[Regia-NA] The Book

[rmhowe]

Eileen Young wrote:

> I bought "Anglo-Saxon Crafts" and like it.  It is a good treatment of
> the crafts it covers, wood working and building construction, horn,
> antler and bone, textiles, leather, pottery, glass and metal working.
> Reading it won't turn you into a potter or a tanner  but you get a
> good idea of what was going on and how we know that it was going on.
> And if you want to know more there is a bibliography.
> 
> Eileen

It is somwhere about midway between the York series, the general
craftsbooks and children's technology in Archaeology series.

It will give you a general idea of how things were made in a pretty
large variety. It will not impart the technical knowledge that comes
from more expert books or knowledgable craftsmen in each field.
It doesn't depict tools or artefacts as clearly as the York Small
Finds series or Daily life series. It does have a reasonably good
bibliography of works applicable to each craft in the archaeological
field as I recall. Haven't looked at it for a bit. I have it.

One would have to invest considerably in further research, tools
and practice to really become competent at the majority of things
depicted. I say this as someone with extensive wood, leather, 
metalworking books and a pretty fair smattering of pottery and
other crafts books. I also have a lot of the references he is
citing or likely to cite in his book. A lot of those I have bought
since I disabled from being a professional craftsman with an
industrial arts education background, had while I was already
working in several advanced trades. Between medieval/ancient and my
later craftsbooks I have somewhere over 3000 books and a couple
thousand magazines and offprints minimum. This doesn't take into
account the rest of my library, a huge portion of which is historical
or arts related.

Put another way, it is a great start for a novice to many medieval
crafts and a useful reference for anyone who wants to cross-research
into newer fields or expand their mundane skills into more medieval
ones. None of the bibliographies I remember in it is very extensive
in the chapters, but they are for general further inquiry.

I would say buy it. I wasn't disappointed.
If you really get that into one field or two start asking for
references and I may come up with some huge posts.
I am getting near 500 documents on this machine I have a large
percentage set apart for different subjects on that are medieval
and ancient.  I will be out of town for a bit in a while.
SO if I am not answering before I come back reask. I am starting
to get behind in my mail. Expect a couple busy days before I leave
and will need to do other things on the computer before a doctor's
appointment [that usually takes me half a day alone].

Today I doubled the Military Illustrated: Past and Present references
in my library from 47 of the original 48 with another few to
all through 94 plus around twenty or twentyfive later ones.
Whatever it may look like presently it was aimed from the first at
the serious reenactors with an emphasis on accurate kit.
The newer 50 or so arrived from Canada and D.C. today and last week.

A bunch of the earliest ones may still be on the net. Excepting volume
12 which I bought and had been looking for for years as it was the
body garments for the later medieval soldier. I had the other four
issues that had been in Gerry Embleton's earlier medieval articles. These
preceded his two later medieval soldier books specifically on kit.
He's been an excellent reenactor, illustrator and writer for a long
time. Capricorn Books in Canada has a listing of the first 40 some
if someone hasn't bought them with the index of articles but they
are not cheap. I got a deal on the ones they hadn't typed onto the
internet that kind of made up for the advanced price on the first
ones and the postage was far less than it looks at $5 plus $3 for
each other book. Try bookfinder.com or http://www.ABEbooks.com/
if it interests you at all.

Magnus

> "Douglas Sunlin" <dsunlin at hotmail.com> wrote:
> 
> 
>> At Amazon, "Dress in Anglo-Saxon England" is linked to a
>> "Anglo-Saxon Crafts by Kevin Leahy". Does anyone here know of this
>> book, and is it any good? Thanks!
>> 
>> On manræden, Osweald of Baldurstrand