The Armour Archive

earnest carruthers

Rubs hands Ok gum arabic - good for making water colours and sticking down paper size/animal glue - gelatine based glue from boiled down animal bones and cartilage - good for: painting with, joinery, fletching. Is bought as rabbit skin glue - although this is not 'authentic' ie the term, the glue is...

earnest carruthers

Tim is describing repousse, you can use a support of pitch to take up the hammering, soem really nice work can be done, as seen in the quiver.

Quite a few mid-medieval pieces use this technique, go for it.

earnest carruthers

Thomas H,

erm 'quivers' for english? as mentioned try cloth bag, or the basket reinforced one with spacer disc for arrows. Scant evidence for what we perceive as quivers, although seen in forn parts.

earnest carruthers

And really easy to make, the viking one seems to have a pivot pintle type thing, rather than hinged straps.

earnest carruthers

There are some 12 - 13th century lucets in finds from Beverley, East Yorkshire, England.

Sheep metacarpal.

I will add the book ref, a friend has it at present.

earnest carruthers

interesting pic from Villard de Honnecourt, a bit later but showing ties.

earnest carruthers

Thanks James, just pm when you are ready and I will send you an email.

earnest carruthers

James, what a nice man you are to offer such a thing to Doug, excellent spirit. ---- Anyway, have you got the whole image available, a friend of mine is a historical house carpenter and collects all kinds of medieval building images, not just of wooden ones, it might be nice to send it to him. thanks.

earnest carruthers

Doug, the later images are keeping faith with the early clothing styles, (even the sixteenth century bits) in the early entries. It is not that reliable as evidence of hose-less gowns as in 14th. The early parts of the Hausbuch are similar in gown and hose as the Duc De Berry Tres Riche Heures, wher...

earnest carruthers

Generally speaking you would need a doublet to attach your hose to. Also if 14th C the hose will not be the same as mid to late 15th hose in the way they should be attached, ie they usually have an edge parallel to the bottom of the doublet in order to be pointed to, 14thC ones are often attached to...

earnest carruthers

Excellent stuff Prof, food for thought. A lot will have to come down to practical analysis too, ie as mentioned above the making of garments and testing them at least to gauge feasibility of various models. I have no vested interest in the piece nor in mail, but was intrigued at the images shown and...

earnest carruthers

Nathan, yep I fully realise that it is not a photograph and open to interpretation, which is what we are discussing. Middle picture, right hand side man under 'William' is wearing a distinctly portrayed 'tunic' with legs, as opposed to the bods who are wearing split sided tunics on the third picture...

earnest carruthers

What I am asking is why are there what appear to be 'hose' on some which shape is incidentally reflected in the mail garment? The men on the left are clearly wearing split tunics so why not merely confer that depiction to the mail, because there seems to be a clear distinction between garment styles...

earnest carruthers

"Thanks for the link karen, but im more after rations. " erm puddings? - sausages preserved and coocked meat in a bag. stock fish - salt cod depends on what time of year as well. But Karen has a point, if you have officers they will be able to afford more than just trail rations, so some coffins - p...

earnest carruthers

Interesting really because in the depictions above there are people with split sided tunics clearly shown and people with apparently not, so the ability to portray what is 'real' is certainly there. So why show them close fitting when they may not have been? Are mail shorts (later on) also not worn,...

earnest carruthers

My wife has a wood one with leather pads, for obvious reasons. No reason to not make one out of wood should you wish, not the biggest conceptual leap for late medieval man to make. Good depictions of tools are a real find, also nice when we see time honoured techniques beig portrayed, a sigh of reli...

earnest carruthers

So even with hose underneath?

Are not mail chausses worn later on, with gussets ets?

It just strikes me as odd that the depictions are very consistent, almost insistent in some of the detail.

Has anyone actually made a mail hauberk that is all in one to try out the pros and cons??

earnest carruthers

The hanging hauberks in the BT pics, why are they not merely integral legs, rather then open? They look like suits rather than split sided hauberks.

earnest carruthers

Out of the Viking era but the ring or hand vice is certainly around in the 15th c

http://www.farreaches.org/fishing/treatyse_hooks.html

the item in question is smack in the middle with the wegge/wedge to its right, the notation is not that precisely laid out but they are noted.

earnest carruthers

Quite Ironic that in later eras Protestant Scots settled in Ulster.

earnest carruthers

Anachronism for the 15th Cent.

erase the word or at leas the peasant related context that it had in earlier eras, it is misleading in England.

earnest carruthers

I think Jorvik woman wanted to know if it is visibly different from veggie tan *in print* presumably because she is looking at catalogues or even on-line. My personal answer to that would be no, because some veg tanned leather can be coloured, waxed and polished and some chrome can be matt and depen...

earnest carruthers

The levied. Commons Men By 15th C the notion of levied 'peasantry' was somewhat outmoded at least in England, quite possibly by mid 14th C too. The commission of array set out the standards for kit for all men based on income, each according to their recorded means. So maybe you don't need it for En...

earnest carruthers

Out of interest (not being an SCAer) is the spelling of the name prescribed, I ask because I see mentions above of correct or incorrect name spelling. Are the organisers not aware that spelling of names was not standard, eg George/Jorge/Jorg Cely to name but one, nevermind Shakespeare/Shakespere etc...

earnest carruthers

What woudl I interpret from that (very nice) pic, on a material physical level: I would say that the artist has good observational skills in that certain details are present that make real sense, the central pole in the tent, notwithstanding the weird perspective on it, but it is a detail that is of...

earnest carruthers

As I said Jehan realism means different things to different people indeed your neat summary "relatively ordinary circumstances (or at least uncommon circumstances portrayed realistically)" makes sense, the issue is always knowing which is which. The capacity to draw realistically has seemingly been ...

earnest carruthers

Jean "My wife and I have a little saying: "That's so ugly it's perfect." We apply it to medieval design principles, because in many cases the medieval eye is offensive to our refined desire for symmetry and perspective and balance." I kind of see what you are saying regarding low end 'art' but come ...

earnest carruthers

mmm interesting. Paltok occurs in 15th C english, I will dig up the relevant quotes. re pour point - meaning for points - if it is a descriptive word and in 15th C English it refers to a doublet and points, what do the points mean in the earlier context? And interestingly the French description by T...

earnest carruthers

tasha - is that the same kind of pourpoint that is being asked of, ie a defensive garment, seems similar to the English source, ie a doublet.

earnest carruthers

"I have a problem with a lot of the internet websites people use to "document" 'women warriors' - firstly, they throw in examples like these - to add to their "case", with a complete misunderstanding of the context (or worse yet, ignoring it). Secondly, they rarely if ever provide the source itself,...

earnest carruthers

David, I would say that he has had very reasonable and well reasoned responses to a vague set of questions/justifications with a full understanding of his position. His response to the other respondents to his query was less than reasonable, defensive in fact. It is clear that he wants approval/conf...

earnest carruthers

" I told them try reading the old Testament..... just because it wasn't a "Popular" name at the time like Mary, John, etc the 5 million Williams and all of that, who says if I wasn't an orphan/bastard whoever that a priest couldn't go Biblical and name me that? " because they have a very good point....

earnest carruthers

"My weapon of choice in the big battles is a sling I know..I know. Whoever heard of a viking slinger)" "But are you saying, that is is entirely IMPOSSIBLE that a viking that traveled to the mediteranean alot to trade saw how sling were used in battles and was already good with one and said "I like t...

earnest carruthers

Sadly I don't read French, hence my question.

If so then I would track back to where she got that information from, historians can be as free and easy as nayone else with terminology.

earnest carruthers

Actually Nathan, my myth comment was not aimed at you in any way, it was a point that I felt I needed to make as the term pourpoint/doublet has been plaguing so called experts in 15th C reenactment clothing for years and it is evident not just from those examples but the way that English certainly w...