A Botter in the Zuiderzeemuseum (Enkhuizen, The Netherlands) 

History and context

Looking at old maps it is amazing to see how land and water intertwined once in the northern part of the Netherlands, Noord Holland and Friesland in particular. It is even more so, when one drives through Noord Holland and reminds oneself that this once was a patchwork of islands and shallow stretches of sea. The Dutch fought - and continue to fight - the sea and at the same time a good part of the populations lived off the sea. The Zuiderzee (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zuiderzee) once was a vast bay of the North Sea, reaching deep into the country, nearly down to Amsterdam. It served as throughfare for transport and as a rich fishing resource. However, pressure on the scarce land was high and the sea was a constant menace to the low-lying shores and islands. As part of their struggle against the sea, the Dutch dammed up the bay by a large dike, the Afsluitdijk (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Afsluitdijk), completed in 1933. This put an end to much of the fisheries. The already in its southern part brackish Zuidezee finally turned into a large freshwater lake, the Ijsselmeer.

Over the course of history there have been various types of sailing fishing vessels with numerous local variants. The best-known is probably the Botter (and its larger variant Kwak). At one stage it was estimated that there were over 1000 in operation at the end of the 19th century. The places around the Zuiderzee with the most botters were Enkhuizen, Volendam/Edam, Monickendam, Marken, Bunschoten and Urk. Spakenburg was an important building place.

Man's tools to win a lifelihood constantly change and are being adapted to changing circumstances, new needs and fashions as well. Thus, methods of fishing evolved in order to increase efficiency and in response to changes to the fishing grounds and other environmental circumstances that influenced the availability of the resource 'fish'. The history of the botter is not easy to trace as no artefacts have survived and artistic renderings are not so reliable bevore say the late 18th century. As with all small boats, they were built without any drawings well into the 20th century. The botter or its somewhat larger version the Kwak as we know it today developed over the past two hundred years.

Sizes vary, but a typical botter has a keel of about 34 feet long.

 

Sources

There are quite a number of comprehensive printed works on the botter and its history (see below). These include also drawings. Some original drawings are preserved in various museums in the Netherlands. However, like so many traditional small boats, botters were usually built without any drawings. The museums also preserve various model built from about the early 19th century onward. There are also surviving quite a number of original botters, the oldest being from the last quarter of the 19th century.

These boats survived because they have been adapted as pleasure craft. Obviously, a lot of concessions had to be made in this case to accommodate the modern leisure-boaters and therefore these boats are not useful for a reconstruction. In more recent years some of these have been reconverted into a state that is more like their original workday appearance. Also, from the end of the 19th century onward some botters had been built als pleasure craft for private owners. They usually deviate somewhat from the work boats and are often fitted with a cabin, as is found e.g. on boeiers.

The Zuiderzeemuseum (https://www.zuiderzeemuseum.nl/home/?language=en) in Enkhuizen preserves a late botter in its boat-hall (https://www.maritima-et-mechanika.org/maritime/zuiderzee/zuiderzee.html).The Zuiderzeemuseum also has a large collection of ship- and boatmodels, including several botters. Some of the models appear to be contemporary, while others have been built in more recent times.

 

The Model

The model is based on the resin kit produced by Artitec (https://www.artitec.nl) in 1:90 (HO) scale. This company has developed a real mastery in casting complex and large resin parts. In addition to the hull, the kit contains castings for the mast and spars, for rigging blocks and, somewhat strangely perhaps, the taken-down sails. Of course, these kits are mainly meant as accessories for model railway layouts and people not knowing a lot about these craft. The kit also contains a small fret of etched parts, mainly for the ironwork of the rigging. While the etched parts are well made as such, they are for the most part not really useful for representing the forged ironwork. For instance, etched mast-hoops are, of course, flat in the horizontal direction, while they should really be short tubes. Other parts simply lack the needed plasticity. Hence most of the etched parts will not be used. Similarly, the cast rigging blocks will be replaced by shop-made ones and 'real' sails will be made. I bought the kit 'second hand' and at some stage the characteristic high stem head was broken off and a new one will have to grafted on. Various other details will be improved for better definition of the shapes. Although the casting is well made, there are certain limitations due to the casting process. A company policy of Artitec is to limit the number of parts and to cast-on as many details as possible. Thus, for instance the spill is cast onto the foredeck. There are limitations to undercuts in the silicone rubber molds, hence the barrel is not completely free. I shall have to remove the material underneath the barrel using a scalpel etc.

The main cast resin item, the botter’s hull

Not only are Artitec masters in casting kits, but also in painting them as is evidenced for instance by the diorama of the Texel Roadsted (https://www.maritima-et-mechanika.org/maritime/texel/texel.html) and models in various other museums around the Netherlands.

To be continued ....

Lovely to see this little beauty again Eberhard.

cheers

Pat

First preparations

Actually, I didn’t do so much with the resin apart from cutting off bits and pieces, but the resin is quite easy to work with, though a bit brittle.

The building begins with removing the casting pips. It appears that the model was cast upside-down, so that excess resin is found only at the bottom of the hull. This excess was cut off with an abrasive disk in the hand-held power-drill. The bottom was then ground flat at the waterline on a piece of wet-and-dry sanding paper.

It is important to hold the hull securely during the various building steps. To this end two 2.5 mm holes were drilled into the solid part of the hull and tapped for M3 screws with which it can screwed down on a piece of wood for safe handling. The tapped holes will also used to hold down the model in its dioramic setting.

 

The hull casting was inspected for any flash and which was removed with a scalpell and files. Luckily, there was hardly any flash. As the next step the hull casting was compared with drawings from the literature, mainly VAN BEYLEN (1985) and DORLEIJN (2001), as well as pictures taken of a Marker botter in the Zuiderzeemuseum while I was living in nearby Alkmaar from 2006 to 2009. As is discussed below, the model will represent a botter from Marken. Botters from different regions differed in some details and these should be represented as true as is reasonably possible at this small scale. When going over the casting, a number of 'problems' were noted: a) the spill lacks some definition of detail, although the general shape is well represented; also a pawl bit is modelled, while normally the pawl would be pivoted on the inside band of the stem; b) the horse for the traveller of the main sheet is foreseen as an iron bar (an etched part), while the more common arrangement is a wooden horse integrated into the slightly raised stern-platform; c) the leeboards are meant to be glued onto wedge-shaped protrusions on the leeboard bollards; on the prototype, the leeboards are suspended on a pin that ties into a band that is laid around the bollard; d) the horizontal wooden knees left and right of the stem-head are missing, but the whole stem-head has to be rebuilt anyway. In addition, holes for thole-pins etc. have to be drilled through. There are other little bits and pieces that need to be improved, but they will not all be listed here.

To be continued ...

Key literature 

BEYLEN, J. VAN (1985): De botter - Geschiedenis en bouwbeschrijving van een Nederlands visserschip.- 223 p., Weesp (De Boer Maritiem).

DORLEIJN, P. (2001): De Bouwgeschiedenis van de Botter. Vierendertig voet in de kiel.- 168 p., Lelystad (Uitgeverij Van Wijnen).

Further preparation of the resin hull

The inside of the bow as cast

Drawing of the inside of the bow from VAN BEYLEN (1985)

In between, the hull-moulding was freed from cast-on belaying and other pins as well as the collar for the leeboards. All parts were replaced in metal for better definition. The respective holes for belaying and thole pins were opened up properly. The missing stem-head was fashioned from an off-cut piece of polyurethane resin. Bands and rubbing strakes for the forestay haliard were added from styrene sheet and copper wire. On close inspection it was found also that the stern piece was too narrow to accommodate the pintels for the rudder. It was widened with a piece of resin stuck on. The tiller from the kit didn't look quite like what I had seen in the literature and on real boats.  Consequently, a new one was rough millled from a piece of Plexiglas and finish filed to shape. The tiller was completed with the band from styrene that holds it together in the prototype.

The horse for the traveller was also fashioned from a piece of Plexiglas that had just the right thickness. All seams were filled with putty. From putty were also sculpted the stem knees. The horse also received rubbing strakes from thin copper wire.

The inside of the stern as cast

Drawing of the inside of the stern from VAN BEYLEN (1985)

To be continued ...

The Anchor winch

Given the problems with the winch, it was cut completely from the moulded hull in order to be rebuilt as a separate item. Square holes and recessions cannot be easily machined from the solid. Therefore, the winch was built up from a number of parts that would facilitate machining, The 0.5 mm x 0.5 mm holes for the handle bars were cut as slots into a section of 4 mm round brass bar.

Milling four slots into the future winch-stem

The ratchet wheel was cut on the milling machine with a dividing attachment.

Wheel-cutting on the dividing attachment on the milling-machine

All parts had a 1 mm hole drilled lengthwise to take up a 1 mm brass rod as axle. Brass was chosen in order to be able to soft-solder all parts together for the subsequent machining operations and to provide an axle.

The roughened out segments for the winch-stem

The cigar-shape of the spill-ends was turned with the Lorch free-hand turning device.

F

reehand-turning on the watchmaker’s lathe with a special tool-holder

The piece was then transferred back to the dividing attachment (https://www.maritima-et-mechanika.org/tools/dividingapparatus/dividingapparatus.html)  on the mill and the eight sides of the winding drum were milled on.

Milling the eight-sides winch-body

The completed winch-stem

And installed in the hull

to be continued ...

Leeboards

The leeboards are cast in resin, but due to the casting process in an open mold, their back is flat and without any sculpting. In reality, they are not just flat boards, but they have a cross-section almost like an airfoil. In fact, they are hollowed out over some part to create a hydrodynamic lift that counteracts the leeway and also pushes the leeboard against the boat. Using files and diamond rotary burrs the appropriate shape was given and the separations of the individual boards of which the leeboards are composed were engraved.

The worked over leeboards from the kit

Belaying cleats

There are various belaying cleats distributed around the hull. The kit has photoetched parts for these, but somehow, they appear rather flat. In addition, some or all of them would have to be of the single-horned variety, rather than the more common double-horned one, as foreseen in the kit. Replacements were roughened out on the mill from a strip of brass and sliced off on the lathe. They were finished using small grindstones and polishers in the hand-held power-drill.

Rough-shaping the half-cleats

The finished halt-cleats at their places

Improving the exterior of the hull

Again, the casting of the hull is nicely done, but Artitec were a bit overenthusiastic in depicting a rather worn state. If there were such big gaps in the hull, the boat would sink to the bottom of the Zuiderzee like a sieve. To counteract the rather rustic appearance, fly-tying silk was glued as 'caulking' into the gaps using varnish.

‘Caulking’ the plank seams

To be continued …

Mast- and spar-making

The cast mast was nicely done by Artitec - in principle, but was too short for a boat of this size, did not have the right chocs for a boat from Marken and above all was warped. A new mast was fashioned on the lathe from a piece of steel rod - I did not have suitable stock of boxwood or similar and brass, aluminium or plexiglas would have not been stiff enough. The mast was turned in steps on the watchmaker’s lathe. This also allowed to turn-on the mast bands. It was then transferred to the dividing attachment (https://www.maritima-et-mechanika.org/tools/dividingapparatus/dividingapparatus.html) on the milling machine to mill-on the squares. The various eyebolts and cranes were fashioned from copper-wire and soldered or glued on.

Mast in the dividing attachment for the milling machine that was built at the same time from antique lathe parts

Basic mast

Eye-bolts and cranes attached

Like the mast, the boom was turned on the lathe from a 2 mm steel rod. The flexing of the rod under the cutting pressure was utilised to obtain the taper towards both ends.

The boom in the process of being turned on the watchmaker’s lathe

Again, the bands were turned-on and the boom was transferred to the dividing apparatus for drilling holes for eye bolts etc. The goose neck was turned from steel and the square, where it attaches to the boom, milled-on using a very small end-mill. This straight part was then bent to form the goose-neck

The gaff has a rather odd, pear-shaped cross-section. In addition its longitudinal shape is rather crooked. It was fashioned from a piece of brass wire that was tapered off and bent to the right shape.

The gaff

A piece of brass sheet was cut to follow the curve of gaff and hard-soldered to the brass wire. The pear-shape was filled-up with soft solder. Then the claws that were fashioned from brass were soldered on. Finally, the 0.2 mm holes for the line with which the sail is attached were drilled. The gaff was completed with various bands fashioned from partially flattened copper wire.

The completed boom and gaff

To be continued …

Some very nice miniature metal smithing there Eberhard.

cheers

Pat

More ‘iron-‘work

The smithy of the boatyard has been busy and turned out various pieces of ironwork for rigging and other purposes:

The mast is held in its tabernacle by a latch hinging on eyebolts.

Mast tabernacle

There is a complex piece of ironwork that guides and holds down the running bowsprit (which will not be shown on the model, as it was normally left home during the winter season, when a reduced rig was used). The ring was turned from a piece of brass rod, while stay was fashioned from a piece of steel rod on both the lathe and the mill, as it has partially a square section. In fact, various parts of the ironwork do have square sections, inter alia to prevent them from turning, or because they have made from square bar, hammered to a round cross-section where needed.

Bowsprit guide

The leeboards are held by sort of square rings that slip over the leeboard-bollards. These rings were made from brass strips soldered together and filed to shape. The leeboard pivots on a bolt that is held by these rings.

Various pieces of ironwork

A major challenge were the various belaying and thole pins. On the prototype their maximum diameter is just under 40 mm, the cylindrical sections generally being around 20 mm. So, in the 1/90 scale this means they are 0.2 to 0.4 mm in diameter, with a length of 3 to 4 mm. There are five different types and the literature (VAN BEYLEN, 1995; DORLEIJN, 2001) gives the typical dimensions and shapes for each them. Turning them from the available brass was impossibe, so that 1 mm steel wire was used as starting material. Even then turning them flying, i.e. supported only in a collet in the headstock proved impossible. This lead to the design and manufacturing of a tailstock-held micro-steady. The spherical parts on the pins where shaped free-hand using files and strips of abrasive paper.

Belaying pin

Specially made micro fixed-steady for turning small slender items on the watchmaker’s lathe.

To be continued …

Rigging-blocks
I have been thinking very hard on ways to make really convincing rigging blocks of late 19th century model. Some of the blocks would have to be as small as 1.6 mm long, while the typical block would be just under 2 mm long. Most of the blocks would have to have external ironwork. The ropes for the running rigging typically would have a diameter of somewhere between 0.15 mm and 0.25 mm in 1/90 scale, depending on the particular rope. This would mean that quite a large number of holes of equivalent diameters would have to drilled to a depth of around 1 mm, which is a bit of a challenge. I wanted to avoid this by cutting slots into the material and inserting real sheaves turned from brass. The slots at the bottom would have to be filled in later.

Shape-milling of blocks with a fly-cutter

Set-up for shape-milling the blocks in a dividing head on the milling machine

The outside shape of the block was to be milled in the dividing head from round stock. A table was prepared that calculated the exact distance of the cutter from the centre-line for each pass, so that eventually the oval shape would emerge. This raw part then was transferred to the lathe for cutting the slots. While perhaps a good idea from a theoretical point of view, the slotted material proved to be too flimsy for further manipulation.

Slotting the blocks on the lathe

The set-up for slotting on the lathe

Therefore, a different method was devised, for which the material was changed from brass to Plexiglas. The outside shape was cut as before, but instead of using a fly-cutter, a dental burr was used, which due to its smaller diameter exerts less force on the part. Then the holes were drilled at pre-calculated positions. The cross-section of the future blocks were positioned in the round Plexiglas stock in a way that the axes of the sheave would coincide with the rotational axis of the dividing head. This arrangement allowed the sheave to be milled out of the solid. The holes then were drilled through with a miniature drill.

Milling of the sheaves from the solid stock

Many ship-modellers just drill their blocks and perhaps, if they have a thin enough tool, attempt to file the edges of the hole round to give an indication of the sheave. However, this never looks quite right, with the ropes sort of sticking out sideways from the hole, rather than running around the sheave.

These blocks then were cut off from the stock on the lathe. It should be noted that the stock was turned down at the end, so that it could be inserted into the collets against a shoulder, ensuring repeatable positioning. The latter was needed, as the dividing head on the lathe and the one on the mill use different types of collets.

The botter has a variety of rather special blocks that also needed to be made, such as the sheepshead-block for the foresail. They were produced by the technique described above, but in some instances were 'eyeballed' from the stock in the dividing head. One violin-block was also built up from Bakelite-paper with real brass sheaves and filed to shape by hand.

The blocks were completed with 'ironwork' from copper wire. On the prototype this ironwork is forged from different sizes of bars. The blacksmith shapes the cross-sections as needed either flat (around the shell of the blocks) or round/oval for the hooks. This process was repeated up to a point by flattening the round copper wire used. In order to flatten the wire in a controllable and repeatable way another watch-repairing tool was adapted: a so-called jewelling press. This tool has a piston the movement of which is controlled by micrometer stop. In watch-repair it is used to set bearings, i.e. the ‚stones’ or ‚rubies’ to an exact depth.

I made some anvils and pistons for it that allow to squeeze the copper wire to a preset thickness over a particular length. The thickness is set with the help of a feeler-gauge.

Jewelling tool

A selection of unpainted blocks

The results from all these labours are by no means perfect, but I think better than what I have seen around in this size.

I am not certain, however, whether I would go down the same route again. It would be useful to be able to solder together the straps, which is out of question for blocks made from Plexiglas. Using Bakelite-paper would be an option, but drilling this material is not so easy, considering the small sizes of drills required. Perhaps one should use boxwood. In both cases round rods would have to produced first from the available stock. Or at least one would need to turn-on a round end, so that the stock can be taken into a collet – square collets for watchmaking lathes don’t exist! (this is another of my future projects, to make a set of square-holed collets*). 

To be continued …

*This happened since: https://www.modelshipworld.com/topic/114-pomeranian-rahschlup-smack-of-1846-by-wefalck-1160-scale/page/3/#findComment-2584

Sail-making

With many parts of the boat actually completed, I turned my attention to the sails. I did this before painting the model, as various fitting and shaping actions will be required that may damage the paintwork.

The plan is to show the sails in a sort of semi-set stage, as they would be in, when the boat is in harbour in order to allow them to dry. This going to be a much bigger challenge to represent convincingly than fully set or furled sails. As the boat will be shown in its winter rig, there will be only two sails.

The raw material is a very thin tissue paper that I found in my stock. The first step was to draw a sail plan 'as built', i.e. with the actual dimensions of the mast, boom and gaff.

Sail-plan ‚as built’

Sail-plan ‚as built’ (detail)

The shape of each panel of sail-cloth was pencilled in also with the help of a French-curve. The drawing then was backed with a piece of stiff cardboard and covered in clingfilm. Based on this pattern, the individual sail-'cloths' were cut from the tissue paper with the addition of 1 mm for the seam. This is rather wide at this scale, but inconsequential as the sail will not be translucent, being tanned and dressed (i.e. soaked in a broth from bark and smeared with a concoction of tallow, oil and ochre) on the prototype. This treatment prevents the formation of mildew and allows to furl the sails when wet without rotting.

The ‚cloths’ of the mainsail.

Using the drawing as a template, panels were stuck together using solvent-based wood-filler as glue. The tissue paper soaks up the filler, turning it into a sort of compound material. I prefer wood-filler over diluted PVA-glue because it does not swell the paper and the joints can be loosened and re-adjusted by applying a drop of thinner. After completing the basic sails, outside margins and doublings were added in the same way based on the detail drawings in VAN BEYLEN (1995) and DORLEIJN (2001).

Glueing together the sail cloths

To be continued …

That tissue paper worked well Eberhard, obviously not your everyday tissue out of the supermarket box?

cheers

Pat

On 7/8/2026 at 10:08 AM, wefalck said:

Shape-milling of blocks with a fly-cutter

Set-up for shape-milling the blocks in a dividing head on the milling machine

I still recognize this setup from my time interning here at the local clockmaker's, that disc with all the holes in it (don't ask me the tool names anymore haha). Nice to see those things again. And I am very impressed by your workshop, beautiful to see!

@Ronald-V It's a dividing disc. I collected those tools since the late 1980s. Now they ask insane price for them.

@Banyan Pat, to be honest I don't remember, where I got the paper from. I suspect it is a 'family heirlom' that survived several house clearances and moves until I took possession of the ream. I may have come from grandfather's office which closed in the late 1960s. It's probably the kind of paper that was used to make carbon copies (cc. ...), but much better quality than what one gets now.

********************************

More from the sail-making loft

The next thing to go on was the bolt-rope. The rope was made on my miniature rope-walk (https://www.maritima-et-mechanika.org/maritime/tips/Ropewalk/Ropewalk.html) from 8/0 size tan fly-tying yarn (UNI-Thread). According to the authors cited, it was left to the individual sailmaker whether the bolt-rope was sewn to the port or starboard side of the sail. I attached all doublings to the port side and decided on the starboard side for the bolt-rope. The ‘rope’ was glued using the wood-filler.

Applying the bolt rope

On the prototype the bolt-rope does not continue all-around the sails, but rather ends at the respective head in spliced eyes. The mainsail is attached to corresponding eyebolts in the gaff with hooks or shackles in these eyes. Owing to the springiness of the fly-tying yarn, I found it impossible to recreate real eye-splices. I took some artisanal license and bound the eyes, pretending they were served eye-splices. The eyes at the other corners of the sails were fashioned in a similar way. To increase the stability of the sail, the corners of the bolt-rope were 'sewn' to the tissue paper using 14/0 size fly-tying yarn (Sheer).

Fake eyesplice

To be continued …

Completion of the sails

The sails were further completed by adding cringles and eyelets. For the cringles the sail was punched with a needle to simulate the eyelets. A piece of 8/0 yarn was threaded through, twisted with itself and secured with a blob of lacquer. The free ends were threaded cross-wise through the second eyelet and secured with knots. The cringle was secured with a bit of lacquer. For eyelets in the sail itself blobs of acrylic gel were set on both sides and once dry punched with a needle.

Sails ready to be painted

The foresail runs on small iron hoops along the forestay. These were reproduced by small rings of copper wire that were sewn to the cringles using 16/0 size yarn (Veevus, https://veevus.dk).

Hoops of the foresails

There are various eyelets in the sail, e.g. for reefing points. These were imitated by a drop of acrylic gel medium glue on both sides of the sail that later was pierced with a needle.

The sails then were checked for any joints having come loose and more wood-filler was applied if needed. Now the sails were ready for painting. The original sails were tanned. Hence, a terracotta colour ('terre' by Prince August Air, https://www.prince-august.net) was chosen as the base colour that was applied with an airbrush. Once on the model some weathering and shading will add more plasticity. The eyelets etc. were ‚metallised’ by turning a soft lead pencil in them.

The painted sails

’Sailmaking’ tools

To be continued …

Painting begins

Now the building has progressed far enough to be able to apply a base-coat of paint. After some preliminary trials I decided on a light terracotta as a base-coat for the hull, while the spars were painted in ‚bois’ (i.e. wood, Prince August Air). On this oak-tinted varnish will be applied to give the ‚wood’, that in the original was painted with tar and harpeus (a mixture of wood-tar and lineseed oil), some depth. The different base-coat colours were chosen to differentiate between the different woods, i.e. oak for the hull and pine for the spars.

The matte base-coat makes quite visible the ‚rustic’ style of modelling by Artitec and also any imperfections in building. Photographic images even further enhance any imperfections that are not so obvious to the naked eye. There is a need to work over one or the other part.

To be continued …

Painting continues

The actual painting is a rather complex procedure and I have not documented all intermediary steps.

The first step after the base-coat was to apply a coat of nitrocellulose-based wood varnish in oak. The idea was to simulate to some extend the surface treatment of the real wood, though with somewhat different materials, in order to create ‚depth’ of the wood surface. I used this method successfully in the past on small parts. Here, however, the problem arose that a second coat or touching up would dissolve the first coat. On the next model I will apply the varnish by airbrush or use an acrylic varnish.

The varnish was cautiously matted with steelwool and a glas-eraser pen. Then the wale and the registration board were painted in black acrylic. The registration number was painted freehand in white acrylic. The next step then was a judicious weathering/washing in burnt umber acrylic to simulate the surface treatment with Stockholm tar. In order to simulate the coal-tarred underwater body burnt umber was applied in more covering layers.

Individual parts, such as the spars, the leeboards, the rudder etc. were treated in a similar way. In order to achieve a uniform degree of matt-ness, everything was coated lightly with the airbrush in Winsor&Newton matte acrylic varnish.

White, beige and black pastels were applied with a brush and Q-tips to simulate grime and salt. The quarter deck and floorboards also attain in this way a nice greyish worn appearance.

The various pieces of ‚ironwork’ received a base-coat in black acrylic with the airbrush. Then a mixture of ‚metallic rust’ (Prince-August Air/Vallejo) and burnt umber was applied with a brush. The parts thus receive a certain patina – in real life they were painted black, painted in lineseed-oil or left bright. On places where the ironwork would have been bright from use a soft pencil (6B) was rubbed, which results in a subtle metallic sheen.

To be continued …

Ethnological studies - Crewing the Botter

As noted at the beginning, the model will be presented in a scenic setting. The ‚story-board’ for this reads like this: a botter from Marken (around the late 1800s) got caught out by ice and made it only into the port of Volendam, where it is locked up now by a solid sheet of ice. It is Saturday afternoon. The crew keeps themselves occupied with some maintenance work, while some Volendammer folk enjoy the cold, but bright winter weather during a walk on the dyke or on the ice. This story was inspired by a winterly visit to the Zuiderzeemuseum in Enkhuizen in February 2009, followed by a drive along the dyke down to Volendam. The Ijsselmeer (Zuiderzee at the time the story takes place) was covered in pack- and pancake-ice.

I don’t find the traditional attire of the women of Marken aesthetically not so pleasing – they had their neck shaved, while long temple-locks dangled from underneath their coifs or caps. The costume of the Volendamm women- and men-folk on the other hand is what we consider ‚the’ traditional Dutch costume. Volendam actually is rather atypical, as it is a catholic ‚island’ in largely protestant surroundings. However, the pictoresque setting and people, as well as increasingly easy accessibility resulted in many painters coming here, so that the Volendam images became icons of the Low Lands. Later, the Dutch tourist board and other marketing organisations perpetrated these images. The above story allows me to show the Marker botter (Volendam mainly used a slightly different variant of it, the Kwak, and the Artitec prototype was a Marker Botter) in a Volendam setting. The winter setting allows me also make Breughel citations of winter pleasures, albeit in a more modern environment.

Marker master-fisherman (© www.geheugenvannederland.nl)

Marker mate (© www.geheugenvannederland.nl)

So, in between the work on the botter model as such, I turned my attention to the botter skipper and his mate. To this end I obtained second hand a set of unpainted Preiser-figurines (https://www-preiserfiguren.de) ‚Various Occupations’, from which I selected two suitable personages. These were carved and sculpted so represent Marker fishermen in their traditional work-a-day outfit. This outfit consist of woolen or linen culots, worn with long dark-blue stockings. The upper body is covered by a dark, woolen shirt with a low upright collar or a turtle-neck sweater. Over this in the winter a short, spencer-type or a pea-jacket was worn. The fishermen appear to have been a hardy species so that one doesn’t see jackets too often on winter-photographs. But they also had woolen underwear. The feet were protected by the iconic wooden clogs. The shape of the clogs varied from village to village. When working the net or doing other wet work, the lower legs were protected by gaiters that reached over the clogs. The characteristic male headgear in Marken was either a black, round (often rather battered) felt-hat or small black képi with a narrow shade.

Scan of the Preiser box

The Preiser country-gentleman or whatever the figure in long boots is mutated into the skipper with the aid of a scalpel and putty. By the same method, an apron-clad drayman with a peaked cap mutated into a fisherman’s mate. The culots were sculpted using putty, while other features, such as shirt collars fell victim to the scalpel. The clogs also were sculpted in putty.

Fisherman ready to painted

Fisherman after receiving a base-coat of paint

I haven’t done any figure-modelling for years so my arsenal of sculpting materials was a bit limited: I just had a 40 year-old tube of Britfix ‚customising body putty’, which to my surprise still was useable. A 20 year-old pack of Milliput ‚grey’ was not quite so fit anymore. The base-coat in terracotta acrylic paint shows up all the places that need to be worked over again. However, remember this is 1/90 scale and the figures are just about 18 mm high and hence appear on the computer several times enlarged.

Fisherman’s mate ready to painted

Fisherman’s mater after receiving a base-coat

To be continued with the actual paint-job ...

A nice crew you've got there, Eberhard.

John

The painting looks very realistic! Really nice 👌