I presume (though I have no evidence) the profession or at least the activity existed in the cities and larger towns.

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Doug Strong
doug-strong@comcast.net

http://armourresearchsociety.org

quote:

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Originally posted by Peder:
Are you talking about a sanitation enginier(garbage man) or about something else?

Brent

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One of the things I do is sell antiquities. Buckles, buttons, strap ends, thing s of that nature. Essentially I am selling medieval "garbage." Things which were lost, broken or thrown away in the middle ages. I though it might be entertaining to make a sign for my antiquities booth stating something like "Talbot the rag and bone man"

Any medieval ideas?

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Doug Strong
doug-strong@comcast.net

http://armourresearchsociety.org

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quote:

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Originally posted by gaukler:
If you sold more textiles, you could be a Fripperer.
mark

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Alass I have no more than 20 textile pieces and thousands of metal bits, so that won't work

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Doug Strong
doug-strong@comcast.net

http://armourresearchsociety.org

Metal bits wern't recycled as a proffession, they usually got tossed out on the midden heap when broken.

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Doug Strong
doug-strong@comcast.net

http://armourresearchsociety.org

quote:

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Originally posted by chef de chambre:
Well, you don't want to be called a 'gong farmer', even though a lot of what you carry was dug out of latrines.....

Metal bits wern't recycled as a proffession, they usually got tossed out on the midden heap when broken.

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whta makes you say that, Bob?
I havent heard of anyone who recycles metal bits professionally, but we have evidence that metal bits were indeed recycled...there's that wonderful Scandanavian tool chest they dug out of the bog with all the great tools and even some broken metal pots that the archaeologists thought were for patching material (they were too small for repair)...

Metal is VERY expensive, far more so than labor in our period. I cant believe they'd toss it out when it broke. Even base metal trinkets can be melted down and recast (unless they get lost in the muck of the THames )

of course other than that tool chest, I have no documentary evidence, and so eagerly await the reams of material to show me wrong .

--AM, another one of those nitpicky detail mongers

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Certainly, small metal bits like buckles, broken knives, & ect were often thrown away. The Museum of London finds books on "Buckles & findings" and "Knives and scabbards provides ample evidence of the practise. Since the vast majority of that was junk that was thrown in a landfill intentionally, along with entire sections of old housing, I'd say that my statement was justified. Ask an archaeologist how much of the little bits they find were precisely dug out of latrines.

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Doug Strong
doug-strong@comcast.net

http://armourresearchsociety.org

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quote:

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Originally posted by Talbot:

I presume (though I have no evidence) the profession or at least the activity existed in the cities and larger towns.

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I haven't posted earlier because I can't find my copy of it, but I believe in Nigel Mill's Medieval Artifacts he discusses the origin of the "mudlarks". They were children and adults who managed to subsist on what they recovered from the Thames shore and the sewers. It brings up images of Dickens, but I seem to remember him saying it went back quite a ways. If they could eek out a nominal living on what they found, there had to be at least some trade in these things. Doug, I know you got a copy of this book from me last year, see what it has to say. And I will go back to moving piles of books looking for mine.

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http://www.gendocs.demon.co.uk/trades.html

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Doug Strong
doug-strong@comcast.net

http://armourresearchsociety.org