Soldier's Kit 9th-11th century

[Saverio]

I decided to work on my soldier's kit again.

http://picasaweb.google.com/conall.macf ... a3YgtO-eg#

For Clontarf I'd wear a helm, but probably not much earlier. I plan on making a blunt knife to use when fighting; the one on my belt is far to sharp for that . I also want to dye the inar a different color, maybe with onion skins.

Any thoughts?

[oldrat]

fine
but in my opinion, shield boss should not be so big and shiny.
about color ... Try to use natural dyes)
it would be interesting

[Saverio]

I oiled the shield since the photo and left the boss face down in the dirt. The moisture and friction has dulled it quite a bit.

I'm saving onion skins to give it a nice muted orange. I might also use some bark for a yellow/tan.

[oldrat]

and about pins.in Lagore found beautiful bone pins. if you make them to be nice)
about the shield boss, I do not think that it should be like a mirror
I do not think that in the Middle Ages, they were polished to a mirror shine
if the boss was such a shield was looked more realistic
we use such a shield boss, as in the photo

[brendan]

Cool that you are working on this kit
Though, as you and oldrat have indicated it is a bit 'new' looking...not that you should roll in the muck and look unwashed, but sometimes it takes a few wears for a garment to settle in.

Brendan

[panda]

For a dark colour you could always throw it in a bog for a couple of weeks....

[Saverio]

Well, I used onion skins, hoping for the usual orange tint. They had begun to break down a bit, changing the chemistry :/. I also used a tin as a mordent, something new for me. I ended up with graphite grey!

[panda]

Probably got most of your colour from the metal. Was it aluminium or steel?

[Saverio]

The onion skins were soaking a tinned steel can for a day. I honestly thought the tin would be negligible, not realizing the acidic mixture would leach the metal out. I'll have to try this again with fresh onion skins and tin. It might have been the partial decomposing that did it. Either way, it looks better than before and was achieved with natural dye .

[panda]

Have you ever tried rhubarb leaves as a mordant?