Traditionally, food, shelter, and clothing are regarded as basic human requirements. Textiles can have a significant impact on each field: food can be collected, processed, and prepared in bags or baskets, shelter can be braced by ropes or covered with fabrics, and clothes are preferably made of cloth. Despite the important role of textiles in human history their cultural, social and symbolic meaning is still underestimated in archaeology. However, over the past several years, a growing community of scientists are increasingly networking on this topic at specialized conferences or on an institutional basis via research projects. As a result, more specialized publication series have collated textile research, which was previously presented independently, into clear thematic threads. The ‘Ancient Textile Series’ of Oxbow Books in Oxford started in 2007. The latest issues present collected contributions of several conferences that are associated with two different research groups, both with a strong background in aspects of textile crafts, the Centre of Textile Research (CTR, https://ctr.hum.ku.dk) and the European Textile Forum (ETF, https://www.textileforum.org).
To start with, Volume 32 First textiles: The Beginnings of Textile Manufacture in Europe and the Mediterranean was edited by CTR guest researchers Małgorzata Siennicka, Lorenz Rahmstorf, and their colleague Agata Ulanowska. This book resulted from an EAA session held in Istanbul in 2014 and the ‘First Textiles’ conference in Copenhagen in 2015. The editors ensured that the contributions cover the outer West (e.g. Portugal, Spain) as well as the East (Romania, Bulgaria, Turkey, Greece, etc.); thus, the publication makes an important corpus of data accessible. In their substantial introduction in Chapter 1, they explain that the aim of research was to shed light on the advent of textiles starting from the Upper Palaeolithic until the Early Bronze Age. The following nineteen articles briefly presented here by examples are listed in chrono-geographical order.
As conditions for the preservation of organic materials in the investigated area and period are often unfavourable, not only finds of textiles, but also their depictions as well as the natural environment and the implements used during the production process have to be taken in account. This fact is also reflected by the overall focus of the contributions: Thirteen out of nineteen chapters cover textiles mainly on the basis of tools for the construction of threads and fabrics found in the archaeological record. For instance, Sophia Vakirtzi demonstrates in her article on ‘Fibre Crafts and Social Complexity: Yarn Production in the Aegean Islands in the Early Bronze Age’ that it is possible not only to draw technological, but also far-reaching cultural and economic conclusions by means of spindle whorls. Three chapters investigate the question of the function of crescent-shaped clay objects that can be interpreted as loom weights. Crescents appear in excavations in central and southern Europe from the Neolithic onwards, such as those presented by Catarina Costeira and Rui Mataloto in their paper on ‘Loom Weights and Weaving at the Archaeological Site of São Pedro (Redondo, Portugal)’. In this context Karina Grömer describes her experiments based on finds of the late Neolithic crescents from Melk-Spielberg. She suggests that they could have been used for weaving on a band or a warp-weighted loom, and especially for twining, a conclusion reached by comparing the results of the use-wear analysis around the fixing holes on the archaeological finds and modern replicas. Agata Ulanowska, on the other hand, in the chapter ‘Experimenting with Loom Weights: More Observations on the Functionality of Early Bronze Age Textile Tools from Greece’ comes to the conclusion that crescent-shaped loom weights could have served as multifunctional tools in textile production. All these contributions bring valuable input in the debate on the practical use of this special form of weights.
Apart from implements, the evidence for early textiles is rather sparse: In her article ‘From Adorned Nudity to a Dignitary's Wardrobe: Symbolic Raiment in the Southern Levant 13500–3900 bc’ Janet Levy looks at the pictorial evidence for clothing. She recognizes a general emphasis on headwear which she considers as a sign for its symbolic use. Chapter 3, ‘Discussing Flax Domestication in Europe Using Biometric Measurements on Recent and Archaeological Flax Seeds: A Pilot Study” by Sabine Karg, Axel Diederichsen, and Simon Jeppson is discussing textiles from an archaeobotanical point of view. Through a comparison of seeds from a gene bank with archaeological material, the authors were able to differentiate between fibre and linseed flax. Their promising results underline the need for further investigations in order to find out when systematic exploitation of flax for textile use began. Only one paper concentrates on archaeological remains of actual textiles: Chapter 13, ‘Plant Textiles in a Grave Mound of the Early Bronze Age in Eastern Romania’ by Neculai Bolohan and Ciprian-Cătălin Lazanu examines mineralised textiles from a tumulus in Popeni, interpreted as remains of a large shroud covering the burial and the tomb floor.
Finally, there are three contributions that provide a synthesis of a variety of information: In Chapter 5, Ulla Mannering gives an overview of ‘The Earliest Cloth Culture in Denmark’. She presents not only tools, but also an assembly of finds made of textile material in a wider sense, i. e. skins and furs. Chapter 9, ‘From the Loom to the Forge. Elements of Power at the End of Neolithic in Western Europe: A Focus on Textile Activities’ by Fabienne Médard studies technical and socio-economic changes in textile production. Chapter 10, ‘Textile Manufacture in the Prehistoric Pile Dwellings of South-West Germany: Planned Investigation’ introduces a research project on textile craftsmanship in the prehistoric wetland settlements on Lake Constance and Upper Swabia where the importance of textiles in the context of Neolithisation is examined.
Volume 34, Ancient Textiles. Modern Science II is the second publication of the ETF-conferences. It was edited by Heather Hopkins and Katrin Kania, both experienced experimental textile archaeologists. This monograph includes the proceedings of the third and fourth meetings held in 2012 and 2013, which took place in the Laboratory for Experimental Archaeology (LEA) in Mayen, Germany. The resulting nine papers are reviewed in detail below. While the majority of the contributions deal with Roman and Late Antique contexts, there are also articles dedicated to Early Byzantine or medieval textiles as well as more general topics. In principle, three loosely woven sections are recognizable: while Chapters 1 and 2 focus on aspects of textile analysis, the next four chapters are presenting finds of textiles and tools, while the final three deal with practical issues of textile dyeing.
The technical part focuses solely on non-loom textiles: in Chapter 1, ‘On the Terminology of Non-woven Textile Structures and Techniques, and Why it Matters’, Ruth Gilbert provides an overview of the different classification systems developed by Irene Emery and Annemarie Seiler-Baldinger (Emery, Reference Emery2009, Seiler-Baldinger Reference Seiler Baldinger1991). Although textile structures and techniques are presented in an order from simple to complex, Gilbert strongly advises against an evolutionary perspective and reminds us that both aspects should be separated as clearly as, for example, archaeological evidence and interpretation. Chapter 2, ‘A New Notation System for Nålbinding Stitches’, by Harma Piening is devoted to comprehensible descriptions in textile analysis. Piening proposes a complex system with defined character combinations in order to illustrate how a thread is guided through interlinked loops.
Finds of textiles and only one type of tool are examined in the following contributions: Chapter 3, ‘Lost Weaving Tablets: Identifying Weaving Tablets During Excavation’, Heather Hopkins explores implications of the fact that textile implements are often misinterpreted in archaeology. By using the example of an excavation in Itchen Park and Ride, outside Winchester, Hampshire (UK), she explains the difficulties in identifying tablets and lists the earliest finds taken from older literature. Thereby, she broaches the variable forms of weaving tablets, but a comprehensive definition of the tool and its use-wear characteristics would have been useful.
In Chapter 4, ‘Romans, Intimately: New Thoughts on Reconstruction and Purpose of Use of Roman Empire and Late Antiquity “tanga briefs”’, Julia B. Krug-Ochmann takes a close look at Roman underwear. Based on her examinations she recognizes two types of leather briefs in Imperial and late-Roman times: type I with confronting triangular pieces, and type II with only one triangular piece covering the front held by a system of leather laces on the back. Experiments seem to suggest that type I was probably used as underpants to secure infants’ nappies, not as tie sided triangle bikini for women as commonly assumed. In Chapter 5 Beatrix Nutz introduces ‘Linen Sprang from Lengberg Castle’ in Austria, where a vault filled with debris and waste dating to the fifteenth century was found. When evaluating the knowledge gained by experimental reconstructions as well as the written and pictorial sources she comes to the conclusion that the sprang fabrics from Lengberg can be interpreted as fragments of headdresses. Concerning the history of the technique she notices a preference for decorative hole designs, which contradicts a former proposal by Dagmar Drinkler that sprang would be ideal for the manufacturing of elastic trousers (Drinkler, Reference Drinkler2009). Chapter 6, ‘Early Byzantine Embroidery Techniques and An Unusual Tunic in the Römisch-Germanisches Zentralmuseum Mainz’, by Petra Linscheidt examines an unfinished tunic showing two clavi, shoulder panels and paired sleeve bands typical for this time. However, against the normal practice, the decorations are not woven but embroidered. Whether tapestry weaving is more skillful than embroidery, as stated on p. 82 might be questionable, as the two methods can simply be regarded as different technical traditions, i.e. patterning during or after the weaving process.
The final section on dyeing is mainly based on practical considerations. Katrin Kania and Sabine Ringenberg together with Sabine Schrenk describe their experiences with late Antique resist-dyeing (dyeing textiles with patterns) techniques. In the absence of concrete coetaneous descriptions they are using information on encaustic painting as a starting point for their experiment and are subsequently confronted with many problems that might have been foreseen with sufficient forward-planning. Still, their results can serve as a reference for future analyses of original objects. In Chapter 8, Katrin Kania, Heather Hopkins and Sabine Ringenberg are investigating the influence of metal kettle materials on the mordanting (i.e. binding) and dyeing outcome in order to understand why dyeing kettles in Pompeii were made from lead. As this material is rarely used in Antique dyeing, a special intention was assumed. Within three experiments performed at the LEA in 2012, 2013, and 2014, it could be shown that—unlike e.g. iron or copper—only lead kettles allow a clear, bright colouration due to the reaction behaviour of the metal. Lead is also the focus of the last contribution, where Heather Hopkins examines the supply of water to the dyeing workshops of Pompeii. She calculates their annual water requirements based on her assumptions concerning working time and the filling capacities of the vats in the archaeological record, but also touches upon the possibility of lead poisoning.
By looking at both volumes as a whole, we have a glimpse not only at one of the most important human activities in history, but also at the diversity of current approaches to textile archaeology. The interpretative value of combining knowledge gained from research on textile finds and implements with that emerging from experimental practice is impressively documented. However, contributions from the field of natural sciences, which have also proven to give valuable insights (e.g. Janaway & Wyeth, Reference Janaway and Wyeth2005; Andersson Strand et al., Reference Andersson Strand, Frei, Gleba, Mannering, Nosch and Skals2010), are somehow missing. In this regard, the title of the second book reviewed here, Ancient textiles, Modern Science, can be misleading, as one might expect it to present archaeometric approaches, and this is not the case. Indeed, experimental set ups based on in-depth analyses of materials and techniques (cf. Andersson Strand, Reference Andersson Strand, Andersson Strand, Gleba, Mannering, Munkholt and Ringgaard2010) may have generated even more relevant results. The section on dyeing, in particular, would have benefited from a few more colour illustrations.
The First Textiles volume accomplishes what it sets out to do, that is, it collects and investigates the combined evidence of textile and leather remains, tools, workplaces, and textile iconography. With this multiple approach it becomes clear that those early finds are far from being ‘primitive’, but were carefully crafted by experienced individuals with a special purpose in mind. Only occasionally, the question arises whether some observations may have been caused by the selective preservation or transmission of the evidence, as for example the reflections by Janet Levy on the frequency of headwear (p. 46). Might it not be possible that other elements of clothing were painted or even dressed, but failed to survive during this long time span? Despite these minor objections, both books are valuable reads for any researcher interested in textiles and their potential for archaeological research. Textiles are on their way to become an integral part of archaeology.
