[David Butchee]

I appreciate all the responses. So i'm guessing that if they did have one it would be a personal civillian type with no exact look, and they would have left at camp when they rode into battle. If clay was used, what about glass? (something like this affixed to a strap, or is that too fantasy like?)

[Bjorn Hagstrom]

Only if you are reenacting this guy



Glass bottles or decanters are rare but not unknown through history, for some reproductions and examples you can have a peek through this catalogue:

http://scanglas.se/katalog/glas.html

[David Butchee]

Hey, don't make fun! There's no harm in making sure it's inaccurate, is there?

[Bjorn Hagstrom]

[Robert MacPherson]

it seems like there is lots of evidence for medieval canteens or field flasks. We have surviving ones in pewter, silver, ceramic, and leather. They appear in period pictures in all these materials as well as turned wood and coopered wood.

We see them on pilgrims and farmers in the field. However, only in the rarest examples do we see them on soldiers or other men at arms. I think that we have to conclude from this that armed men with canteens were not the thing you could expect to see.

Mac

[Mark Griffin]

As hardened and seasoned medieval campaigner I'd be surprised if anything made of glass would last the trip from the bar to table, let alone bouncing off my kit for miles and miles. There is a lot of medieval glass about but there are also a fair few leather cases shaped for the purpose so if traveling people would take sensible precautions but I doubt they would festoon themselves. Woven rushes etc are also visible around delicate wares and have been found archeologically.

This is why leather wins out. Horn is also very resilient and dried gourds are to be seen in many pictures. In fact my first water carrier was a gourd as when I were a lad, I couldn't afford a leather one but could afford a packet of seeds. Then i learned to sew and shape leather...

I did have a pottery costrel but that got smashed in a 'brawl', funnily enough in a lovely 14th cent inn at Rye in Sussex. I fell on it and the only blood drawn that day was me picking sharp bits of ceramic out my rear.

On potability, our water here in the debatable lands comes from a hole in the ground, 95 ft down. Its clean enough to drink direct although we filter it for particulates and zap it with UV but that's mainly for guests. We are used to it but some people are more sensitive. The previous owners used it for 30 years without. We have a tudor well in the kitchen but only 45ft deep and when tested that had all sorts of fun things living in it so we leave alone. Water is ALWAYS best turned into beer if you ask me, although I don't baulk at watered down wine on a hot summers day.

[Robert MacPherson]

Oh, Yea yea! Gourds! I forgot about gourds. They continued to be the standard canteen of pilgrims into modern times, if one is to judge by the Santiago iconography. One of the classic pilgrim souvenirs was turned wooded beads that looked like gourd-canteens. You could sew strings of them on your hat, interspersed with little wooden pilgrim staffs.

Mac

[David Butchee]

Wow, I didn't expect this thread to still be going; I suppose leather wins in medieval usage and logic (not breaking like ceramic) any examples from artwork of the time or anything? I found this page that shows supposedly leather costrels, but it is dated in the 1400's http://heatherrosejones.com/picnicproject/gastonphoebus.html

Well I know better terminology to use now, costrel, not canteen.

[Robert MacPherson]

David,

I guess I lost track of the dates you were looking for. That's a bit early for me. Sorry.

For what it is worth, I concur that the canteens from the Gaston Phoebus hunting book are most likely leather, made to "reference" coopered wood. That nice flask cooling in the spring is either pewter or silver. Of course it belongs to a high status guy, and he has people to see to it that it comes to no harm.

Mac

[Dan Howard]

[Robin Smith]

It's really too bad you're not doing Merovingian/Vendel, 'cause then you could use cool blown glasswear like these:

[Mark Griffin]

I'd say that the Gaston Phoebus vessels could be leather but could also be coopered stave ware. Mini barrels as much loved by St Bernard dogs.

I have two original 18th/19th cent ones and they have a long period of use going back much further. Certainly small staves from tiny barrels (and not open topped jugs or 'tygs' as they are curved) turn up in well deposits.

Leather vessels from Netherlands too.

a wee selection from some of mine below

I can say you want the rounder, flatter types if you are mounted or they roll and bounce all over the place. There are wooden ones shaped with a very flat side,pretty much half a circle, that are presumably for that purpose.

I also have a leather skin that works well so that could be added into the mix. I've not seen them in any N european context, think they were a bit more sophisticated than that but I haven't really looked either. But they work well, especially if slung across the back as they shape themselves to you nicely.

[Robert MacPherson]

Mark,


I was thinking that the color of the G.P. Hunting book examples suggested leather rather than any other material. On the other hand, I see now that they lack the characteristic seam line around the bung, so perhaps you are right, and they are intended to be wood.

I have also seen sketch a pewter canteen of this form. (Unfortunately I can't remember where...) Our ancestors seemed to have loved skeuomorphs.


Mac

[Bjorn Hagstrom]

Here are two leather costrels I made, one for me and one for the dog
And also as inspiration, my collection of historic glasses.

So what do I use most often when I'm out on events?
A wooden bucket and a ceramic pitcher! Bucket for the dog, the pitcher for me. Much more convenient really, as long as the well or tap is within walking distance from where you spend your day.

[Mark Griffin]

this also touches on this:

http://www.myArmoury.com/talk/viewtopic.php?t...teen+gourd

[Joshua Waters]

After reading this discussion, it has left me curious as to whether a professional fighting man would carry a canteen if they were on crusade? Even though European soldiers did not seem to carry them on campaign, one would think they would carry a canteen on a crusade, because things like wells and streams were few and far between.

If you were someone like a Templar or Hospitaller, one of their duties was to patrol roads to protect pilgrims. They would not have had a supply wagon following them to carry water provisions on something like a simple patrol. So I think they would have to carry a canteen of some sort.

[Greg Ballantyne]

[David Butchee]