| ANNE WANNER'S Textiles in History / book reviews, articles |
| François
Verdan und die Indienne-Manufaktur von Greng und Biel im 18. und frühen 19. Jahrhundert. in: Freiburger Geschichtsblätter, Band 78, 2001, Sonderdruck hgg. vom deutschen geschichtsforschenden Verein des Kantons Freiburg, im Universitätsverlag, 1700 Freiburg / Schweiz, 2001, p. 125-140 by Ingid Ehrensperger reprint 2001 in german language, 15 pages, black and
white photos |
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Greng is a small place in
Switzerland, near Murten, which is about 30 km from Biel.
The place is situated close to the lake of Murten. There
also was a river with 3 mills and in 1734 an Indienne
manufacture was founded at the upper mill. In 1731
another manufacture in the middle part of the river came
into existence. It was overtaken by the brothers Louis
and François Verdan. In 1784 it was sold to the french
aristocrat Gigot de Garville.This means that Greng had a
production of printed cloth from 1734 to 1784. According
to some notes the place had some importance: Friedrich Oberkampf, the brother of Christoph Philippe Oberkampf, founder of the manufacture in Jouy-en-Josas near Paris, visited Greng. Another notice of 1764 by the Count Zinzendorf reads like the description of a roller printing machine and it seems that already in 1767 there was a type of roller printing machine in use at Greng. |
| In 1991 documents were found in the archives of the castle of Greng which show the importance of cotton printing in this place. Some of them are now in the possession of the community of Greng and the documents of the family archives Neuhaus are now in the archive of the Museum Neuhaus at Biel. |
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| In the end of the article a letter of Daniel-Henry Jeanneret to François Verdan is added, from: Greng, 11 february 1782 (archive Museum Neuhaus, Biel). Jeanneret was a designer in the fabrique of Cortaillod (NE) from 1760 to 1775. In den following years until 1782 he was working at Greng. |
| see also: Markus F. Rubli, Greng. Aus der Geschichte eines kleinen Dorfes und seines Schlosses, Greng 1991 and Pierre Caspard, "Mon cher patron" (letters of the Indienne artist Daniel-Henry Jeanneret to François Verdan), in: Revue trimestrielle du centre de recherches sur la civilisation industrielle, 1980. (the letter mentioned above is not included here) |
| home content | Last revised April 4, 2002 | For further information contact Anne Wanner wanner@datacomm.ch |