Scrimshaw Trivia Quiz

Answer: Scrimshander

Both scrimshaw and scrimshander come from unknown language paths but scalawag actually has nothing to do with maritime terms. Instead it was a name given to American Southerners who supported reconstruction after the Civil War.

Answer: 19th Century

Of course the craft may be older than the 19th century but the earliest piece is dated to 1817 to a ship out of London named Adam. What could be handier than the date being scrimmed on the whale's tooth? The tooth further states that the whale gave 100 barrels of oil.

Answer: Mystic Whaling Museum

The museum is located in Mystic, Connecticut.

Answer: Lampblack

Lampblack is nothing more than soot in a lantern mantle. The soot accumulates when there is not the proper mixture of oxygen for the flame and the fuel doesn't burn cleanly, leaving behind a black film called lampblack.

Answer: Tagua nuts

The ivory-nut palm, or Tugua nut has the same consistency as ivory but instead of killing animals all that is required is harvesting the nuts instead.

Answer: True

So as to not get the wrong idea baleen is found in only some species of whales and it is only located in the whale's mouth.It composes the upper jaw and it filters out plankton which is their food source.

Answer: False

While the whalers did not use it, modern scrimshanders buy old piano keys to make new works upon and the source of much of this ivory came from elephants via piano keys.

Answer: John F. Kennedy

It's interesting that JFK was a collector as he served in the presidency during the 1960s. During this same period works of scrimshaw had a revival in American interests and people set out doing it for themselves. I myself remember watching the man do it in the window front in a store in Woodbridge Mall, New Jersey.

Answer: false

While these chessmen which were found in the Outer Hebrides of Scotland are made from walrus tusks the dating of these artifacts is much earlier than scrimshaw artifacts. Scrimshaw as we've seen has been dated significantly post-Renaissance and it is primarily two dimensional in nature. The chessmen are carved figures [three dimensional] and they date as early as the 12 century AD.

Answer: Pacific

The art work flourished from the isle of Fiji initially but it was not isolated to only there. Today the art-form is practiced chiefly in Alaska and Siberia where walruses and whales remains can be found on beaches for harvesting the ivory needed to do scrimshaw work.

In the United States even finding ivory and keeping it is illegal but Eskimos and Inuits are allowed to harvest and sell works with certificates of origin.