Customer Reviews

Muzzleloader Magazine's The Book of Buckskinning

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This is the first book I've ever read on Buckskinning.
This book is a collection of magazine articles.
Each article is written by a participant and their
interest and committment in the hobby/sport/lifestyle
are obvious. The book has many pictures of people
and buckskinning events. Many drawings of the artifacts
are also included. I have attended buckskinning gatherings
in the past when they are open to the public at local historical
events. This book explains what is expected of the buckskinners
and their guests such as how to approach and enter a tipi, Which
anachronisms are acceptable and which are not. I really enjoyed
the article on putting up a tipi and tipi living.

Black Powder shoots are an integral part of the activities
both target practice and hunting. The basic methods of Knife and
Tommahawk throwing are taught(I bought me a hand forged,
guarenteed for life, tommahawk this summer.)

Crafts such as Blacksmything and beadwork are also covered.

Over all, the book is fun and interesting. Additional books
are in the series but I haven't read them yet.

Historical re-enacting has been a part of my life for a very long time,and this book was one of the first guides I had. And it is still one of the best for the newcomer to the hobby, despite being first published 21 years ago. Basic clothing, tents and tipis, camp behavior, the crafts of 'buckskinning' are all here. One minor criticism from me is that this volume, more so than the others in the series, concentrates on the Western Fur trade era, to the exclusion of the eastern frontiersman, but to be fair, when this book was published most of the interest in re-enacting was leaning more toward the 'mountain man' rather than the 'long hunter'. Despite this, I highly recommend this book and all its companion volumes (8 total books...)for anyone interested in the wonderful hobby of historical re-enacting...

I admit that I bought this several years before amazon.com came into existence. That aside, this is a must for anyone who is interested in 'mountain man' recreations. It's all in here: the clothes, the guns, the accoutrements, the jewelry. There's even information on the food!

The gun information is wonderful (my favorite). It is a bit biased towards flintlocks, though, which is a bummer for those who are going for a later period impression and using a caplock.However, caplocks are discussed and the limited information provided is quite good.

The series is produced by the same guys who do MUZZLELOADING magazine and it sticks to their same high standards.

Note: buying the books individually gets exspensive, so try to save some money by buying them in sets.

Excellent book for the mountain craft enthusiast. It has great guidelines for getting starteds in the Mountain Man clubs and many natural crafts projects.