technology and Culture, Vol. 5, No. 3 (Summer, 1964). The Johns Hopkins University Press. p.313

Ellis, Marietta (2015?) Colonial Soapmaking – Its History and Techniques. Spadét.

Guibert, Philbert. The Charitable Physitian, Shewing the manner to make and pre­pare in the house with ease and little paines all those remedies which are proper to all sorts of diseases, according to the advice of the best and ordi­nariest Physitians. Serving as well for the rich as the poor. Translated into English, by I. W. London: Printed by Thomas Harper, 1639. 
http://tei.it.ox.ac.uk/tcp/Texts-HTML/free/A02/A02327.html

Leed, Drea (2006) “Ye Shall Have It Clean”. Medieval Clothing and Textiles, Vol 2, the Boydell Press, NY. 

Lémery, Nicolas & Harris, Walter (1686) A course of chemistry. London: R.N. for Walter Kettilby, p.433

Ruscelli, Girolamo. A verye excellent and profitable booke conteining sixe hundred foure score and odde experienced medicines apperteyning unto phisick and surgerie, long tyme practysed of the expert and Reuerend Mayster Alexis, which he termeth the fourth and finall booke of his secretes ... Translated out of Italian into Englishe by Richard Androse. 1569 .

https://www.google.com/search?q=what+is+tartar&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Potassium_tartrate

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tartrate
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Potassium_tartrate 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sequestrant

Photo Essay: To make Alumen faecis

For more background on tartar and alum faces, see other posts.

The crude tartar is calcined over open fire (propane burner) in a fireproof vessel in a well ventilated area (sunroom) into charcoal. Iron was indicated to be able to withstand the heat, but as I enjoy my cast iron, I choose to use a pyroceramic corningware dish (as pyrex would shatter). Calcining creates lots of smoke while the organic contaminants and volatile gasses are burned off.

Then the black charcoaled winestone is put on an iron dish (pizza plate) into the oven and ashed using the self-cleaning cycle. This worked really well (and I was very glad I did the calcining outdoors as we do not have an outdoor vent on our oven).

The powder is then filtered and stored in a jar.

As mentioned in the 1686 A course of chemistry, if these ashes are dissolved or lixiviated in water, and then evaporated, another salt will appear, which will have become hygroscopic, or draw moisture from the air: “Break the Retort which served you for distillation of Tartar, and take the black mass you find in it; Calcine it until it becomes white, then put it into a great deal of hot water, and make a Lixivium, filtrate it, and pour it into a glass, or earthen vessel, evaporate in a sand-heat all the water, and there will remain a white salt, which is called the Alkali Salt of Tartar. If you expose for some days in a Cellar this Salt of Tartar in a wide glass vessel, it will dissolve into a liquor that is improperly called Oil of Tartar per Deliquium.”  What this indicates is that the ashes of tartar, or the potassium carbonate, dissolved in water reacted to form potassium hydroxide, which when evaporated will re-crystallize, but will also be hygroscopic (pull moisture from the air, as soap makers know from experience hydroxide is wont to do!).


Following are two period recipes which include tartar and alum feces, for more samples please see my IceDragon documentation on Academia.org.

From T bouck va wondre (The Book of Wonders), anonymous, 1513: this recipe would make an all-purpose cleaning soap ball. The rock alum would act as a mild deodorant and acidic buffer, the tartar would help buffer the alkaline soap and help remove mineral stains, the egg would help disperse trapped dirt (and help with sticking the dry powders to the hard Spanish soap). I am not familiar with waterlily rhizomes in specific, but know of similar plants which are saponaria (soap plants) and would act as a wetting agent to help the soap penetrate the fabric deeper so more debris can be rinsed away.

32. To make soap, that, purifies all sorts of stains, whatever they might be.
Take rock alum, lees [tartar] one pound and make this in a powder, rhizomes of flames or waterlilies of Florence, pulverized a half pound, a fresh egg, two pounds and a half of spanish soap, stomp the previously mentioned powders with the egg and the soap, and make little balles thereof. And if you think the egg was not enough, take as many as you like, or as you think is enough, to make the previously mentioned. And if you want to take on the stain, take clean water, and soak and wash the mentioned stain of both sides of the sheet, and rub with the mentioned ball, and sheet on sheet; that done, wash the dirtiness out with fresh water, and wring the sheet to get rid of the fat, and wash the sheet again with fresh water, and it will stay clean.       

From Allerley Mackel (All Kinds of Spots) by Peter Jordanim, 1532: This recipe describes not only the use of tartar in a cleaning solution, but also a method by which cream of tartar was obtained for use in cleaning. When alum feces (potash or pearlash; potassium carbonate) is combined with crude tartar (tartaric acid) in a liquid solution, cream of tartar (potassium bitartrate) is precipitated. Some precipitation occurs naturally during the winemaking process, but collecting the tartar-rich solid leftovers during winemaking and adding them to a solution of potassium hydroxide (lye, or potassium carbonate mixed with water) allows for a much greater amount of pure cream of tartar to be created. (Leed) And once again just about all available cleaning materials are then mixed together. This combinations should form a concentrated emulsion containing solvents to hold fats and waxes in solution (the campfor and oxgall), tartrates to help remove mineral stains, and absorbents to help remove embedded dirt (the alum with the dragon’s blood would form an aluminum resinate which would give some viscosity to the mix). 

3. Another way
Six ounces alum feces, four ounces crude tartar, two ounces alum, one half quent [1/4 scruple or a dragme] camphor, one half quent dragon's blood, grind all together to a fine powder and mix well, then take six ounces ox gall and six "bucklin" of clear water, put all together in a kettle, let boil to remove a third of the volume, then strain through a piece of cloth. Whenever you cannot get the ox gall or the camphor the water itself is strong enough. For use take a new piece of woolen cloth, moisten it with the water, and rub the spot or stain with it. When the piece of cloth becomes dry, moisten it again with the water and rub until the spot has disappeared; thereupon take warm water and wash the place where the stain has been. But for white cloth take the same water and add some soap, distill it, and work as before.

Winestone donated by my friend Ian Barry of Barry Family Cellars.

https://www.facebook.com/BarryFamilyCellars/?ref=page_internal

All photography by Susan Verberg.

For a complete bibliography, more background, more photo’s, and how to make cream of tarter, you can download my documentation at:

https://www.academia.edu/32370309/Alumen_faecis_An_unusual_Medieval_Ingredient._Includes_some_thoughts_on_the_production_of_Tartar_and_Cream_of_Tartar

Photo Essay: To Make Tartar

For more background information on tartar, cream of tartar and alum faces, see other posts.

“… as well as its property of not being soluble in water without much difficulty: for a very great quantity of water is requisite to keep the crystals of tartar in solution; and it must moreover be boiling hot; otherwise as soon as it cools most of the tartar dissolved in it separates from the liquor, and falls to the bottom in the form of a white powder” From the Encyclopedia Britannica, 1771.

From the information given in the above text, among others, I choose to boil the winestone and let it cool down to re-crystallize the tarter out of the suspension.


The Process:
   

Rinse and dry crude tartar. My tartar came from a local wine maker (Barry Family Cellars) and comes from white wine (which is why it is uncolored). It smells weird. The crude tarter is added to water. It only dissolves during the boiling stage of water and settles back out of solution when the water cools down.
         

The refined tartar settles out of solution in a fine powder and as a sludge can easily be dried.
When using red wine winestone, this stage would be done multiple times while decanting the water which would contain most of the colorants and tannins.

I assumed it would crystallize to the sides, given the text by Lémery from 1686 below:
“Boil in a great deal of water what quantity of white Tartar you please, until it be all dissolved; pass the liquor hot through Hippocrates his Sleeve, into an earthen vessel, and evaporate about half of it: set the vessel in a cool place two or three days, & you'l find little Crystals on the sides, which you are to separate; evaporate again half the liquor that remains, and remit the vessel to the Cellar as before, there will shoot out new Crystals: continue doing thus, until you have gotten all your Tartar , dry the Crystals in the Sun, and keep them for use.” 

This did not happen. I did not filter the hot liquid but let it cool down on its own, as indicated by the more recent texts. I wonder if the little crystals indicated are cream of tartar instead of straight tartar, as cream of tartar will keep appearing at each new boil until the liquid is exhausted.

The dried sludge is broken off and powdered in a fine mortar and sieved.
The resulting white powder is tartar, or potassium tartrate.

 
Winestone donated by my friend Ian Barry of Barry Family Cellars.
https://www.facebook.com/BarryFamilyCellars/?ref=page_internal

All photography by Susan Verberg.

For a complete bibliography, more background, more photo’s, and how to make cream of tarter, you can download my documentation at:
https://www.academia.edu/32370309/Alumen_faecis_An_unusual_Medieval_Ingredient._Includes_some_thoughts_on_the_production_of_Tartar_and_Cream_of_Tartar

The obscure ingredient Gillyflower as used in medieval culinary & cosmetic recipes.

Is it this? Or is it that? What is it?!

As part of my interest in medieval soap making I come across some rather strange and unusual ingredients. Some only look strange at first glance as the medieval word has undergone modernization. Some describe ingredients no longer used in this way, either because they are hard to mass-produce, or because they are now known to be detrimental to our health. Every unknown ingredient I come across digging through countless medicinal and cosmetic soap recipes is carefully checked out and these sometimes obvious, often times obscure, ingredients are compiled in my Glossary for future reference.

For example, when using google translate to translate muschio, its first hit will be moss. While plausible, when looked at the word in context of the recipe, it is unlikely moss was added as a scrub. What was meant here was the scent musk, a much more appropriate addition as the recipe came from a book about perfumery.

Same with fate poluere - when put into google translate it comes up as fairies dust... Would we really think renaissance Italians caught fairies, dried them, ground them up, and made such good soap Mona Lisa literally seems to glow? I'd like to, though it does seem more likely it is only an older way of spelling fare polvere which means to make into dust, making a whole lot more sense considering the rest of the recipe...

Then what about the botanical garofano? When looked up in the 1611 medieval Italian to medieval English dictionary the Florio the translation given for garofano (garofani) is both cloves (Syzygium aromaticum) and gillyflower, also called carnation (Dianthus caryphyllus), and leaves the matter up for interpretation. Gillyflower as an ingredient makes an appearance in several non-English language soap recipes, including the Italian Notandissimi and the Dutch Dat Batement van Recepten. My curiosity was peaked, but a conclusive period source for either interpretation was nowhere to be found. The 1771 Encyclopedia Brittanica gives the alternate name clove pink for carnation, indicating some sort of connection between clove and carnation. But while it mentions the term gillyflower can be any of several flowering plant species, the spice clove is not listed among them. If they truly are two different plant species, then how can gillyflower mean both in medieval texts?

Scadian Italian cosmetics enthusiast Giata (Gigi Coulson) translated this intriguing recipe from Caterina Sforza to treat horrible breath, to include cloves:

A guerire una persona a chi puzzasse la bocca o vero el fiato.
Piglia 1 onca garofani, 5 onca cinamomo fino, 5 onca tirats, con un terzo de finissimo vino fa pistare et fa bollire et danne mezzo bichieri per volta.
To heal a person who has horrible breath.
Take 1 ounce cloves, 5 ounces ground cinnamon, 5 ounces tirats (sic), and mix with a third of finest wine, then do grind and boil it and take a dose of half a glass at a time.

A handful of cooking recipes in the 16-17th century Martha Washington’s Cookbook also include gillyflower as an ingredient. Here, the translator states gillyflower is what is now known as the clove-scented pink, or carnation (Dianthus caryophyllus). According to her, gilly comes from French girofle, for clove, and is pronounced jilly. As evidenced by the older forms jellyflower and July Flowers it most likely always was; both are fine examples of the substitution of a word of known meaning for an unknown one of similar sound. Clove (Caryophyllus aromaticus) comes from the French clou de girofle, because of its resemblance to a nail, while the French girofle likely came by way of the Greek caryophyllon. Cloves are the dried flower buds of the clove tree.

Clove gilliflower image from A Sip through Time.

The collection of old brewing recipes A Sip through Time by Cindy Renfrow also gives clove gilliflower of the family Caryophilli as an alternate name of gilliflower. Maybe through confusing nomenclature it had become a case of mistaken identity? The Dutch books of secrets soap recipes refer to gillyflower as groffelsnavel, which the Medieval Dutch internet translator Historic Dictionaries on the Internet also translates to gilliflower. At first glance, groffelsnavel (Dutch), groffiaat (Belgium), garofano (Italian), girofle (French), girofre (Spanish) and a number of other alternates all lead back to gillyflower as a carnation.

Then the medieval Dutch translator had one last thing to say: "The word was also (including in the Roman Languages) used for the clove (Caryophyllus aromaticus) -1892". In our modern time the Latin name for cloves is Syzygium aromaticum, but in history the Latin name for cloves was Caryophyllus aromaticus - very similar to the Latin for gillyflower which is Dianthus caryphyllus, and indicates both are part of the family Caryophilli. In history cloves and carnations were classified as belonging to the same family. They had similar physical characteristics (with both the bottom of the flower is sort of nail shaped), were thus likely assumed to have similar properties, and were used interchangeably. Apparently, it is up to context and personal interpretation to decide whether the gillyflower called for is the spice cloves or the herb carnation.

Gilliflower is found mentioned in several recipes, both in personal cosmetics (scented soap) and in brewing. Following are a selection of recipes to illustrate the importance of context:

For Clarre. Take cloues and gilofre quibible, and mac? canll' gygner and spiguale off an in poudre and temper hem with good wyne and the iij. parte as much of fyn honi that is clarified and streine hem thorough a cloth and doo it into a clene vessel, and it may be made wyth ale &c?.
For Clare.
Take cloves and gillyflower quibible [could be qui belle, or very beautiful], and mac? canll' [much candied?] ginger and spiguale off [spigot, or drain off?] and in powder, and mix them with good wine and the iij. part as much of fine honey that is clarified and strain them through a cloth and do it in a clean vessel, and it may be made with ale, etc.

In this recipe from The Customs of London: Otherwise Called Arnold's Chronicle (1503) gillyflowers & cloves are listed separately, by name, and since gillyflower is likely described as beautiful, my guess is that carnation is meant here.

To Pickle cloue gilliflowrs cowslips burrage & marrigoulds
Clip your flowers clean from the whites & cover them over in white wine vinegar, sweetned with sugar, & shake the glasses you put them in often, & when you discover your pickle to shrink, add more to it.
Since this 16th to 17th century recipe by Martha Washington describes gillyflowers as flowers, it likely indicates that carnations were meant, as opposed to the dried out flower bud of the spice clove.

Carnations, and the double-cloaue Gillofers

from the 1578 Nievve Herbal or Historie of Plantes by Gerard Dewes.

From Dat batement van recepten, a 16th century book of secrets, comes the following recipe for gilliflower soap:

133. Om seepe girofflat te maken.
Neemt een pont seepen, set die te weeken in rooswater drie dagen in de sonne; ende als ghi v seepe maken wilt, neemt een vnce ende een half groffelsnagelen wel gestooten, ende die helft van die selue nagelen sult ghi in v seepe doen, ende dat seer wel mengelende. Met dander helft doet dat hierna volcht. Neemt een cleyn potken met rooswater, ende doeghet ouer 't vier sieden, ende alst beginnen sal te sieden, doeter die reste van dat groffelsnagelpoeder inne, ende neemt den pot van dat vier, ende decten seer wel tot dat die bobbelen ghecesseert zijn, ende dattet water law geworden si, dan roeret met een houtken, ende also roerende, mengelet met v seepe. Ende is 't dat ghijer een luttel beniuyn toe doen wilt, ghi moeget doen, ooc sult ghi v seepe in een busse doen, ende si sal goede ruecke aennemen.
133. To make gilliflower soap.
Take a pound of soap, put it to soak in rosewater three days in the sun, and if you want to make soap, take an ounce and a half gillyflowers well crushed, and half of these same nagelen should you put into the soap, and mix very well. With the other half you do as follows. Take a clean pot with rosewater, and cook it over the fire, and when it starts to boil, add the rest of the gillyflower powder, and take the pot off the fire, and cover it well until the bubbles seized, and that the water is luke warm, then stir with wood, and also stir, mixing with the soap. And if you would like add a little benzoin, which you should do, also you should put the soap in a container, and it shall take on a good scent.

Cloue tree image from the 1633 The Herball, or, General Historie of Plantes by John Gerard.

In this case the giroflatt (alternate of girofle) is also identified with nagelen, an adverb used in modern Dutch for kruidnagelen ("herb-nails"). Kruidnagelen specifically means cloves therefore in this case I would be confident to say here giroflatt means the spice cloves.

From The Housekeeper's Pocket Book by Sarah Harrison, 1739 (as reprinted in A Sip Through Time by Cindy Renfrow, p.154):

To make clove gillyflower wine.
Take six gallons and a half of spring water, and twelve pounds of sugar, and when it boils skim it, putting in the white of eight eggs, and a pint of cold water, to make the scum rise: let it boil for an hour and a half, skimming it well; then pour it into an earthen vessel, with three spoonfulls of barm; then put in a bushel of clove-gillyflower clip'd and beat, stir them well together, and the next day pit six ounces of syrup of citron into it, the third day put in three lemons sliced, peel and all, the fourth day tun it up, stop it close for ten days, then bottle it, and put a piece of sugar in each bottle.

In this instance it is clear from context as a weedy herb is used, it is not describing the dry spice cloves, but the fresh state of carnations.

My conclusion: from the handful of brewing and cooking recipes I found using gillyflowers, most seem to indicate using carnation, either as a fresh or dried herb. Most of the perfumed cosmetic recipes seem to use cloves, as a powdered or crushed ingredient. It makes sense that if powdered or crushed gillyflower is called for it is likely to mean cloves, and if fresh or dried gillyflower is called for it is likely to mean carnation. And take a closer look at the provided images of both carnation and clove - the bottoms of the flowers on both plants do look strikingly similar…


Published in the June 1st, 2017 of the Aethelmearc Gazette:
https://aethelmearcgazette.com/2017/06/01/is-it-this-or-is-it-that-what-is-it/


Bibliography:
Arnold, Richard (1503) The Customs of London, London: Printed for F. C. and J. Rivington, et. al., 1811.

Braekman, Willy L. (ed.) (1990) Dat Batement van Recepten (House of Recipes). Brussel: Omirel UFSAL. Likely translated and reprinted from the 1525 Venetian Opera nuova intitolata Dificio di recette. http://www.dbnl.org/tekst/_bat002wlbr01_01/colofon.htm (© dbnl 2009)

Coulson, Gigi (Giata Magdalena Alberti). Caterina Sforza’s Gli Experimenti, A Translation. Self Published. https://labelladonna.net/

Dewes, Gerard. (1578) Nievve Herbal or Historie of Plantes. London.
            This encyclopedia has a nice chapter on the carnation.

Encyclopedia Brittanica; https://www.britannica.com/plant/gillyflower

The Florio 1611 Dictionary Search:
http://www.pbm.com/~lindahl/florio/search/search.cgi

Gerard, John. (1633) The Herball, or, General Historie of Plantes.
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Houghton_STC_11751_The_herball,_or,_General_historie_of_plantes,_1633_-_clove.jpg

Hess, Karen. (1996) Martha Washington’s Booke of Cookery and Booke of Sweatmeats. Columbia University Press.

Historische Woordenboeken op Internet (Historic Dictionaries on the Internet).
http://gtb.inl.nl/?owner=MNW

Renfrow, Cindy. (1996) A Sip Through Time, a Collection of old Brewing Recipes. Self published.

Translations by Susan Verberg, unless otherwise noted.