[Ansteorra] period shoe polish

[Stefan li Rous]

Does anyone know whether they used such a thing as shoe polish in period to refresh scuffed shoes?

I have a pair of period style shoes that were made, I believe, in a modern third-world country. They are made of a fairly shiny, brown pebbled finish leather. After a number of SCA events, the toes were getting roughed up and losing their color and there were some scuff marks on the heals.

I ended up using a modern liquid shoe polish from a bottle since that is what I had on hand. However, while the scuff marks are now brown again, they aren't as shiny as the rest of the leather.  These are very soft leather shoes, so I'm not sure that a paste wax would have made any difference or not.

I find it hard to believe that our period forebears wouldn't have done something to refresh the looks of their shoes. However, maybe the rich just got new shoes and the poor couldn't afford to bother?

Thanks,
   Stefan

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THLord Stefan li Rous    Barony of Bryn Gwlad    Kingdom of Ansteorra
   Mark S. Harris           Austin, Texas          StefanliRous at austin.rr.com
http://www.linkedin.com/in/marksharris
**** See Stefan's Florilegium files at:  http://www.florilegium.org ****