A Tarsoly

Dagny’s been after a small pouch to keep bits and pieces in at events, and I’d been wanting to try making a tarsoly for a while, so I decided to kill two birds with one stone.

Some notes I commented to a question asked when I first posted the tarsoly on my Facebook, regarding what evidence we have, if any, for what genders they were used by, and when they were common/in use.

“You know how to ask the difficult questions!

The tarsoly is primarily associated with the Hungarian Magyar, as the tarsoly pouch was ubiquitous in Hungary for a very long time. Unfortunately, despite the richness of the earlier graves, much of the information about them remains unanalysed – especially any skeletal remains. We do know that they were in relatively common usage from at least the 9th/10th C conquest of Pannonia. Many of the early graves contained flint for lighting fire, which could point in any direction for gender (or none) depending on your interpretation.

Several examples were found in graves from the viking age trading town of Birka. The find that I primarily based the size on was Birka grave bj93, which contained such a small amount of human remains that it is impossible to tell what gender it belonged to. The same is true (as far as I could find) for Birka graves bj904 and bj154 which also had fittings from this style of pouch.

So we know that they were in use during the Viking Age – both in Hungary and to some extent with ‘viking’ trading settlements such as Birka – but we’re unable to say for certain, to my satisfaction, which, if any, gender it was associated with.

The pouch eventually spread through to Prussia, Russia, France and Britain over the centuries where they became known as sabretache and remained popular until falling out of fashion by the 20th C, though some military units, such as Hussars, wear them to this day for ceremonial occasions. During this time, as part of standard military uniforms, they were certainly seen as masculine.”

I’ve had some requests for a step-by-step guide, so that’s something I’ll get together at some point!