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  • Waterlogged Organic Artefacts – Guidelines on their Recovery, Analysis and Conservation. The Historic England guidance booklet has recently been revised to reflect organisational changes.The new layout makes it more suitable for digital distribution and screen reading and you can access a copy here for free: Waterlogged Organic Artefacts

  • Newsletter No. 48 The latest Newsletter, for September 2018, is now available in the Members' area of this site (see menu opposite).

  • Two recent books on gilt leather:

    F. Pereira (2017), De Córdoba para Portugal: el comercio de guadamecíes en el siglo XVI, Chiado books
    looks at 16th century contracts in which ornate gilt leather wall hangings, cushions and altar frontals were traded from Córdoba to the Portuguese court.

    A. Caldas and F. Pereira (2017), Pele com Pele, Transfiguraçao & Transcendência, Chiado Books
    illustrates the authors' creative work in producing gilt leather artefacts to their own designs, as well as showing what these owe to the medieval and later craft traditions of the Iberian peninsula.

    De Córdoba para Portugal
    Pele com pele


  • Recent ALG Publication

    Book cover

    The Proceedings of 'Leather in Warfare', a joint conference held by the ALG and the Royal Armouries, Leeds in 2014 is now available to purchase from the Royal Armouries website at £30: Leather in Warfare
    ALG members will receive a 25% reduction on entering a discount code which can be found in the Members' section of our website (see menu opposite).


  • Due to be published in December 2017 is Chariots in Ancient Egypt: The Tano Chariot, A Case Study, by André J. Veldmeijer, Salima Ikram, Ole Herslund, Lisa Sabbahy & Lucy Skinner. The book will be available in print form and as an e-book (pdf), it will also be free to browse online. More advance details, including an Abstract and List of Contents appear here: Chariots in Ancient Egypt

  • Papers from a well-attended conference held by the ALG in 2011 are now published with the title Why Leather? The Material and Cultural Dimensions of Leather. They are available in printed form or as an e-book from the Sidestone Press website and can also be browsed there for free: Why Leather?

  • Northampton Museum's Cinderella Project is currently exploring new ways of displaying shoes, with the aim of securing a wider audience for its internationally renowned shoe collection:
    more details here

  • Chasing Chariots. Proceedings of the First International Chariot Conference (Cairo 2012) edited by André J. Veldmeijer & Salima Ikram, Sidestone Press, 2013.
    This volume contains the proceedings of a conference jointly organised by the Netherlands-Flemish Institute in Cairo (NVIC) and the American University in Cairo (AUC) and held between between 30 November and 2 December 2012. A paper by Salima Ikram, André Veldmeijer and Lucy Skinner presents the first results of research into the Tano chariot (the leather casing and other trappings of a chariot, recently discovered in the Cairo museum), together with a report on its conservation. The book can be read online for free, or purchased as an e-book or in printed form:
    Chasing Chariots

  • ALG now on Facebook
    The Leather Group now has its own page on Facebook where news, photos, queries and details of events can be posted. ALG members and others with shared interests are invited to contribute. Thanks to Lucy Skinner for setting it up:
    Facebook page

  • A CD is now available containing copies of all the ALG Newsletters, from the first issue (Summer 1986) up until September 2017. The Newsletters contain articles on archaeological and historical leather of many periods and these are often well illustrated, particularly in more recent issues. If you are interested in purchasing a CD, it can be ordered online here: Collected Newsletters.

  • André Veldmeijer's book, Leatherwork from Qasr Ibrim (Egypt). Part I: Footwear from the Ottoman Period is now available to purchase as a print volume or as a download from Sidestone Press: Qasr Ibrim. Part 1. It can also be read for free online.

  • "Sandals, shoes and other leatherwork from the Coptic Monastery Deir el-Bachit"
    This report by André Veldmeijer on leatherwork from a site near Luxor, Egypt, is available to purchase as a print volume or ebook
    from the publishers, Sidestone Press. It can also be read online for free: Deir el-Bachit.

  • Waterlogged Organic Artefacts – Guidelines on their Recovery, Analysis and Conservation
    The 1995 English Heritage Guidelines on the care of waterlogged archaeological leather have been reviewed (2012) in the light of new developments in conservation treatments and planning changes affecting the heritage environment. The new guidelines cover other waterlogged organic materials as well as leather and can be freely downloaded from the English Heritage website: Waterlogged Organic Artefacts – EH Guidelines

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    Mozilla Firefox

  • “Leather Trades in medieval Lisbon: from the 12th until the 16th century” by Franklin Pereira (2012). This book, the fruit of many years of documentary research into the history of leatherworking and its artisans is now published on a 'print on demand' basis by Lambert Academic Publishing. It is available from Amazon.co.uk for £41 including free postage within the UK. In the US, Barnes and Noble have it for $54 including postage. It covers the development of this important Portugese industry from the time when it was dominated by Muslim influences to the Renaissance period. As well as looking at the leather trades from an artist's viewpoint, the study aims to shed light on the development of local and national legal frameworks to regulate the trade of saddlers, shoemakers, bag and belt makers and those producing the wall hangings and leather upholstery for which the Iberian peninsula has long been renowned.

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  • The German Leather Museum/German Shoe Museum, Offenbach

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    In March 2011, members of the Leather Group visited this wonderful museum, which is not as well-known as it should be. Nowhere else will you find such a wide-ranging collection, which has a significance for social and folk history and for the history of the decorative arts which goes way beyond its special concern with leather and shoes. We defy any visitor not to find its collections fascinating! On this page, Jutta Göpfrich describes its recent refurbishment and future expansion:
    Offenbach Museum

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  • Recent ALG Publication
    Papers from the Leather Group's 2008 Conference at Walsall Leather Museum have now been published: Leather Tanneries: The Archaeological Evidence is edited by Roy Thomson and Quita Mould and can be obtained from the publishers, Archetype Books (www.archetype.co.uk)

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  • A downloadable .pdf of A. Veldmeijer's recent article on leather from Ancient Egypt can be found here:
    Part X. Leather Composite Sandals
    This presents 15 well-made and well-preserved sandals, many in bright colours and decorated, from New Kingdom contexts. It forms part of the Ancient Egyptian Footwear Project.

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  • John Parrott's book on the history of the tanning industry in Wantage, Oxfordshire, has just been published. Details can be found here: The Largest Tanyard in the Kingdom

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  • If you have any problems using this website (e.g. links not working) please let us know:

    contact ALG