The Historic Saltire Society

Living History

The ever expanding living history section of the group shows a wide range of Daily occurrences in the medieval time period. War and Battles were rare, and it is the living History section that shows what life was really like in the 13th century.

Food & Drink

Cooking

The Group has an Iron A frame from which cauldrons are hung over a flaming open fire to cook their contents. Maureen researches authentic medieval recipes and only cooks using food ingredients available in the medieval time period, so no chips or potatoes, and yes, they did have oranges!!

Brewing

Men, women & children would drink Ale which was a non-alcoholic brew made with water and local produce such as barley and wild heather. Different Ales would be produced at different seasons of the year. For special occassions, the Lords & Ladies would enjoy a brew, especially naturally fermented, which would cause a 'little merriment'.

Pole lathe

Just as with a modern day lathe, the wood being worked with is spun around and a variety of tools are used to hone and shape it into a product. However, being in the middle ages, this device was powered by foot. This was the main method of manufacturing cups and plates and bowls and all sorts of other dishes in the thirteenth century.

Candle Making

Candles were in every day use in the 13th century. Most people would go to bed at sunset so candels weren't actually used that much for staying up late at night. Candles were used during the daytime inside big dark castles. There was no such thing as glass, so most castles had very few windows which were often very small, and even after glass was invented, this trend continued because glass was so expensive. Even those who could afford such luxuries didn’t have huge windows as they were a structural weakness in a world which could erupt into battle at any time.
There are two main methods of making candles which our group practises, one is to take a wick, dip it in wax and then leave until the wax hardens. The process is then repeated, and repeated, and repeated…. The other method is to take a flat sheet of Beeswax and roll it into the cylindrical candle shape. Obviously it’s quite important to remember to put the wick in the middle first!

Scribes

Without anything like a modern day printing press, all books were produced by hand. The decorative font used is normally associated with monks, and they would use old fashioned quills and ink. Medieval Iron Gall Ink is made from growths formed around Wasp eggs laid in buds of (usually) oak trees

Coin Striking

Again, without the modern day Machinery used by the Government today, Coins had to be struck by Hand. A simple method was used. The flat piece of metal to be made into a coin was placed between two engraving irons which were then hit very hard with a hammer. Simple and effective, just like the rest of Daily life in the 13th century!

Drop Spinning

Everyone knows wool comes from sheep, but you don’t just sheer of a couple of balls of yarn! The raw material from the Sheep has to be spun into a thread, and in the 13th century this was done by drop spinning.

Weaving and Tablet Weaving

Once the wool was in a thread form it could then be interlaced with more of the same wool in the traditional method of weaving. Again in the good old days this was all done by hand. Cromptons mule wasn’t invented for another 500 years!

Dyers Kitchen

Once you had created the materials using the techniques above, you might want to add a bit of colour. Ancient Dyes were taken from plant life to produce colour in plain materials. Our Dyers kitchen uses the same techniques, with clothes being soaked in vast tubs of water and the ungents for different lengths of time for darker or lighter colours. Now you are finally ready to cut out some shapes, sew them together and viola, clothes!