when entering the home of a friend, any concealed weapons would be revealed. It follows that the would be removed from its hiding place and displayed in the stocking top held securely by the garters. The also resembles the small skinning knife that is part of the typical set of hunting knives. These sets contain a butchering knife with a blade, and a skinner with a blade of about . These knives usually had antler handles, as do many early sgian-dubhs. The larger knife is likely the ancestor of the modern dirk. Bog oak, jet black in appearance, was a very hard wood suitable for the purpose. The handles on the stag knives simulate horn which was also traditionally used. Any ornamentation is merely a reflection of the Highlander's lack of confidence in paper money which resulted in him embellishing much of his personal wearing apparel with silver and valuable cairngorm stones. Thus he carried on his person most of his worldly wealth. The black dagger () was usually carried in a place of concealment very often under his armpit (or oxter). When the Highlander visited a house on his travels having deposited all his other weapons at the front door he did not divest himself of his concealed dagger. Etiquette called for its removal from its place of concealment and displayed somewhere where his host could see it, usually in the stocking on the side of his dominant hand (right- or left-handed). The can be seen in portraits of kilted men of the mid-19th century. A portrait by Sir Henry Raeburn of Colonel Alasdair Ranaldson MacDonell of Glengarry hangs in the National Gallery of Scotland; it shows hanging from his belt on his right hand side a Highland Scottish dirk, and visible at the top of his right stocking what appears to be a nested set of two sgian-dubhs. A similar sgian-dubh is in the collection of The National Museum of Antiquities of Scotland. Construction The early blades varied in construction, some having a "clipped" (famously found on the Bowie knife) or "drop" point. The "spear-point" tip has now become universal. The earliest known blades, some housed in the National Museum of Scotland in Edinburgh, are made from German or Scandinavian steel, which was highly prized by the Highlanders. Scalloped filework on the back of the blade is common on all Scottish knives. A short blade of is typical.