Leather bloom

To comment on the request for information regarding spue in 18th to 20th
century bindings:

In objects conservation as I was taught in England (and this may be more
a vocabulary difference) a white deposit found on the surface of leather
is called "spue".  It is generally suspected to be a dressing that has
oozed out of the leather.  In general it has a waxy, white appearance,
and pretty much looks like it has seeped out of the pores of the
leather.  Right now we have a bunch of 19th and 20th century saddles in
the lab covered with spue.  However, I can't tell you anyone that has
analyzed this material, but that doesn't mean it hasn't been done. There
is a publication called "Leather Conservation News".  The editor is

    Paul Storch
    Minnesota History Center
    345 Kellog Blvd.
    West, St. Paul, MN 55102-1906
    612-296-9961.

This newsletter could have some information of interest.

Jessie Johnson
Materials Conservation Lab
Texas Memorial Museum
BRC #122, 10100 Burnet Road
Austin, TX  78758

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                  Conservation DistList Instance 7:67
                  Distributed: Friday, March 25, 1994
                        Message Id: cdl-7-67-002
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From whenry [at] lindy__stanford__edu
To: tqaa345 [at] UTXVM__CC__UTEXAS__EDU Fri Mar 25 00:00:00 1994
Date: Friday, March 25, 1994
Message-Id: cdl-7-67-003
From: Walter Henry <whenry [at] lindy__stanford__edu
To: tqaa345 [at] UTXVM__CC__UTEXAS__EDU>
Subject: Leather bloom

>In objects conservation as I was taught in England (and this may be more a
>vocabulary difference) a white deposit found on the surface of leather is
>called "spue".

I missed it this morning, but under the variant spelling "spew", the
OED has:

     spew , sb. Also 7-9 spue. [f. the vb.]
...
b. techn.  (See quot.)
 1893 Labour Commission Gloss. No. 9, Spew-out, the emanation similar
to treacle of the glucose from the uppers or leather when kept for a
time.
...

In any case, I'm rather surprised that Roberts and Etherington doesn't
mention leather dressing in the entry on  "bloom".

onward
w

                                  ***
                  Conservation DistList Instance 7:67
                  Distributed: Friday, March 25, 1994
                        Message Id: cdl-7-67-003
                                  ***