Old Ooks

There's a movement in angling towards using really old gear, ancient cane rods, antiquated reels, sitting on wicker creels and generally turning the back on the modern and efficient. Well, for all you traditional anglers out there, ere's something you don't ave in your Ogden's 'Redbreast' Flake tin and probably never will unless you buy them from me...

 
Old ooks...

Now I don't mean these were the kinds of ooks used by Dick Walker, no, these are older than that. I don't even mean they were the kinds of ooks used by that 17th Century geezer, Walton, no, they are older even than im.

What I'm talking about and showing to all you disciples of the cane, is really bloody old ooks and the kinds of ooks used by the grandmother of all anglers, Dame Juliana Berners, born 1338, because these are nothing less than Medieval ooks for Medieval fisherpeople.

I found these ooks on the Thames Foreshore in London about twenty years ago in a previous life as a Mudlark. They are not at all common, let me tell you. Such fragile iron things as ooks are preserved by the oxygen free conditions of the famous and miraculous Thames mud for alf a millenium, they eventually wash out and once exposed to the air, rot to nothing in a week. That's ow I know their age because the deposits they washed out of were 14th -15th Century ones producing other more easily dateable items like coins and buckles.

All ave spade ends — there was no such thing as an eyed ook then. The long one is a worm ook probably for flounder, the wide gape pattern which is about the size of a modern size 2 is probably a salmon ook because the river ad enormous runs of that fish in the middle ages, but the smallest is a mystery. Its very short shank and in-turned point puts me in mind of a modern circle ook and I reckon that's more or less what it is — a longline ook.

Interesting ain't they? You couldn't use them though, they'd not land a roach in the state they're in now, but you could look at them and wonder how little things ave really changed in five undred years because brand new they'd still work as well as any ook you could buy in a shop today.

I'm selling them on Ebay if you're interested?

Lots of watchers but no bids as of yet — they'll go for a few quid though, for sure, but make me an offer, I'll strike the listing and sell them offline.

As for droppin' me H's...

As a Cockney... just like old ooks... don't ave a use for em!