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Leather sling pouches from York, UK. (Read 24954 times)
Mauro Fiorentini
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Re: Leather sling pouches from York, UK.
Reply #15 - Mar 3rd, 2013 at 8:26am
 
Bill, that's what I meant.
Lying underground in certain humidity conditions may have caused these pouches to shrink.
I see this happens when I treat my sheats with water in order to resize them. Analysis of York's soil humidity percentage would be perfect.
I can't remember if these artefacts were found in the ancient sewer...
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David Morningstar
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Re: Leather sling pouches from York, UK.
Reply #16 - Mar 3rd, 2013 at 11:11am
 

If leather shrinkage is likely then I will revert my objection and accept them as sling pouches. I think I might try making a couple.
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jlasud
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Re: Leather sling pouches from York, UK.
Reply #17 - Mar 3rd, 2013 at 11:57pm
 
Some of those would be perfect for lead slinging.
I bet they also used special slings for slinging lead.
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Re: Leather sling pouches from York, UK.
Reply #18 - Mar 4th, 2013 at 6:43am
 
OK It gives the measurements for some of them. Starting from the left- The left the first one is 8 cm. the 2nd one is 14 cm. The third  one is 10 cm  The 5th one is 10 cm.  The last one is 10 cm.
  Like to point out that the 3rd one is incomplete, part of it was torn at one point.  They all date from from the mid 10th through the 13th cent.  One of them had been found wit a thong passed through one of the terminal slits and knotted.


  Turns out there are more of these that have been found. Here's a list of other sites where other leather pouches/ elliptical panels have been found.
Chapel Lane Staith, Hull dating to post 1350
Guildhall Yard, London associated with pottery dating  1050-1150
Welsh Back, Bristol  Medieval
Perth, Scotland  Medieval
Waterford, Ireland, 13th cent.
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Thearos
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Re: Leather sling pouches from York, UK.
Reply #19 - Mar 4th, 2013 at 8:10am
 
betw. 8 and 10 cm, 12 cm seem pretty OK for a pouch (especially if you're fowling). If you add even 25% for shrinkage, which seems a very conservative figure, you get perfectly normal pouches. More allowance for shrinkage, and you're talking serious poucheage.
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Re: Leather sling pouches from York, UK.
Reply #20 - Mar 4th, 2013 at 8:11am
 
+ the knotted thong is pretty suggestive.

All kudos to slingbadger for finding and publicizing the details !!
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Re: Leather sling pouches from York, UK.
Reply #21 - Mar 4th, 2013 at 4:24pm
 
From the archeological site-- The area contains deep waterlogged soil and anoxic conditions, ensuring minimal degradation of organic materials.

BTW they are looking for volunteers for the new dig this summer.
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Re: Leather sling pouches from York, UK.
Reply #22 - Mar 4th, 2013 at 7:55pm
 
Thank you for the actual measurments.  They seem useable as is, although a little on the small size.  Could they have been used by children or as a pub game, similar to bowling or darts. 

The men are standing around the pub, having a beer or twelve, there is a target hanging on a tree, and somebody says "I bet I hit the target three out of five throws"...

Everyone has their own sling, similar to owning your own set of darts.
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Re: Leather sling pouches from York, UK.
Reply #23 - Mar 5th, 2013 at 10:27am
 
Before you guys brought in the idea of shrinkage, I made a template of the smallest pouch and cut out a similar piece of leather. It´s really small, so I decided to attach short single cords to it and tried 5 throws with stones of max. 4.5 cm length. 4 of 5 stones fell out. I tried 2x greek overhead, 2x sidearm and 1x (modified) apache style. Only 1 sidearm throw worked, and the power was more than bad. But I´m not a very skilled slinger and I think the ammo was too big. Maybe one of you will have more success. Considering the shrinking of leather things would change and I´d sling with a pouch size that`s more similar to the one I`m used to.

Small pouches (better: small ammo) could maybe have been used by peasants to protect the harvest from groups of small birds on the field without damaging the plants as it would have happened with big stones. Or maybe people threw small stones with short-corded slings inside in a stable to birds, mice, rats that were sitting under the roof, too high to reach them. In this case smaller stones would have done their work, again without causing too much collateral damage.
But this are only personal speculations (I´m also academic  Smiley)
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Re: Leather sling pouches from York, UK.
Reply #24 - Mar 5th, 2013 at 3:47pm
 
Those like the one above are almost certainly hair barretts.

Most of the others do look like viable sling pouches. Especially the ones with holes round the edges.

Also the size most likely reflects the value of the leather and the fact that fairly small sling bullets are very common in the historical records. Why waste leather, also small sling pouches have less air resistance.

That said - the smaller the pouch the more important the shaping/cupping is. With minimal leather you need it hold the ammo secure and the best way to do that is to have the pouch cupped.

So my personal preference would be to keep all the ones that are clearly shaped sling pouches as sling pouches and have alternative uses for the ones that are clearly not shaped pouches.  
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Re: Leather sling pouches from York, UK.
Reply #25 - Mar 5th, 2013 at 6:00pm
 
Whoa, lakeslinger-- that *is* small
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Mauro Fiorentini
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Re: Leather sling pouches from York, UK.
Reply #26 - Mar 5th, 2013 at 6:12pm
 
Here's the .pdf from the Council for British Archaeology: http://www.yorkarchaeology.co.uk/resources/AY17-16-Leather%20and%20leatherworkin...

It's downloadable for free.
"Pouches and pourses" from page 3402 to page 3410.
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Re: Leather sling pouches from York, UK.
Reply #27 - Mar 6th, 2013 at 10:08am
 
Here is an approximate replica of a York sling:

...


...

I was interested by the large holes at the ends of some of the artefacts compared to the smaller holes along the edges, which were themselves large compared to the hole made by sewing a pouch on with thread e.g. onto a braided sling.

I used thick jute twine and sewed it directly through the edges of the pouch. I used sticky tape on the working end to act as a needle, melted wax would have had a similar effect. Both cords pass through the final hole at each end, accounting for the larger size. The cords were reverse twisted together to form the release and retention cords. The finger loop was spliced back into itself. The pouch length is about six inches.

This works well and is a good way of using thinner leather for a pouch, since the tension is taken by the cords and not the leather itself. It is much quicker and simpler than making a braided sling with a sewn leather pouch.
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« Last Edit: Mar 6th, 2013 at 11:24am by David Morningstar »  
 
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Mauro Fiorentini
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Re: Leather sling pouches from York, UK.
Reply #28 - Mar 6th, 2013 at 10:36am
 
My newest sling has holes on the whole perimeter: http://slinging.org/forum/YaBB.pl?num=1361216942/0 (first page, last picture) and I've found it to be the best solution for accuracy and swiftness.
I also think we may write to those York archaeologists, submit them our opinions... any thoughts? C_A?
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Re: Leather sling pouches from York, UK.
Reply #29 - Mar 6th, 2013 at 11:07am
 
your pics aren't showing up david. I even tried pasting the url directly into my browser and had no joy.

is it just me ?
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