two Ebay Scots Guards sporran oddities

[OC Richard]

Admittedly there's probably more than two, but these jumped out to me today.

First is a sporran that's wrongly listed. The seller calls it "Black Watch" but it's the Scots Guards style.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Black-Watch-...AAAOSwGOxW~7pH

The oddity is that it's far too short. All military pipers' sporrans are around 18 inches long, this appears to be only around 14 inches or so.

Short hair sporrans were introduced for Other Ranks in the 1970s, a generic pattern with ugly fat chrome top. This sporran seems to be made to the length of those, which is strange.

Here's a photo from the listing. The box is made for the normal full-length sporrans, which makes it clear how short this thing is



The second one is this one, a strange mongrel. It's a Scots Guards style cantle but in brass. The sporran has the five bullion tassels such as are worn on the Officers' Levee Dress sporrans of a number of regiments. And last but not least a badge is crudely riveted onto the cantle.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Long-Horse-H...4AAOSwh-1W5VDC

[kilted firefighter]

The second listing ships from Bahrain. Not exactly a hotbed of Scottish culture me thinks.

[Tarheel]

I suspect spell check gave away the secret that the second sporran (with it's "tessels" ) may not be military issue.

[MacCathmhaoil]

Both make me think that they were assembled off shore, from left over bits and pieces so that they could squeeze the last few $/£/€/¥ out of their remaining stock. I'm not sure that any of the reputable military suppliers would be caught dead selling these.