Hi Brad,

I think that this is a very difficult subject to write about with most persons learning directly on the job however some years ago (March 1992) Paul Russell penned an article for the Architects Journal which covered the construction of the library barn at South Harting, West Sussex, England and this included one of the better attempts at explaining how to scribe. I Have a copy of this article in *.pdf format which is about 2.5mb so if you would like me to email this to you (and any of the other TFG forum regulars come to that) then please send me an email at ken@kfhume.freeserve.co.uk and I will undertake to forward a copy of the article for your enlightenment.

For what its worth Paul Russell is in my opinion probably the best carpenter that I have met to date. I have been fortunate to examine examples of his work first hand and this is observed to be closer to original vernacular practice than most due to his sensible, economic and careful use of less than perfect timbers hence his judicious use of scribed timbers.

Regards

Ken Hume

I too believe Paul to be the finest carpenter I've ever had the good fortune to work with, and consider him to have been something of a mentor. Working with him certainly changed everything about how I approach my work.

The article is likewise, perhaps the clearest description of how to scribe, I've read to date, there's a bedraggled dog eared photocopy in one of these file cabinets, or did I tuck it into a book...