We have desperate need of your abilities!

  OK, enough of that. I have contacted a museum in Southampton. They have a piece there that is obviously a sling. ( I brought this up before, in New Sling Find)
  It is currently mis labeled as a "16th cent Saxon shoe tongue". In speaking with the curator, he admits that it really hasn't been investigated since it was found. They are going on the word of the archeologist that found it. However, if someone who is knowledgable could look at it, he could have the classification reviewed.
   This is where you come in.
   Is there anyone who is willing to go to the museum and look at the shoe tongue in person? I think only by looking at it in person could someone make a definite ID. The picture on the website, is alas, a drawing, so one cannot see wear patterns, and other things like that.
   I have shown this drawing to several people in the SCA who are historical bootmakers, and they conclude that it is not a shoe tongue.
  If we work together, we can set to rest what it is, one way or another.
  Any volunteers??

I won't be in England till May, but then I will be near Southampton, but not really going there.
If there are no better candidates, sooner or more learned or both, I might be able to stretch my travel a bit that way.

Willeke

Southampton is the other end of the country, and a dump to boot. I am trying to think of reasons to give my wife why we should 'pop down to Southhampton for the day' but can't.... The only claim to fame the city has is the famous quote by Buff-hoon at the start of the second gulf war.

"Umm Qasr is a city similar to Southampton," UK defence minister Geoff Hoon said in the Commons yesterday. "He's either never been to Southampton, or he's never been to Umm Qasr," says a British Squaddie patrolling Umm Qasr. Another soldier added: "There's no beer, no prostitutes and people are shooting at us. It's more like Portsmouth

Pat

Well, I hope you meant people who are living in england of any nationality, rather than english people living anywhere in the world? And you might include Wales, and Scotland (even Northern Ireland ) but we know what you mean.

I used to know Southampton quite well - perhaps Leeds_Lobber's comments should offend me, but I happen to agree with them.. I may be down there about May time, but I'm not sure it would help.

Given the way the system works in the UK (and most other places I've been ), the curator will want to deal with bona fide academics at some point in this, I would think. He might feel able to change the label to 'Shoe Tongue (possibly sling pouch)' - something like that on the basis of 'public' input.

I just had another look at the topic

New Sling Finds

.  Since the last time I read that topic, Lee (who is an archaeologist) added some comments, and provided a link to a

sketch of a 14^th-century shoe

and how it was made.  Lee's position was that the artifact in Hedeby Museium looked to him like a sling pouch, but so did some parts of some shoe designs, so no conclusion could be drawn from the evidence available.  More evidence is needed (preferably by examining the artifact).

Of course, nobody would ever even conceive of taking leather from an old shoe, and making a sling out of it...

Now let me see. Should I quote the whole message I'm referring to?

Naahhh,,,
Dale wrote on Mar 11^th, 2007 at 12:46pm:


An interesting aside may be that the shoe link refers to an artifact associated with the Mary Rose. This was Henry VIII's flagship which sank with all hands (before Britain ruled the waves ) just a few miles down the estuary from Southampton, home of the putative sling pocket.

So much of interest in Southampton - but it's still a dump .

Of course 'english' lived very close by. Anyone know where he went?

I may be traveling via, or nearly via, there later in summer, I don't know yet.  If I do I'll pop in.  If we can get better info about the object perhaps a working replica would help to convince ( I'm also sure that from what I can see it would be a good sling pocket ).  If a few slingers are travelling as far , for some, as Southhampton why not travell just a little more and visit Chesill beach, ocean smoothed rock laid out in size order, from sand to boulders and everything in between,  by the side of the sea.  Slinging ammo and range paradice.  There is even some iron ore from a shipping accident centuries ago, now nicely rounded into pebbles.  http://www.soton.ac.uk/~imw/chesil.htm

In my research, I found several refernces to the Isle of Portland, and the fact that the natives are excellent slingers. One is from John Lelands Itinerary, wtitten in the 16th cent. It is a sort of travel book.
The other was a book called Polyalbion, written a century later.