Halide Sarıoğlu, Melda Özdemir

Keywords: Leather,military leather goods and accessories,leather items in Harbiye Museum

Abstract

Leatherwork has been the most used material after stone and wood since ancient times. Leatherwork has developed in time with hum an's learning how to proccess it and taken its place at numerous branches ranging from home and clothing materials to various accessories.

One of these areas is the use of leather for military purposes. It is well known that leather, having a large range of usage in the lives of Turks, was used in the making of such materials of the army as boots, harnessing, tirkeş, quivers, bowstring, drum, kös (big drum) from the establishment of Ottoman Empire onwards.

Today there have been some of leather arts at the museums and collections. The items at the İstanbul Harbiye Military Museum have a large range. This study focuses on military accessories belonging to this Museum. Leather goods and accessories were examined in terms of the features of materials, designs and compositions.