Tool Talk

General Category => General Discussion => Topic started by: Branson on July 28, 2014, 07:47:53 AM

Title: Jaw Harp
Post by: Branson on July 28, 2014, 07:47:53 AM

A while back we had a thread on jaw harps.  Yesterday, while researching Russian tools (looking for early 19th Century Russian cooper's tools),
I ran across pictures of the oldest jaw harps I've ever seen.  These were dug up by archeologists in the old city of Novgorod.   These are Medieval jaw harps, probably 800 years old.

http://users.stlcc.edu/mfuller/Novgorod/NovgorodMus332jawHarp.jpg

Title: Re: Jaw Harp
Post by: Papaw on July 28, 2014, 07:40:17 PM

Pretty darn cool! :grin:

Title: Re: Jaw Harp
Post by: Branson on August 08, 2014, 07:32:13 AM

 
   The source for the picture is Wood Use in Medieval Novgorod, editors Mark Brisbane and Jon Hather, published in
2007 by Oxbow Books, Oxford, UK.

The book is a great source of information.  There's a short chapter on woodworking tools, and a definitive chapter on coopering.  They've dug up nearly whole buildings in old Novgorod as well as children's toys and children's school work scribed on birch bark. 

 

Title: Re: Jaw Harp
Post by: bear_man on August 09, 2014, 02:26:09 AM

Neat!  Thanks, Branson.