Question regarding real sinew…

[Black_Feather]

Have any of you stitched clothing (non leather items) such as cloth or wool using real sinew? Would that work? Was considering as a challenge to myself to see a capote using real sinew.

 

[Notchy Bob]

A lot of cotton muslin Ghost Dance shirts were reportedly stitched with sinew. I don’t see why it would not work for a capote.

I’ve done a couple of leather stitching projects with real sinew, and I’ve used it for “seizing” the fletching on arrows and for wrapping the bases of feathers. I made a tubular pipe years ago from a deer leg bone and wrapped it with beef sinew. However, I have not tried using real sinew for beadwork or stitching fabric.

I think you ought to try it.

Notchy Bob

 

[Black_Feather]

A lot of cotton muslin Ghost Dance shirts were reportedly stitched with sinew. I don’t see why it would not work for a capote.

I’ve done a couple of leather stitching projects with real sinew, and I’ve used it for “seizing” the fletching on arrows and for wrapping the bases of feathers. I made a tubular pipe years ago from a deer leg bone and wrapped it with beef sinew. However, I have not tried using real sinew for beadwork or stitching fabric.

I think you ought to try it.

Notchy Bob

I think I’ll give it a try, crazy crow seems to have very good prices in sinew.

 

[Phil Coffins]

There are some draw backs with sinew, it drys hard which may not be desirable on a capote. But when it gets wet it loosens up.

 

[appalichian hunter]

When you process the sinew, it breaks the fibers down into pliable strings. I would get elk sinew and break it into usable strands by laying the dry sinew on a 2x4 and using another 2x4 pound ( when I say pound don't go at it like driving spikes, you just want the individual strands to start separating)the sinew until it starts to come apart in strands then pull those strands by hand. That way you control the thickness of the strands, keep your stiches small and occasionally while sewing draw the strand through your mouth keep it damp but not dripping wet.

 

[tenngun]

You can keep the sinew in mouth with one end out. It makes its own needle.
It’s a pion to work with as it’s only a foot long or so, so you’re constantly staring new threads.
It shrinks when it dries and pulls TIGHT. It’s great for skin, I’ve never used it on cloth
I would point out that Indians bought cloth and thread as soon as they could.

 

[Black_Feather]

You can keep the sinew in mouth with one end out. It makes its own needle.
It’s a pion to work with as it’s only a foot long or so, so you’re constantly staring new threads.
It shrinks when it dries and pulls TIGHT. It’s great for skin, I’ve never used it on cloth
I would point out that Indians bought cloth and thread as soon as they could.

I might just start using linen thread instead with a backstitch at every seam. Currently I'm using faux sinew, I'm starting to wonder mainly if real sinew was ever used on capotes beacuse of the sinew length a backstitch would require alot of tie offs and a running stitch would'nt be tough enough, a whip stitich would be uncomfortable, I was thinking of using it on a capote for the manly factor but Im rethinking my ideas. The patterns tease using real sinew, but I'm thinking that is part of the myth. Definately thinking of using it for leather projects.

 

[Phil Coffins]

Wearing a capote on wet windy night is plenty of “Manly” for anyone I’ve met! 🙄

 

[Loyalist Dave]

I'm starting to wonder mainly if real sinew was ever used on capotes beacuse of the sinew length a backstitch would require alot of tie offs and a running stitch would'nt be tough enough, a whip stitich would be uncomfortable, I was thinking of using it on a capote for the manly factor but Im rethinking my ideas.

On a cloth capote, it was very unlikely used unless there was absolutely no other choice, and that would be a repair. IF one has a blanket, one has wool threads which might be pulled, and then twisted together for strength, and then used, rather than the sinew. Ghost Shirts were ceremonial garb, not everyday wear.

Why not sinew? As Phil Coffins mentioned above, when the stuff gets wet, it loosens up. When used with leather, the leather is normally treated with some sort of water resistant coating such as animal fat. Mocs and bags and sheaths are greased. A wool capote is not, so there is no protection of the sinew from wet or damp. So sinew is not something for everyday cloth clothing. Artificial sinew only has one property of real sinew..., it resembles real sinew at a glance from the naked eye.

LD

 

[Notchy Bob]

I've done a little work with real sinew, as noted above. I would agree with @Loyalist Dave that if you could get fabric, you could get thread. However, I have not run across references to greasing sinew-sewn seams in the period literature. If anyone can provide sources for this practice, I would appreciate it. I have seen frequent references to almost daily moccasin repair, though, and several of the chroniclers (Ruxton and Larpenteur come to mind) mentioned the mountaineers carrying sinew in their bullet pouches to use for necessary repairs, and evidently the native men did the same. I ran across this interesting quote just yesterday in J. W. Schultz' Blackfeet and Buffalo. A Blackfoot man was preparing for an expedition, and he said, "At last on a day of early summer I said to my wives: ‘At once make for me two pairs of moccasins, plain ones. Put them, an awl, sinew thread, sacred paint, flint and steel, [and] some pemmican in my war sack.“ (p. 322)

From any given animal, the backstrap sinew fibers will be longer and finer than the leg tendon. I don't have it open in front of me, but I recall in Carrie Lyford's Quill and Beadwork of the Western Sioux, she said something to the effect that horse back sinew was particularly prized because the fibers were "long and easy to roll." By "rolling," I am confident that she meant twisting the short strands into longer ones. This photo illustrates it:


On the left is a dried elk leg tendon. In the middle are strands from a similar tendon pounded up, and on the right is a cord twisted from some of that same batch of fibers. That cord is roughly 1mm in diameter and about seven feet long. The cord is pretty stiff. I intend to soften it up a little with a brief soak prior to lacing up my project. However, the point of this is that you don't need to keep repeatedly tying off short strands if you twist them into a single longer one.

Single strands of sinew are generally tapered, slightly wider on one end and tapering to a fine tip at the other. I have heard of leaving the finer end dry, as @tenngun describes, to form a natural "needle." I have no doubt that this was done, but actual needles were also used. Richard Irving Dodge commented on this in Our Wild Indians (p. 257):


I found it interesting that by Dodge's time (1827-1895) the native women were using "civilized appliances" (i.e. needle and thread) for most of their sewing, but they preferred sinew for beadwork... and they used it with needles.

Best regards,

Notchy Bob

 

[LME]

Have any of you stitched clothing (non leather items) such as cloth or wool using real sinew? Would that work? Was considering as a challenge to myself to see a capote using real sinew.

If sinew gets wet you want like it? I have used sinew on arrows for primitive bows. I researched a lot about this subject and found that indians used pine tar mixed with animal fat over the sinew when they could when they tied their stone head on the shaft. My therory is to keep it dry?
There are numerous plant fibers they used to sew things together. I would look at that way before using sinew on clothes.

 

[Black_Feather]

So, on the subjects of moccs and bags, since they wouldve been greased, would you just use some sort of tallow and beeswax mixture?

 

[Notchy Bob]

I don't know much about capotes in general, but this thread prompted me to investigate a little.

If you are researching guns, powder horns, shot pouches, knives, and that sort of thing, there are tons of old ones pictured online and in books. Not so with capotes. There are a lot of new ones, a lot of patterns and instructions, and a number of old photographs of native people wearing capotes, but there are just not many detail shots of real antiques available. I only found these two real antiques, and I doubt they are really all that old. This one is on the Worthpoint website:


There was not much about it. The seller said it came from northern Manitoba and had actually been used by a Metis trapper. It was made from a relatively rare five-point genuine Hudson's Bay blanket. No details about how it was stitched.

This one, however, was on the Etsy website, with several excellent detail photos. Again, the seller had no idea how old it was, and I suspect it may have even been made by a devoted buckskinner in the 1970's, but it looks like the real deal:



They provide some good detail of the seams, noting that they are blanket-stitched with colored thread matching some of the stripes on the blanketing.



It appears to me that the coat was stitched right-side-out, which would make sense to keep those bulky seams from bearing against the person wearing it. However, I had not given this much thought before. I suppose if one were to stitch a capote with sinew, this would be the way to do it.

Notchy Bob

 

[Cvkotvkse]

Decades ago, I made the blanket case for my first muzzleloader out of scraps left over from a red Hudson's Bay blanket that had been used by an Abenaki friend to have a capote made, stitched with sinew that I had dried, pounded, separated, wet with saliva, and then let dry. The stiffness made a needle unnecessary with the openness of the weave of the blanket. Yes, it took multiple strands, but they knotted easily, and have retained their strength. It has held up well, even surviving a gentle cycle machine wash recently! (Necessitated by contamination by pollen to which my wife was horrendously allergic...)
Have been told it still looks good holding my old CVA Hawken with the 1840's stock stain, linseed oil and lampblack finish, and antique domed tacks on the stock.

 

[gmo]

Decades ago, I made the blanket case for my first muzzleloader out of scraps left over from a red Hudson's Bay blanket that had been used by an Abenaki friend to have a capote made, stitched with sinew that I had dried, pounded, separated, wet with saliva, and then let dry. The stiffness made a needle unnecessary with the openness of the weave of the blanket. Yes, it took multiple strands, but they knotted easily, and have retained their strength. It has held up well, even surviving a gentle cycle machine wash recently! (Necessitated by contamination by pollen to which my wife was horrendously allergic...)
Have been told it still looks good holding my old CVA Hawken with the 1840's stock stain, linseed oil and lampblack finish, and antique domed tacks on the stock.

Do you have a picture, by any chance? I like this idea.

 

[rich pierce]

If one has linen cloth, threads can be pulled from the edge and used to sew that fabric or any other. I’ve used sinew for bowstrings. There’s a lot of work involved and it’s no good when it gets wet.

 

[oldwood]

I'm leaning toward advising you to look at the artificial sinue from the Crazy Crow Catalog. I've used it , and it looks real .