Miscellaneous.Pdf

Crotal Bells Crotal bells, also known as rumble bells, were used on horse-drawn vehicles before motorised vehicles were common. They were often made of bronze with a slot cut down the side. These bells were used to warn other horse-drawn vehicle users (mostly on country roads) that another vehicle was approaching. They came in many sizes, from a small 1-inch version to bells that were many inches across - the older ones were forged while others were cast. They were either hung on a small leather-and-iron harness bracket above the horse's collar on smaller vehicles. On larger vehicles, such as delivery wagons, they were driven into the wooden frame of the wagon. Jews Harp Example of a Jews Harp found in US – c.1860 The Jew's harp, also known as the mouth harp, is a lamellophone instrument, consisting of a flexible metal or bamboo tongue or reed attached to a frame. The tongue/reed is placed in the performer's mouth and plucked with the finger to produce a note. Each instrument produces one pitch only, with its multiples (overtones), though different sized instruments provide different pitches. There is no standard pitch. Jews harps have a long history of being folk instruments, with a wide geographical distributions. They are believed to be indigenous to South East Asia, and had been introduced to Europe by the Crusades (11th to 14th Centuries AD). The form of the European Jews harp, is made from metal, commonly iron in modern examples. The tongue forms a separate component hammered into a rabbet in the thickest part of the frame. The other end of the tongue is bent into a prong, however this part of the jews harp rarely survives in archaeological examples. To play the instrument, it is held in one hand, with the frame being lightly supported between the player's teeth. The metal tongue is then plucked by the fingers on the other hand. The mouth cavity acts as a resonator and the pitch can be modified by the position of the lips, tongue and cheeks. Photo of find 2019 Lead Seals Photo of find 2019 Lead seals such as cloth seals and bale seals were widely used in Europe between the 13th and 19th centuries as a means of identification and as a component of regulation and quality control. Cloth seals were typically two disc seals joined by a connecting strip. These were intended to be folded around each side of a textile and stamped closed, in a manner similar to that in which coins were stamped. Bale seals were single disc seals, rather than two disc seals, and were also used to identify textiles, as well as parcels and bales of trade goods. The obverse would typically display a city's arms, and the reverse would record data such as the length or width of fabric or the weight of a parcel. After the bale was wrapped and brought to market the tax man would clip the bale with a seal to show the tax on it had been paid. Then when a livestock farmer fed his cows he'd lay the hay out in a field to feed them. that's when the bale would be cut open and the seal would be discarded. Photo of find 2019 Photo of all Bag Seals Victorian: Skirt Lifter A skirt lifter, also known as a dress lifter, skirt grip, dress suspender, hem-holder, page or porte-jupe, was a device for lifting a long skirt to avoid dirt or to facilitate movement. It clamped on to the hem and was attached to the belt by a cord, ribbon, or chain. The first skirt lifters date from around 1846 and they were most popular in the 1860s. Photo of find 2019 Farmers Ring or Pocket Sundial Example of 17th Century Pocket Sundial Farmers Rings are a type of portable altitude sundial also called “ring dials”. The principle behind them was to suspend it in a vertical place so that the aperture faces the Sun. A beam of light passes through the small hole in the ring and falls on hour-curves that are inscribed on the inside of the ring. To adjust for the equation of time, the hole is usually on a loose ring within the ring so that the hole can be adjusted to reflect the current month - the initials I.F.M.A.M.I on one side and I.A.S.O.N.D on the other. At this time there was no 'J' in the alphabet. Some examples have been found with inscriptions on the outside of the ring a rhyming couplet in two lines, "Live ever mindfull of thy dying, For time is always from thee flying" and another with "Set me right and use me well, and I to you the time will tell." Ring dials were in use in the 17th century with a continuation into the 18th century. These simple sundials can never have been very accurate and could only be used at the latitude for which they were made but in rural areas in an age when the only certain measure was the rising and going down of the sun they must still have served a useful purpose. Among the lower classes they could have been used for a considerable time even after clocks and watches became more commonplace. Although at first still not very accurate these mechanical timepieces did have one distinct advantage over sundials - they were not subject to the vagaries of the weather and so the general use of pocket sundials gradually petered out sometime in the 18th century. Photo of find 2019 Medieval: Purse Bar Towards the end of the 1400s it became fashionable for rich men to wear large purses hanging from their belts. They were made of velvet or other expensive fabric fitted to fancy metal frames. They were generally sewn below the bar. Williams Class J bars have distinctive spherical terminals, which either have twisting grooves or are moulded to imitate bells. Photo of find 2019 GPO Bag Seal A Square Post Office Letter Sack Seal found on the Thames Foreshore Charles I opened up his royal mail to the public in 1635. Oliver Cromwell established the General Post Office in 1657. In the early 1700s a letter could take weeks or months to reach its destination if it ever got there at all. In 1784 John Palmer of Bath introduced the first horse drawn mail coach, which also carried passengers. Typically bag seals will display the name of the destination Post Office branch, however others can be blank. The vertical bars on the seals are crimp marks made with a set of pliers used to firmly adhere the seal to a mail bag. In the early days the parcels were chiefly packed in wicker hampers with heavy fastenings, but the weight and cost of these receptacles rendered it necessary to find something lighter. Many experiments were made, and at last a receptacle was adopted with a wicker body and a canvas top, which required no metal fastenings, as the canvas top was tied with string and sealed with wax, and later lead seals. A later improvement on this was the substitution of a leaden seal for the old wax sealing. Even this much lighter receptacle was considered too heavy & costly for the conveyance of ordinary parcels and canvas sacks of extra durability were generally used for the conveyance of parcels across London & to and from provincial towns. Parcels of a fragile nature when sent by railway are still packed in wicker receptacles for security. In 1911 the post office finally replaced wax seals used in smaller post office regions with lead ones for sealing letter and parcel sacks, although lead seals were probably used in the larger post offices since Charles I. Photo of find Why are so many buttons found in the field? Shoddy is the name given to an inferior woollen yarn made by shredding scraps of woollen rags into fibres, grinding them and then mixing them with small amounts of new wool. The object was to manufacture a cheap cloth which could be made into products and clothes. It was also known as Rag-Wool. An even finer shredding process produced what was called Mungo. Shoddy was first made in Batley, Yorkshire, by, it is believed, Benjamin Law, and its production quickly spread to surrounding textile towns in the area. The collection of the rags for this process started in streets all over Britain by rag dealers or rag and bone men as they became more commonly known. The rags were sorted, and any seams, or parts of the rag not suitable, were left to rot and then sold onto to farmers to manure crops. Or they were used for bedding or stuffing. The remaining wool rags were then sent to the shoddy mills for processing. The rags were again sorted before the shredding process. This shredding created a very fine dust which, again, was used for manure on the fields. But the fine dust also caused health problems for many of the shoddy workers who breathed in the fine dust. It was known as 'shoddy fever'. During the manufacturing process not all of the shoddy could be used as it was too short to spin. This was packed up in bales and sent off to farmers to be used as manure on the fields. After spining the coarse cloth was sold on. In the mid-Victorian period the US and Canada was a large export market for the cloth.

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