Not a piper but like the look of a horse hair sporran

[OC Richard]

I wish they still made 'em long and a bit scraggly on the ends like in the old photos.
Now, they're all trimmed short and perfect on the bottom. I much prefer the look of
the old ones.

What you're mainly seeing is the difference between goathair sporrans and horsehair sporrans.

But even with horsehair sporrans, the way the bottom is finished is something which has changed over time, one of those "fashion" things that changes for no apparent reason. (And in old photos and old catalogues it's sometimes very difficult to tell goathair and horsehair sporrans apart.)

Anyhow, here are some Highlanders in 1856 showing the fashion of letting the bottom end in a fringe of scraggly hair



Now here are some Pipe Majors c1900 showing the fashion(s) at that time



and here in the 1960s we can see that the sporrans are often trimmed to a curve





Currently in the Army there's a tendency to trim the bottom straight across, which I don't care for





My sporran BTW is a modern goathair one, with a vintage cantle