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  1. #11
    Join Date
    7th May 20
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    Yes I've seen them, I'm looking for a square top cantle which is proving very difficult!! Thanks for the reply!

  2. #12
    Join Date
    18th October 09
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    Beautiful, isn't it, when dingy metal is made bright and new?

    I've acquired a large number of tarnished things over the years- cap badges, waistbelt and crossbelt buckles, dirks, sporrans- but the worse example was a particular set of pipes.

    I visited a piper friend and he said "an old guy brought me some old beat-up pipes to see if I could get anything for them."

    I was anxious to see them! You never know, with old pipes. My friend produced a very dingy very old set of pipes in a cardboard box. He thought they were unexceptional pipes from the 1960s, and in poor condition. He said "I told the guy he would be lucky to get $800 for them".

    I thought they were much older, and though filthy in pretty good condition. I paid the money and as soon as I got home I started cleaning them.

    I knew they were Lawries, very old Lawries. Ebony with real ivory mounts, and also mounts of some unknown metal. I'd never seen bagpipe mounts that colour! Chocolate brown. Deeply tarnished. Copper? I had no idea.

    I got out the metal polish and started applying the elbow grease. For the longest time the metal looked like some kind of base metal. I thought the mounts might have once been silver-plated but all the plating had come off.

    After numerous applications of polish, after around an hour I started to see something wonderful, a dim hint of silver! That hint eventually turned to bright gleaming silver. Not Sterling Silver, but "German silver" or "nickel silver". I knew that Lawrie made identical pipes with thistle-engraved mounts, some Sterling, some nickel.

    I wish I had taken "before" photos! But here's "after"



    (These photos were taken after I had been playing these pipes for a couple years, and I hadn't recently polished them, sorry!)



    Last edited by OC Richard; 18th May 20 at 09:51 AM.
    Proud Mountaineer from the Highlands of West Virginia; son of the Revolution and Civil War; first Europeans on the Guyandotte

  3. The Following User Says 'Aye' to OC Richard For This Useful Post:


  4. #13
    Join Date
    18th October 09
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    Quote Originally Posted by M A N N A View Post
    I'm looking for a cantle for a pheasant sporran
    Interesting! I would love to see what specific design you have in mind.

    I have this sporran, an old one from, probably, the second quarter of the 20th century. I would call those "Celtic birds" I suppose.



    Last edited by OC Richard; 18th May 20 at 10:00 AM.
    Proud Mountaineer from the Highlands of West Virginia; son of the Revolution and Civil War; first Europeans on the Guyandotte

  5. #14
    Join Date
    22nd March 07
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    Quote Originally Posted by OC Richard View Post
    Interesting! I would love to see what specific design you have in mind.

    I have this sporran, an old one from, probably, the second quarter of the 20th century. I would call those "Celtic birds" I suppose.

    Nice sporran! I always liked that one of yours. To my eye, and knowledge, I assumed these were zoomorphic celtic dragons.

    Frank
    Drink to the fame of it -- The Tartan!
    Murdoch Maclean

  6. #15
    Join Date
    18th October 09
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    It's hard to know what all of those creatures are supposed to be.

    Baines puts them all in a section called "zoomorphics".

    Some are clearly birds, or dogs.

    There are others Baines describes as "dog-like animals with top-knots, tails, tongues, legs, and toes with claws".

    A Gaelic speaker many years ago described the "Celtic beasts" engraved on pipes as each-uisge, that is, water-beasts, what we would call sea-serpents. But things like the Loch Ness Monster aren't "serpents" but more like mammals.

    Here's the each-uisge or Celtic beast on a friend's old set of Henderson pipes

    Last edited by OC Richard; 18th May 20 at 11:39 AM.
    Proud Mountaineer from the Highlands of West Virginia; son of the Revolution and Civil War; first Europeans on the Guyandotte

  7. The Following User Says 'Aye' to OC Richard For This Useful Post:


  8. #16
    Join Date
    22nd March 07
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    Quote Originally Posted by OC Richard View Post
    It's hard to know what all of those creatures are supposed to be.

    Baines puts them all in a section called "zoomorphics".

    Some are clearly birds, or dogs.

    There are others Baines describes as "dog-like animals with top-knots, tails, tongues, legs, and toes with claws".

    A Gaelic speaker many years ago described the "Celtic beasts" engraved on pipes as each-uisge, that is, water-beasts, what we would call sea-serpents. But things like the Loch Ness Monster aren't "serpents" but more like mammals.

    Here's the each-uisge or Celtic beast on a friend's old set of Henderson pipes

    Nice photo OCR. Thanks for sharing.

    Frank
    Drink to the fame of it -- The Tartan!
    Murdoch Maclean

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