Dear Dominik and Matthew,

yes, plenty of birch in Russia. And the letters are incised
in the bark. Here two photos where that is more clearly
visible:

   http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Birch_bark_manuscript#mediaviewer/File:Beresta.jpg
   http://users.stlcc.edu/mfuller/Novgorodwoodp.html (scroll down)

It am not sure whether ink was rubbed into the incisions
(palm‐leaf style), but this may have been unnecessary since
the incision made the darker lower bark visible through the
light outer layer.

All best,
Stefan

--
Dr. Stefan Baums
Institute for Indian and Tibetan Studies
Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich

_______________________________________________
INDOLOGY mailing list
INDOLOGY@list.indology.info
http://listinfo.indology.info