Scrimshaw is a form of art that is created by the carving and etching into certain firm materials. The most common materials to be carved into are ivory, shells, or bone. However, scrimshaw can also be created using tagua nut (A large nut found in Columbia, Northwestern Brazil, and Peru), Sculpey, or shed antler.
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFzL5Ge1X1EHX89m2p-XhLmpqATtL9juCyXajHz6MH5V259wsIPmP0u-liL53qqL_8N_W83qNOvv05rUwwLG-naN1L-VDuSf20tsBJV1IvpuUpS_Idz5Am-ykR6iaBZe1W2g1xCFjffaay/s320/scrim+box.jpg)
People who create scrimshaw usually create a variety of different things, because if you were to only make one type of art with one type of material than it would be hard to keep that art as your passion. Some people create scrimshaw on knife handles, and it can also be created on the tops of boxes. Some scrimshaw is made using plain bone as the canvas, and other scrimshaw is laid out of as picture frames. There are many different forms of scrimshaw.
One who makes scrimshaw is known as a scrimshander.
In the scrimshaw field, it is most often that the theme of the piece is either sailing or ships. Many of the pieces I found included large ships and almost a pirate-esk feel. I'm not sure why this theme is so popular, but it seems to be very common in scrimshaw works.