Mi Contra Fa

Saxon Floor Tiles

I've been kicking around the idea of painted cloths, as either rugs or decorations, for a while.  I can't find any evidence for rugs or carpets in early England, or indeed in early western Europe, except maybe the Marby rug (which is also super cute!).  But some class notes from the Fiberary Facebook group on painted cloths suggested tiled floors as a possible source.  The painter was using Islamic tile patterns (which seem to influence the Westminster Cathedral floor, a hundred years at least too late for me) but lo!  There are other tile finds!

I started with an 11th cen London find, where the design motif is a diamond-shape inside a circle.  Colors are green, brown, and yellow-brown.  On to the bibliography!

This is a wall tile from Coventry, also 11th cen.  A flower made out of four circles.

This article is behind a paywall, but Google Image Search provides a thumbnail preview of the designs. I suspect the nice, clean, square tile is a proposed reconstruction, based on the fragments shown.  When tiled, it would look like the 11th cen London find.

A find at St. Edmund's Abbey of ten fragments gets some different motifs.  There's bird heads, a bit of interlace, the diamond-in-circle, and some other geometry.  Red as well as white tiles were used, and there are a few more colors (although green, brown, and yellowish are called out again).

From St. Frideswide, a very pretty brick red and cream design.  Says it's early medieval, so probably late Saxon. I haven't read it carefully yet for more details.  Color photo on Pintrest.

This report was in the first article's bibliography, haven't looked inside it yet. It's for London.

Volume 10 of Medieval Ceramics, also referenced, allegedly free online but I'm getting a frowny face from my browser right now trying to view it.

I'm thinking maybe a small welcome mat-sized rug for in the tent, based on the Frideswide pattern to start. Maybe an interlace border, or just plain.  Two colors and geometric - I can probably pull that off!

Camp cookery

A while back, I bought a folding firepit.  I took it to Pennsic the year I camped solo and never used it - it seemed like it would be too much trouble to build and tend a fire just for myself.  I've been wanting to get more practice in with campfire cooking, because at the site is not the best time to realize you don't know what you are doing and will be eating cold cereal for dinner.  So I took the thing out to the back concrete patio, put some kindling in it, and lit it up.  I had on-hand a sturdy pottery bowl with broth, oatmeal, cooked chicken, and vegetables.  I covered it with an aluminum dish from my mess kit.  I've cooked with this bowl before on Coleman stove and on charcoal, but not wood coals.  I also put my lightweight cooking grate up, over the firebowl.

Lesson One: Wind is a thing.  My kindling was kiln-dried, and it wasn't raining, so I thought getting fire would be simple.  And it wasn't hard, but the heat was going everywhere but up to the bowl! 

Lesson Two: Coals are hot.  I burned about 12 sticks or so of 1" kindling to coals, then got rid of the cooking grate and put the bowl and its cover right onto the coals.  I was worried the coals would go cold before the soup heated and the oatmeal cooked.  NOT A PROBLEM. When I peeked under the cover after a few minutes, it was at a rapid boil.   Clearly, this is why a tripod with adjustable chain is helpful to have.

Lesson Three: Get two BBQ gloves.  The bowl was hard to handle with just one - to get leverage, I just about put the dirty glove-thumb in the soup a few times.

Lesson Four: Keep stirring!  I stirred almost constantly once I saw how high the boil was, and I still got a layer of toasted/burned oatmeal on the bottom.  On the other hand, the toasted oatmeal was delicious, so...?

Lesson Five: Use a bigger bowl. I could have fit in more greens, and the bowl would have been easier to handle, if I'd used a slightly bigger one.  As it was, the cooking bowl was the serving bowl, and so it was pretty much topped up.

Lesson Six: Evidently, wood fire puts out way more soot than charcoal. The bowl was red and black before; it's all black now!

Red Mountain Mead Hall report

I LOVE Red Mountain Mead Hall.  It is the loveliest site I think I've ever been to - a log hall with a great stone fireplace in the Virginia mountains, above a running stream.  The event itself is pretty old school - very laid back, a lot of good fellowship, with a schedule that's more of a suggestion than anything else.  And, while I loves me a day jam-packed with classes and demos and activities neatly slotted into place, so everyone gets their thing without stepping on each others' toes, it is very nice to just sit next to a big fire and relax for a day.  It's also been cold (early spring in 2017, late fall in 2018), which is novel for an SCA event with a significant outdoor component.  (Yes, there are others. I haven't been to them.  And it's uncommon.)

Hall-Joys

Therefore there is no man so proud-minded over this earth,
nor so assured in his graces, nor so brave in his youth,
nor so bold in his deeds, nor his lord so gracious to him
that he will never have some anxiety about his sea-voyaging—
about whatever the Lord wishes to do to him.
Neither is his thought with the harp, nor to the ring-taking,
nor to the joys in women, nor in the hopeful expectation in the world,
nor about anything else but the welling of waves—
he ever holds a longing, who strives out upon the streams.

   ----- The Seafarer, lines 39-47, trans. Dr. Aaron Hostetter

If you sat through Brit Lit in high school, you probably read one or more of the Old English "elegiac" poems like The Seafarer, and had to write an essay on the contrast between sea-faring life and life ashore (with bonus points if you could articulate how this is extended to life on Earth vs. in heaven).  And if you've ever come inside from a miserable, cold, raw day outside, you have an idea of what the poet is going on about.

It's another level closer to go from a cold, raw outside to a warm inside that's filled with people, laughter, good food and drink.  And which happens to look not unlike you might imagine a Saxon lord's hall to look.  To experience that was a 'magic moment' for me.

On this Veteran's Day (Observed), I feel compelled to note that a few moments or even hours outside compare in no way to the old seafarer, on his ship for days or weeks, or the modern warfighter, deployed for months.  I'm not claiming that experience. It was just a step up from my previous experience.

Cold-Weather Camping

The cabins are unheated shelters.  I have used tents both times I've gone, because... if I'm going to sleep in the cold, I'd rather have privacy! 

Know Your Gear
I had to put up my tent in the dark for the first time in a couple decades.  It went smoothly, actually, because I've put the tent up many times. (Also, I realized in time that if I set the flex poles down, I would never, ever find them again.  So I inserted each after it was assembled, instead of assembling all three and then inserting them.)

Gear Plus-Ups
Faolan's headlamp looked mighty useful. A tall pole from which to hang the lantern would have helped.  A small, light LED light with a hook (to hang inside the tent) would also be welcome.

Stress-Testing the Sleeping Bag
I used my 4" mat, the ExPed MegaMat.  I didn't use the wool pad that I use when I dress it with sheets and blankets - the mat is insulating, and the pad is mostly to promote circulation.  With a sleeping bag, the bottom layer allowed air to circulate between me and the mat.

The first night, it was supposed to get down to 35 F or thereabouts.  I slept in wool socks, bike shorts, sweat pants, a T-shirt, and an overshirt (which regrettably only had 3/4 length sleeves).  I crawled entirely into the bag (which also kept the lights from the hall out of my face) with my CPAP hose as a snorkel.  I woke up early in the dark of the morning because I was too hot.  I removed the outer shirt and sweat pants and unzipped the side of the bag.  Ah, perfect.

The second night, temperatures were to fall to the low 20s. I downgraded the sweats to thinner exercise pants, but otherwise burrowed in the same.  From the waist-down and ankles-up, I was fine.  Despite shoving some clothes into the bottom of the bag, my feet were chilly (but not so cold I couldn't sleep).  The drafts coming in from the top of the bag, though - those made my bare lower arms uncomfortably cool.  I alternately tried to pull other blankets into the opening to plug it up, or toss them over the opening to cover it.  At one point, I used a light piece of wool as a sort of wrap in the bag.  These techniques worked well enough, and I slept okay.  Definitely did not unzip the bag!

Extra Blankets
I brought the wool pad, my plaid wool blanket, the furry blanket, and the aforementioned light wool wrap.  I ended up only really needing the wrap, although the furry blanket was nice to snuggle with in the hall.  Also, I used it as a cloak going from the hall to my tent, and WOW I felt no cold except through the soles of my turnshoes.  That fake fur is super warm!

I am now confident enough in the sleeping bag's capabilities that, next time, I may bring it as the back-up and try to sleep under blankets.

Extra Garb
I was only in garb for a few hours Friday night, so I just wore the same outfit again on Saturday.  I didn't need the other outfit I had brought, BUT.  It would have been easy for me to have slipped in the mud or frosty leaves, dumped water on myself, or had some kind of mishap that would have left me dirty and/or wet and cold.  So I think having the extra outfit was a good idea.

Handicrafts

I spent a lot of time on Saturday working on the fur-lined hood UFO (UnFinished Object). (It was so cold that I did not feel comfortable bringing a harp. Should have brought a whistle, though.) It's scraps left over from the furry blanket sewn onto a thrift store wool scarf.  Faolan pointed out, correctly, that I would have been better off sewing the scraps into a rectangle, and then sewing the rectangle into the scarf. (I was sewing each scrap in separately, which resulted in some weird wrinkles and empty patches.) 

I left it as a cap with long tails.  I have another scarf I can use to make it more hood-like - I will experiment with pinning things together and see how it looks.

Another nice thing about Red Mountain is that it gives me an opportunity to wear warm garb like this!

Bardic!

Always a bit touchy, feeling out a group's unspoken policy on bardic performance.  Friday night, the vibe was "let's sit around the fire and talk."  Saturday, after the feasting was done but before the plate-clearing had happened, a lady got up to sing.  Faolan and I looked at each other when she was done - was it an open floor?  Or were we still in "feast" territory, where you don't generally want to put too many performances right after one another?

Within a few moments, an Isenfiri gentleman got up to tell a story, and then he formally opened the floor to performance.  Faolan and I each did one piece until we saw others taking seconds.  I did the first five minutes of Brynhild's Tale (from disobeying Odin to Sigurth leaves her hall).  On an inspired whim, I changed the opening sentence, much to the better.  I had been doing "Brynhild was a valkyrie, handmaiden of Odin, chooser of the slain."  It is now, "She stands before Odin, defiant."  Much better hook - who is she? Why is she defiant?  What's Odin going to do to her?  Also has the benefit of cutting about 30 seconds of exposition.

There was vocal disappointment when I cliffhangered.  The second round of performances went much more quickly - not as many people took seconds - and someone asked if I intended to finish the tale that night, or if I would make them wait until next year.  I did the rest of the thing, all 15 min or so of it, in a go.  I paused at each break point to check that this was their wish, and it was.  I made some efforts to be more effective with my gaze-catching and audience interaction, but I think I moved around too much.  I need to work on being still, and moving only for effect, rather than having motion be a default.  Pacing is distracting.

It went over very well.  I got more comments that I have in a while.  (Doubly gratifying - I'd opened with "Hild (The War That Does Not End)", which was the audience favorite at Pennsic. This time, they all liked the piece I'd actually worked on, so yay.)  I think I will write them down elsewhere, so this post doesn't feel too self-congratulatory, but one thing is worth noting as a performance evaluation.  One lady, as I finished the tale, looked... shocked? Displeased?  Unsettled?  I caught her eye, and she said, "That's it? That's how it ends?  That is not okay!"  She wasn't angry, I don't think, just sort of disbelieving.  I think the problem is in part the nature of the tale, but my ending is also pretty abrupt and the closing words are not very strong.  It needs some kind of closure, I think, for the audience.

It could also be the 'problematic' nature of the piece.  The third act violence is kicked off when Brynhild tells her husband that Sigurth slept with her by deceit, prior to their marriage.  This is a lie.  But her husband believes her. 

In August 2018, at Pennsic, this was just the typical sort of thing you see in a medieval story.  In November 2018, after the Kavanaugh hearings, it's, ah, fraught.  "Women are lying liars who shouldn't be believed!" is NOT supposed to be the moral of the story.  If I had to assign an Aesop-like moral to it, it would be "Don't make promises you can't keep," or "Pursuit of honor is pursuit of death" or something more aligned with a critique of the morals of the warrior-culture that birthed the tale.

My version ends with Brynhild stabbing herself, asking her maidens to die with her, telling her husband that she lied, and then pledging to be with Sigurth in the afterlife before dying.  The "she was lying" thing gets dropped like a bomb just before the end, and that is probably not the best way to frame the end of the piece.  I will have to work on it.

 

 

Kolrosing

This is one of those "let's try it!" sorts of projects.  Incised decorations filled with contrasting powder were used to decorate the Trossingen lyre. I got a softwood (basswood maybe?) box at the craft store and used knives to cut lines into it.  Then I rubbed cinnamon into the lines.

Findings:

• The Finnish carving knife worked better than the Xacto knife. The Xacto was too fine, at least for what I was doing (fingerpainting with blades).  The lines were so fine they hardly held any cinnamon.
• Hand strength is needed!  The knife wants to follow the wood grain, which is probably not where you want it to go. 
• I tried sketching some ornaments on with pencil and then cutting overtop.  It ended up looking like pencil.
• The cinnamon does highlight the lines, but it's not as dark as it could be. Powdered charcoal is the real thing to use, but you have to use a dust mask with it.  Faolan suggested pulverized instant coffee.  I had some espresso ground coffee that was old and no longer fit to brew, so I tried to powder it down finer.  (Turkish coffee would be fine out of the box.)  Haven't used it yet.

I used motifs from the Overhogdal tapestries because they're simple and geometric. I've been up to my ears in Sigurth legends recently, so I picked all the elements that might plausibly be related to that.  I did adjust the burning hall motif so that it had men inside instead of women, and added Guthrun standing outside.

Graphical elements from Overhogdal tapestry

Top row: Gunnar in the snake pit; Guthrun burns Atli's hall; Brynhild waits atop the mountain.  Bottom row: Andvaranaut, Fafnir and Sigurth

That's it, it was just for fun.

Holiday Fun

I did a few projects this winter that were just for fun.

For the Palio races at Twelfth Night, a Thoroughly Authentic Hobby Horse:

I named him "Grani" after Sigurd's horse

The coloring was based on the Bayeux Tapestry.  It's blue linen and white acrylic yarn.  The bridge ornaments are inspired by the finds in Sutton Hoo Mound 17.  They are gelt wrappers that I rubbed down overtop of a Celtic knotwork pin.  The decoration only barely showed, but at least it pretty well erased the American money designs.

Little-known Norman blue-and-yellow coat color

                        I call him "Sutton Horse"

Then, Lochmere's Midwinter's Revel had a Diwali theme and a mandala competition.  All I know about mandalas, I learned on a quick trip to Wikipedia.  Symmetric, intended to represent the structure of the universe.  I briefly got confused and thought Buddism had a Ninefold Path, then said, "Hey, there were nine worlds in Norse mythology!" and then went on from there.

Laying out the mandala with a compass was really fun!  It was kind of too bad that the set screw that held the lead was missing, so eventually I couldn't use it anymore.  I labeled the worlds and the wells with a fine-tipped calligraphy marker, because European charts of the world/cosmos often did that sort of thing, too. (No reference, just my memory of looking at such things.)

And there's a little Midgard Serpent swimming through the seas of Midgard

Here's the documentation:

According to Wikipedia, a mandala is a symbol that represents the universe. I was inspired to represent the Norse concept of the universe, as presented in the Prose and Poetic Eddas.

Norse Cosmology

Yggdrasil, the world tree, has its roots in the wells Mimir, Udur, and Hvergelmir. The serpent or dragon Níðhöggr gnaws at its roots. In its branches are the nine worlds:

• Asgard, home of the great gods

• Vanaheimr, home of the gods conquered by the Aesir

• Alfheimr, home of the elves

• Svartalfaheimr, home of the dark elves or dwarves

• Midgard, home of the humans

• Jotunheimr, home of the giants

• Muspelheimr, land of fire

• Niflheim, land of ice and snow

• Hel, home of the dishonorable dead

Bifrost, the rainbow bridge, connects Asgard and Midgard.

Mandala Construction

Rather than show the Yggdrasil in a natural fashion, it has been rendered in the nested, symmetric fashion of the mandalas. The three wells are contained in a center circle. A row of 'petals' are the roots of Yggdrasil, and Níðhöggr gnaws at them. A green zone with rounded edges represents the branches and leaves of the great ash tree. The worlds are shown in the outer ring, all connected by the rainbow of Bifrost. (Technically, Bifrost only connects Midgard and Asgard, but it was most symmetric to link all the worlds.)

Compass and ruler were used for most of the layout and some of the drawing.

Materials

Copy paper; acrylic paint; 1 mm felt-tip calligraphy pen

Sources

Norse Cosmology. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norse_cosmology

(I used Wikipedia to check my memory on Norse cosmology. I have read the Eddas, but I can't honestly say I referenced them for this.)

Mandala. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mandala

 

Odds and ends today

Spoon!

I thought I had lost my good wooden spoon. I bought it from a local merchant, not sure who anymore or if he even still sells.  It's based on a Coppergate, York find, and I love it.  I call it my "food shovel," and I finally understand how a spoon can be an all-purpose utensil.  I did find it, but I wondered what I would have done if I really had lost it.  So I spent about 45 min whittling down a cheapo wooden spoon from the grocery store, mostly to thin down the edges of the bowl.  For someone with no carving experience, I think it came out pretty well.

I used it to eat soup tonight, and it's not quite done.  Still a bit too thick to really get comfortably into the mouth.  But it does work.

Shoulder Sack

I have a bunch of stuff to return to people at Fall Crown, and it was looking kinda tacky in the plastic grocery bag I'd stowed it in.  So I made a shoulder sack.  Because of the size of the fabric I had, there are seams at the bottom of each satchel.  That's probably not the best design.  But all the items fit into it, it seems to settle nicely over my shoulder, so hurray!  I should try walking around a bit with it - things tend to slide off my shoulders, so I shouldn't assume it'll stay there stably.

Llawt'u

The barony is trying to get folks in livery hoods for Crown.  I want to wear my Incan tunic, so a European hood isn't going to go.  I've tried to make an Incan (male) piece of headgear called a llawt'u.  I've seen it described as "cords wound around the head" or "turban" or "headband."  The pictures look like a headband or head wrap, sometimes with a cord overtop.  High-ranking men seem to have bling sticking out of the center-front of it - and the higher the status, the more the bling.  Re-enactors dressed as plain soldiers, for example, just had two feathers.  The Emperor had big gold thingies.  Anyway, mine's made out of red and white striped fabric, and the blingie is the Storvik populace badge, backed on felt so it sticks up appropriately.

I'll have a final post on my Incan outfit in a couple days. I've ordered some (admittedly nylon) fringe for the knee ornaments.  I can't tell from the pictures I'm seeing if they were fiber or feather, but since they seemed to be on men of all ranks, I thought probably not feathers. I could definitely be wrong. (I should check the re-enactors as the solar festival...) I am not doing rawhide sandals - my Medieval Moccasins will have to do.   I will probably also skip the man-purse that seems to be a part of the outfit.  I don't have the right sort of patterned fabric - I used to, it was a souvenir from Texas that I got in 1989 or something, but I haven't seen it in years, so I assume it got de-cluttered sometime around college.  But I'll have the shoulder sack for carrying things around in.

Always learning

I'm teaching an Intro to SCA Camping tomorrow.  Since it's been a while since I made a foil meal, I figured I should fire up the grill and test-drive my recipes for the class.  I unexpectedly also learned more about charcoal cooking.

I don't usually do outdoor cooking in all weather.  Sure, wind and rain makes things harder, but... Matchlight charcoal, yeah? How hard can it be?  I got my first set of coals lit, put the lid on the grill (yes, with the air holes open) and wandered off to chop vegetables.

And when I came back, instead of nicely ashed coals, I had half-started coals.  Apparently, lid on, holes open isn't enough air to catch the charcoal?  Or else some of my initial coals went out.  I did find that I had to use 2-3 matches to get it going instead of just one.  So I learned more about charcoal grills today!

Foil Meals: I bought thin-sliced chicken breasts and put them along with thin slices of potatoes, carrots, and onions into a two-layer foil packet with Italian dressing, just like old times.  I know you're supposed to have more coals on the top than the bottom, but I think I had roughly equal amounts - but I planned to flip it halfway through anyhow, so it should have minimized any difficulties.  10 minutes chicken-side down, then 7 minutes potato-side down, and it was nicely done.  A few potatoes were a little underdone, but they were edible.

Bread: I left myself good notes from the last time, so this was more like a review than a pathfinder.  Used King Arthur bread flour, about 12-15 coals under and about 20 over, for 50 min covered the whole time. Beautiful-looking loaf, first slice tastes okay although I'm not sure if I'm still smelling raw flour.  Maybe should let cook for a full hour.

Red Mountain Mead Hall and Night on the Town

Two events in two weeks! It's like some sort of record.

Red Mountain Mead Hall

This is a charming, laid-back event at a gorgeous 4-H camp in Isenfir.  The main hall had a large fireplace and a really rustic log-cabin look to it - really felt like a mead-hall. I took classes on Birka posaments and sprang, did my "Beowulf" performance as requested, and enjoyed a quite delicious feast. 

I tent camped, and there was frost on the ground both mornings.  Lessons learned: my old blue puffy sleeping bag is still hella warm.  Next time I put up the pyramid tent, try not putting the stakes in all the way.  Get the pole up, and then get the stakes down.  It was just unreasonably hard to get the pole up.  The only thing I can think that I did differently from when I first got the tent is that I drove the stakes all in.  (I remember I did not when I first used the tent, because I caught my gown on one of them and tore a hole in it.)

Night on the Town

I don't know if I've been to this local Lochmere event before.  Since I've been rationing my events (e.g., since kids), a mostly-fencing event doesn't usually rise to the level of me spending one of my 'chits' on it. Having just spent a full Fri-Sun in Isenfir, I didn't think I'd be able to make this one. But the weather was lovely and my husband was okay with it, so off I went.

Good Garb: I wore my oldest still-fitting violet tunic under my 7th cen. caftan, with appropriate jewelry and headgear. And you know what? I rocked it.  More and more these days, I am looking in the mirror and seeing things that fit well and look right, instead of seeing a to-do list of things to improve.  And at the event, a lady actually recognized what I was wearing down to the era, because she was interested in making the same sort of garb.  Yay more Anglo-Saxons!

Bardic: Lazy afternoon hanging with the bards.  Got some tips from Lord Wyn that might help my strained throat.  Warm up with humming, then open-mouth humming, then la-la-las.  Keep throat relaxed when singing.  I tried it and I think it helped.  I told "Thrymskvitha" here and at Red Mead Hall, and it went really well both times.  Comedy!

Spinning: I entered my spinning into the Novice A&S competition, since I've been doing it just since last year's Sheep and Wool.  And I won!  Woot.

 

 

Spinning notes and flax

I have been working on my spindle.  It's just a dowel with a large glass bead on it (low whorl).  Version 1 had a notch cut into the top, like the Oseberg spindle, and that worked if I wanted to do a half-hitch.  But I'm intrigued by all the medieval spindles that are just long and pointy at the top - no notch, no obvious place to secure a half-hitch.  I went back to 15th Century Spinning and worked a bit more at trying to copy her technique.  I think I get it - you loosely hold the spindle between middle and ring finger, while thumb and pointer finger spin it.  Now the need for a tapered top becomes clear, as the 0.25" dowel did not want to spin easily between my fingers.  I whittled it down and did a little supported spinning - I will need practice before I can spin it between my fingers but not drop it.

I had the opportunity last week to stop by the American Revolution Museum at Yorktown (formerly the Yorktown Victory Center).  They are rebuilding the whole facility with a grand opening in the spring, but I did get to stop by the colonial farm for the flax processing demonstration.  (They also have a pig butchering-and-salting demo on Thanksgiving weekend, which would be really need to see!)  The flax processing had six steps.  (These are mostly notes to myself and my own memory - if you are reading this, you can Google "breaking flax" or "scutching flax" to see the equipment that's used.)

• Harvest, followed by drying
• Retting (rotting, essentially) in water
• Drying again
• Breaking.  This was the first demonstrated step.  The breaker is a wooden gizmo about waist height, hinged at one end.  The colonial-garbed docent first crushed the flax stalks between two flat surfaces at the open end of the breaker to crack the outer material. He said some people skip that step, but he thinks it's effective.  Then, he laid the flax stalks across the "teeth" of the breaker and slammed the handle down.  Lift, pull the flax a little towards himself, slam. Lift, pull, slam.  Lift, pull, slam.  Then he turned the bundle of flax around so he could smash the ends he'd been holding.  
• Breaking results in exposed flax fibers and a bunch of crunchy stalk bits.  The scutching board is next - a flat, vertical wooden board.  Hold the flax against the board and use a dull wooden scutching knife to scrape down, removing the worst of the crunchy stalk bits.
• Finally, the hackle. It's like a big toothy dog brush.  The docent liked to lay the flax through the teeth at about a 45 degree angle, but then pulled straight back towards himself, so that the fibers pulled more strongly against the teeth.  Just as you would do for long hair, he did the tips, then a little up from the tips, the half the bundle, and so on.  The short flax fibers and crunchy bits caught in the hackle are what he said are "tow," lower-quality flax that can be spun for lower-quality linen.  In his hand was the long-staple flax for making good linen.  And I got to take the flax home!

Only weird bit - the docent told me that linseed oil was toxic, so you had to be careful with the retting water and handling the linen itself.  Now, it does not surprise me that water which has had plants rotting in it isn't healthful to drink, but I thought traditional spinners often ran the flax over their lips to wet it?  Well yes, perhaps, said the docent, but it isn't good for you.

After I left, I remembered that oil-rich flax seeds are sold as a health food.  So I did some Googling.  Linseed oil is perfectly safe in normal doses.  Yeah, if you take a megadose of supplements, it can have some bad side effects, like doing straight shots of oil tends to have on a body!  The museum oddly does not have an email contact address, so I think I will write them a short note thanking them for the experience (it's a really cool museum and re-construction!) but also pointing out that maybe they should double-check that part of the docent script.

Still obsessed with bushcraft tents

Although the proportions are admittedly off, it occurs to me that getelds look similar to shelter halves.  I'm still waffling a bit on whether or not the main "body" of the tent is a rectangle or a trapezoid.  But if it's a rectangle with equilateral triangle doors, then... same shape.  And then I wonder if the "tube" up top is a connector between the two shelter halves?  Even if it's directly sewn... so that the top seam isn't rubbing against the ridge pole.  And the little flappy ends keep rain off the supporting poles.  They might also be sewn shut to tension the thing, like Greet found was helpful.

Might be worth trying if I can get $1-2/yard wool suiting.  Need about 10 yards, I think; 60" wide gets me 48" tall tent, 54" gets 44".