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A Stitch in Time
Essays in Honour of Lise Bender Jørgensen
i
GOTHENBURG UNIVERSITY
Department of Historical Studies
GOTARC SERIES A. GOTHENBURG ARCHAEOLOGICAL STUDIES
ISSN1403-8293
No 4. A Stitch in Time: Essays in Honour of Lise Bender Jørgensen
Red. Sophie Bergerbrant and Sølvi Helene Fossøy
Printing: Reprocentralen, Humanities Department, Gothenburg University, 2014
Layout: Rich Potter
Cover: Rich Potter
ISBN 978-91-85245-56-9
ii
Preface
he idea for this festschrift began with Antointte Rast-Eicher, who compiled
the list of contributors and participated in the early stages of producing the
volume. Unfortunately she was unable to contribute to the main work with
the volume due to other commitments. However, we want to thank her for her
initiative.
his book could not have been printed without the inancial support from
Sparebanken Midt-Norges gavefond til Norges Teknisk-Naturvitenskaplige
Universitet; Department of Historical Studies, Gothenburg University and the
Department of Historical Studies, Norwegian University of Technology and
Science. Dr Kristin Bornholdt Collins consulted on language-related issues and
assisted with proofreading and revision, and we are grateful for all her help
and language support through the various stages of producing the book. We
would also like to thank Ragnhild Berge for helping us in Trondheim; Lena
Hammarlund for consultations on terminology; Ulla Mannering for tracking
down photographs of Lise; and Karina Grömer for providing an excellent
opportunity to present the book.
here is no Tabula Gratulatore in this book; this is due to Lise’s vast network
of colleagues and friends within so many ields and countries. How could we
possibly reach them all, and where would the line be drawn? It therefore seemed
preferable to concentrate on the actual content, and to produce a worthy tribute
honouring Lise for decades of hard work and her important role as a pioneer in
textile research. It comes with heartfelt gratitude, admiration and best wishes
from all of her colleagues and friends, naming none but including all.
With this festschrift, the editors, authors, colleagues, friends and all the
individuals at supporting institutions wish Professor Lise Bender Jørgensen a
somewhat belated Happy 65th Birthday. he opportunity to present the book at
the 2014 NESAT conference was too good to be missed.
Gothenburg and Drammen, 2014-03-03
iii
iv
Contents
A Stitch in Time
Sophie Bergerbrant
vii
he red thread
Lotte Hedeager
xi
Lise Bender Jørgensen: research in textiles
Antoinette Rast-Eicher
xv
Bibliography of Lise Bender Jørgensen’s publications
Antoinette Rast-Eicher and Sølvi Helene Fossøy
xix
Science, heory, Methodology and Prehistoric Textiles
Experimental soil burial studies for archaeological textile preservation and research
– a review
Elizabeth E. Peacock
1
Implications of a web - considerations of a crat-oriented research perspective
Ulla Isabel Zagal-Mach Wolfe
23
Speciality ibres for special textiles
Antoinette Rast-Eicher
43
Prehistoric textile patterns: transfer with obstruction
Johanna Banck-Burgess
63
A rich seam: stitching as a means of interpreting Bronze Age textile fragments
Sølvi Helene Fossøy
77
Tacit knowledge and the interpretation of archaeological tablet-woven textiles
Lise Ræder Knudsen
91
he holistic nature of textile knowledge: fulling cloth in the sea
Carol Christiansen & Lena Hammarlund
111
Social Aspects of Prehistoric Textiles
Out of the dark… New textile inds from Hallstatt
Karina Grömer, Helga Rösel-Mautendorfer and Hans Reschreiter
129
v
Italian textiles from prehistory to Late Antique times
Margarita Gleba
145
Wool fabrics from Arditurri Roman mines, Oiartzun (Basque Country, Spain)
C. Alfaro Giner
171
A well-preserved household textile from Roman Egypt
Hero Granger-Taylor and Karen Finch
189
hrough Roman eyes: cotton textiles from Early Historic India
John-Peter Wild and Felicity Wild
209
Tools of textile production in Roman Iron Age burials and settlements on Funen,
Denmark
Sophie Bergerbrant
237
Cloth, clothing and Anglo-Saxon women
Penelope Walton Rogers
253
he textile interior in the Oseberg burial chamber
Marianne Vedeler
281
An exceptional woman from Birka
Eva Andersson Strand and Ulla Mannering
301
2/2 Herringbone twill fabrics in Early Medieval Poland: Imports or local production?
Maria Cybulska and Jerzy Maik
317
Textiles of iteenth- to seventeenth-century layers from Heidelberg and Kempten,
Germany
Klaus Tidow, Textilingenieur, Boostedt
331
1
vi
Italian textiles from prehistory to Late Antique times
Margarita Gleba, University of Cambridge
Of Lise Bender Jørgensen’s many valuable contributions to archaeology, her
catalogues of Scandinavian (1986) and North European (1992) archaeological
textiles are among the most signiicant and long lasting. At the time of writing,
little was known about the prehistoric textiles of Italy and comparative material
from South Europe included less than ten Italian sites where textiles have
been found. Since the more than two decades following Bender Jørgensen’s
publications, archaeological textiles of Italy number in hundreds if not
thousands, illing a gap in the European textile corpus. As a tribute to and
continuation of Bender Jørgensen’s groundbreaking work, this contribution
provides an overview of the archaeological textiles of Italy known today from
prehistory through the Roman period.
Italian archaeological textiles
Although various conditions of textile preservation are present in Italy, textiles
surviving in their original and complete form are quite rare (Rottoli 2005). he
largest corpus consists of linen textile fragments found in various Neolithic and
Bronze Age sites in the north of the peninsula, where they have been preserved
by the alkaline conditions of the Alpine lakes. Wool textile fragments, on the
other hand, have been recovered from burials, where they were conserved in
waterlogged environments. A few Iron Age clothing articles were recovered from
an Alpine glacier (Dal Rì 1996; Bazzanella et al. 2005). Meanwhile, charred or
carbonized textiles of the Roman period have been preserved as a result of the
eruption of Vesuvius (D’Orazio et al. 2000). he vast majority of archaeological
textiles in Italy, however, has been preserved in association with metal objects
and survive in the shape of often minute, mineralized traces.
he following overview of Italian archaeological textiles is certainly far from
exhaustive, but it demonstrates the large number of textiles that have survived
in Italy, allowing researchers to examine the corpus of extant material in
relation to its technical and functional parameters. he focus is on recent inds
and only the analysed textiles will be presented in detail, although many more
fragments, particularly those preserved on metal artefacts, await study (for
a more extensive catalogue and bibliography of the pre-Roman material, see
Gleba 2008).
Neolithic (6000-2300 BC)
Some of the oldest textiles in Italy have been found in the submerged Neolithic
settlement of La Marmotta in Lake Bracciano, 14C-dated to 5480-5260 BC
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Margarita Gleba
(Rottoli 1993:310; Rottoli 2003:68). he threads and textiles are presumably
made of lax. Although inal analyses of the material have not been published,
the inds demonstrate that lax-based textile technology appears to have been
present in Italy by the early Neolithic.
Bronze Age (2300-1000 BC)
he vast majority of the prehistoric Italian textiles come from northern Italy
and have been dated to the third and second millennia BC (Rast-Eicher 1997;
Bazzanella et al. 2003).
Charred linen tabby fragments woven in S2z yarn as well as numerous cordage
examples were found at Lucone di Polpenazze, dated dendrochronologically to
the Early Bronze Age (Bazzanella et al. 2003:186-193). he thread count of the
textiles is approximately 10-12 threads/cm in both warp and weft. Some of the
fragments preserve fringes and one has been mended in antiquity. A recently
excavated fragment also preserves a possible starting border in rep, which is
10-12 threads wide and has about 24 threads per cm in weft (Fig. 1; Gleba &
Baioni in press).
More than 20 fragments of what appears to be the same open tabby textile
made of z-twisted plant ibre (exact nature remains to be identiied) were
found folded at Valle delle Paiole, and are dated to the Early-Middle Bronze Age
(Bazzanella et al. 2003:198). he thread count ranges 3-6 threads/cm.
Fig. 1 Linen textile from Lucone di Polpennazze, Early Bronze Age (Photo: Margarita Gleba,
reproduced with kind permission of the Soprintendenza per i Beni Archeologici della Lombardia).
146
Italian textiles from prehistory to Late Antique times
Numerous textiles found at Molina di Ledro have been cited extensively for their
technical complexity and similarity to the Swiss Neolithic textiles (Bazzanella
et al. 2003:161-174; Bazzanella & Mayr 2009). Unfortunately, they were not
excavated stratigraphically and are hence rather broadly dated to the MiddleLate Bronze Age. he majority of the surviving fragments are of ine linen tabby
woven of S2z-twisted yarn, with diameters 0.4-0.6 mm. One of the textiles is
decorated with tiny seeds sewn on like beads (Bazzanella & Mayr 2009:52-54).
At least two of the fragments are narrow strips over 2 m long and were found
rolled-up in bundles (Bazzanella et al. 2003:161 no. 5 and 162 no. 6; Bazzanella
& Mayr 2009:41-46). he ground weave of one of these strips is tabby but the
two ends of the cloth had been woven with a pattern of concentric abutting
lozenges formed with a technique similar to twill.
he earliest Italian textile entirely made of wool was found in the Terramara of
Castione dei Marchesi, and is broadly dated to the Middle-Late Bronze Age. he
fragment is a tabby woven in z-twisted wool, with 8/6 threads/cm and thread
diameter of 1.3 mm (Fig. 2; Bazzanella et al. 2003:200). he wool ibre has been
analysed and is composed of very ine underwool and a few much coarser hairs
reaching up to 90 microns in diameter, demonstrating that the sheep had not
yet achieved a high degree of selection for particular wool quality (Rast-Eicher
1997, 2003, 2005:127, and 2008:136; Gleba 2012:3647-3648).
Fig. 2 Wool textile from Castione dei Marchesi, Middle-Late Bronze Age (Photo: Margarita
Gleba, reproduced with kind permission of the Soprintendenza per i Beni dell’ Archeologici
Emilia-Romagna).
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Margarita Gleba
In addition to these organically preserved examples, mineralized textiles are
known from several sites, again mostly from northern Italy. A tabby is preserved
on a weapon from a hoard reportedly discovered between Montemerano and
Saturnia, and dated to the Early Bronze Age based on the typology of the object
(Gandolfo 1981:362-365). A linen textile has been identiied on a Bronze Age
bronze object from Olmo di Nogara (Rottoli 2005:79; Castiglioni et al. 2005).
Another mineralized textile was preserved on a ibula at Somma Lombardo,
dated to the Late Bronze Age (Castiglioni 1995; Rottoli 2005:79).
One of the few prehistoric textile inds from southern Italy is a metal weapon
with traces of an open tabby woven in S2z-twisted hemp yarn with thread
diameter of 0.2-0.45 mm, found in Tomb 6 at Gricignano d’Aversa and dated to
the Final Eneolithic-Early Bronze Age (Bazzanella et al. 2003:210).
he majority of surviving Italian Bronze Age textiles appear to be balanced
tabbies in linen, woven in S2z yarn, the latter being characteristic for the Early
and Middle Bronze Age Swiss textiles. he technique of yarn production may
need to be reappraised, as recent evidence shows that the yarn during the
Neolithic and Bronze Age in Switzerland was made by splicing and plying spliced
yarns together, like in Egypt, rather than by draft spinning (Leuzinger & RastEicher 2011). Other plant ibres, including hemp and tree bast, were used for
woven and non-woven textiles. he only surviving wool textile is a coarse tabby
made in thick z-twisted yarn. Textiles could be decorated with more complex
weaving techniques, fringes and applied seeds. Rep borders are typical for the
tabby textiles from the Neolithic and Bronze Age periods excavated in northern
Italy and in Switzerland (Médard 2006, 2010).
Iron Age (tenth-first centuries BC)
In the irst millennium BC, textile inds are more evenly distributed throughout
the Apennine peninsula.
Northern Italy
Several inds of organically preserved textiles from northern Italy provided
much new information regarding Iron Age textile technology in the area,
which was inhabited by Etruscan, Venetic and, later, Celtic peoples. Six nearly
complete articles of clothing, two pairs of leggings and a pair of inner shoes,
were found in a glacier at Vedretta di Ries/Riesenferner, and 14C-dated dated
to 795-466 BC (Fig. 3; Dal Rì 1996; Bazzanella et al. 2003:179-182 and 2005;
Rottoli 2005: 73). Diferent weaving techniques were employed in the making
of these textiles: the under-leggings are made in s/s tabby with 18/7 threads/
cm, the over-leggings are in diagonal or herringbone Z2s/Z2s twill with 8/7
threads/cm, while the shoes are in 2/2 z/s twill with 12/8 threads/cm. he
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Italian textiles from prehistory to Late Antique times
Fig. 3 Clothing items from Vedretta di Ries, Early Iron Age (© South Tyrol Museum of
Archaeology).
Vedretta di Ries textiles were sewn together, in some cases from several pieces
of diferent fabrics. Numerous mends are also clearly visible, indicating the reuse of textiles that once constituted larger garments.
Another relatively recent ind is a wool sock or a shoe lining measuring 15x7
cm from the urban excavations of Largo Europa in Padova, dated to the ifth
century BC (Maspero 1998:63, ig. 20). It is a rather coarse tabby with c. 10/14
threads/cm, woven in z-twisted yarn. Wool analysis has shown that the textile
was made of very ine ibre with hairs and kemp completely absent (Gleba
2012:3650).
Contemporary with the textile from Padova and from the same cultural area is
a wool textile fragment from the site of Este, Via Gambina, dated to the sixthfourth century BC (Fig. 4). his textile fragment measuring 8x12 cm is another
relatively coarse balanced tabby with c. 10/10 threads/cm, woven in z-twisted
yarn. In contrast to the Padova example, the wool of this textile has a coarser
quality, suggestive of a diferent type of wool and possibly sheep (Gleba 2012:
3653).
Some of the most spectacular Italian Iron Age textile inds have been found over
the past decades at Verucchio, in the northern Adriatic region of Italy. Among
149
Margarita Gleba
Fig. 4 Wool textile from Este Via Gambina, sixth-fourth century BC (Photo: Margarita Gleba,
reproduced with kind permission of the Sopprintendenza per i Bemi Archeologici del Veneto).
them are virtually complete male and female garments including mantles and
tunics in wool. he publication of the textiles found in male Tombs 89 and 85
has provided the irst glimpse of this sensational material (Staufer 2002, 2003,
2004 and 2012; Ræder Knudsen 2002, 2012); textiles from the female tombs
are being currently analysed. he eighth-century BC Tomb 89, also known as
the Tomba del Trono, a richly appointed cremation burial of an important male
personage, contained over 160 textile fragments that were preserved by the
cremation process, as well as two mantles and what was probably a tunic-like
garment, which survived almost intact. he mantles are of very ine wool (cf.
Gleba 2012: 3650), woven in 2/2 twill, with groups of s and z spun single yarns
in both directions (‘spin-pattern’) and coloured red, with borders dyed blue. he
thread counts in both tunics average 22-26/12-16 threads/cm. he tunic-like
garment, also made of wool, was woven in 2/2 twill with 19-20/14-16 threads/
cm. It was also ‘spin-patterned’ and dyed red with red borders. Both mantles
have elaborate borders made by the tablet weaving technique and featuring a
triangle motif and three horizontal lines (Ræder Knudsen 2002 and 2012; also
see in this volume). Among the numerous fragments preserved in the cremated
remains, most of them twills with varied spin efect, there are some pieces that
are very ine and dyed red or blue. One of the fragments is decorated in soumak
technique and another is looped (Staufer 2003). he presence of hundreds of
amber and glass beads and other decorative elements indicates that many of
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Italian textiles from prehistory to Late Antique times
these textiles were luxuriously decorated. Some of the Verucchio textiles bear
traces of regular folding (Staufer 2012:250), conirming that Etruscan artistic
representations of garments, like those seen in the painted tombs of Tarquinia (cf.
Steingräber 1986 and 2006), are accurate depictions of contemporary practices.
Numerous mineralized textiles are also known (Gleba 2008:48). For example, at
Monte Bibele, fourth-third century BC Celtic burials yielded mineralized textile
fragments on 26 metal objects from 15 burials (Moulhérat 2008). he yarns are
invariably z-twisted and occasionally S-plied. hread counts range from 6/8 to
36/40 threads/cm. Textiles include balanced and weft-faced tabbies, as well as a
few 2/2 twills. he materials include wool, linen and mixed. he predominance
of z/z tabbies at the site corresponds well to contemporaneous Gaulic sites in
Central Europe, indicating standardization of textile production (Moulhérat
2008:94).
Central Italy
Large numbers of textile inds are known from central Italy, an area associated
with Etruscan, Faliscan, Picene and Latin cultures, although few of these have been
analysed. Rich Etruscan burials in particular have produced numerous textiles.
Bender Jørgensen described in her catalogue (1992:105-106) the material
from Sasso di Furbara near Cerveteri, a large number of wool textile fragments
which were retrieved in 1953 at the Caolino necropolis after being found by
construction workers in a wooden monoxile boat, interpreted as a cenotaph
(Masurel 1982; Mames & Masurel 1992). he boat was 14C-dated to the eighth
century BC, which is consistent with the stylistic dating of the materials found
in the surrounding necropolis (Brusadin Laplace & Patrizi Montoro 1982). More
than 60 fragments survive, which were diferentiated by Masurel into seven
fabric types. he textiles are currently conserved under glass at the Pigorini
Museum in Rome, Italy. he textiles preserve some of their original colour and
recent dye analysis of a few samples identiied likely use of madder and woad.
Textiles made of animal and plant ibre were excavated in several tombs at
Casale Marittimo, dated to the eighth - sixth centuries BC (Esposito 1999:41 ig.
31, 68-69 ig. 65, 71 ig. 67 and 93-94). In Tomb G, an iron dagger and an axe
were wrapped in wool rep, while food oferings were covered with linen tabby
with 10/10 threads/cm woven in – unusually – S-plied or possibly spliced yarn,
a remnant of the Bronze Age technology. In Tomb A, a bronze cinerary urn
contained textile remains that probably served as wrapping for cremated bones.
Mineralized textiles were found on two iron spear counterweights from Tombs
1 and 4 at Poggio Aguzzo, Murlo in central Italy dated to the early seventh
century BC (Tuck 2009). he textile from Tomb 4 is a relatively balanced tabby
woven in single-spun z-twisted yarn of medium twist. he yarn measures c.
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Margarita Gleba
0.4-0.5 mm in diameter in both systems. he thread count is about 18-20
threads/cm in both systems. Tomb 4 contained two iron spear counterweights,
each preserving traces of a textile. One of these is a twill, most likely a simple
2/2 twill. he thread measures about 0.4 mm in both systems and is single,
medium z-twisted. he thread count in both systems is about 20 threads/cm.
he second textile is a tablet weave made using at least 17 tablets alternating
3Z3S with about 12 tablets/cm (Fig. 5). he threads are single z-twisted and
measure about 0.3 mm in diameter.
A mineralized fragment of plain z/z tabby weave was found adhering to the
bottom of an oinochoe of a sixth-century BC Italo-Corinthian style attributed
to Orvieto (Hayes 1977: 144). his completely calciied fragment is probably
part of a cloth on which the jug was placed or in which it was wrapped. he
Etruscan city of Chiusi produced another completely calciied textile fragment
found inside a clay burial urn, now in the Royal Ontario Museum, Canada
(Hayes 1977:144). he latter fragment is unusual in being of a very ine weave
described as ‘twined’. A sixth-century BC bronze bowl from another Etruscan
city, Veio, currently at the Newark Museum, USA, has a z/z tabby imprint on
the bottom (Carroll 1973). Numerous mineralized textiles are known from the
cemeteries of the Etruscan cities of Tarquinia, Veio, Vulci and Faliscan Civita
Castellana (Gleba 2008:55-56).
A cloth (presumably linen) measuring 10.6 x 9.4 cm was found inside a bronze
and silver box containing cremated bones in Tomba del Duce at Vetulonia, 650630 BC (Torelli 2000: 582 no. 130). Another large fragment of linen was found
at Volterra, Portone, dated to the fourth-irst century BC (Fiumi 1976:65),
while fragments of light tabby with yellowish borders and remains of gold
thread from the same site come from unknown contexts.
One of the largest and probably the most famous specimen of Etruscan cloth
is the so-called Zagreb mummy, preserved by the dry climate of Egypt (Fig. 6;
Flury-Lemberg 1986, and 1988:344-357, 496; van der Meer 2007). he cloth
survives in twelve 35 cm wide strips, which originally comprised a part of a
linen book, liber linteus. It is believed that the book was taken to Egypt c. 150
BC and after some time torn into strips to be used as mummy wrappings. he
textile itself, however, was 14C-dated to 390±45 BC (Srdoč & Horvatinčić 1986)
and may have been produced in the region of Perugia. he textile is a closewoven warp-faced tabby, with 23/12 threads/cm. his type of weave is unusual
and may indicate particular requirements of the linen books.
Several calciied textiles from second-century BC tombs at Strozzacapponi, near
Perugia, have recently been tested for dyes and shellish purple was identiied
in three samples (Fig. 7; Gleba & Vanden Berghe in press). he textiles appear
to have been folded and placed in the travertine urns or a ceramic vessel. he
cremated remains of the deceased were either placed on the folded textile or
152
Italian textiles from prehistory to Late Antique times
Fig. 5 Detail of a mineralized tablet-woven textile from Tomb 1 at Poggio Aguzzo, Murlo, seventh
century BC (Photo: Margarita Gleba, reproduced with kind permission of Anthony Tuck, Poggio
Civitate Excavation Project).
Fig. 6 Liber linteus zagrabiensis, the linen book of Zagreb, third-second century BC (© Zagreb
Archaeological Museum, reproduced with permission).
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Margarita Gleba
Fig. 7 Calciied textile fragment from Tomb 24 at Strozzacapponi, Corciano, second century BC (Photo:
Margarita Gleba, reproduced with kind permission of the Soprintendenza per i Beni Archeologici dell’
Umbria).
Fig. 8 Textile from Cogion-Coste di Manone, Tuscania, fourth century BC (© University of
Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, reproduced with permission).
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Italian textiles from prehistory to Late Antique times
wrapped in it. Heavy mineralization precludes technical analysis but it is likely
that the textiles were made in wool and likely woven in rep.
Another rep fragment, found in 1899 and recently rediscovered in a museum,
comes from a Faliscan chamber tomb at Cogion – Coste di Manone, in the
territory of ancient Falerii, modern Civita Castellana (Fig. 8; Gleba & Turfa
2007). he fragment is dated to the later fourth century BC based on two
Faliscan red-igured cups associated with the tomb. he fragment presents a
twisted jumble of golden brown threads measuring 11x5 cm in size. It is a ine
s/s tabby with 10/60 threads/cm. A small part of the textile, now separated
from the larger fragment, has a portion of an edge in which the denser system
is folded over and sewn with a thicker dark yarn which is Z2s. he fact that it is
woven in s-twisted yarn and is made of unusually ine wool (Gleba 2012:36533654) suggests that the textile may have a non-local origin.
A fragment of asbestos textile supposedly from the Etruscan area is currently
in the collections of the British Museum (Granger-Taylor 1982:23 note 2).
he fragment is a relatively coarse tabby 13x14 cm with possibly one selvedge
preserved. he yarn is s-twisted, about 1-2 mm in diameter. he thread count
is about 5-6 warp threads/cm and 4 weft threads/cm. Asbestos is derived from
a mineral amphibole and has a unique quality of withstanding extremely high
temperatures (Pionati Shams 1987:3-11), a trait that was noticed and used in
antiquity. hus, in the irst century AD, Pliny the Elder (36.19-21) calls it live
or incombustible linen and praises its usefulness for making funeral shrouds,
napkins, lamp wicks and ishing nets.
From the Latin area, published inds are signiicantly less numerous. Tomb 41
at Borgo le Ferriere (ancient Satricum), dated to the ifth century BC, contained
a metal object with two layers of ine z/z weft-faced tabby with 11 threads/
cm in warp and 60-80 threads/cm in weft (Gnade 1992:115 and ig. 35). An
important recent discovery is a mineralized tablet-woven fragment with a
complex geometric pattern from the ninth-century BC cemetery of Santa
Palomba near Rome (Fig. 9; De Santis et al. 2010). he ind indicates that by
the Early Iron Age, tablet-weaving technique was not only known but also well
established in central Italy.
Southern Italy and Sicily
Signiicantly fewer textile inds are known from southern Italy and Sicily, and
none are published for Sardinia. his, however, is unlikely to relect the actual
lack of inds but rather lack of publication.
Several bronze objects at Pontecagnano, including two axe-heads, a bowl and a
tripod, found in the eighth-century BC tomb 928, have traces of textile adhering
to them (d’Agostino 1977:14, 60). Other textiles are preserved on three iron
155
Margarita Gleba
Fig. 9 Mineralized patterned tablet weave from Tomb 2, Santa Palomba, ninth century BC
(Photo: Margarita Gleba, reproduced with kind permission of Anna De Santis, Soprintendenza
Speciale per i Beni Archeologici di Roma).
ibulae from Tomb 3284, and on a large iron ibula from Tomb 4870. Tomb
1697 had not only ine tabby traces on iron spits but also numerous small rings
and bronze buttons that were probably attached to a sumptuous dress of the
deceased. Tabby and twill traces are also noted on metal ibulae from the nearby
sites of Eboli, Sala Consilina, and Massa Lubrense, dated to the seventh-sixth
centuries BC. Other mineralized fragments, dated between the eighth and
fourth centuries BC have been noted at Vico Equense, Cales, San Marzano
sul Sarno, Cuma, Capua, Fratte and Paestum in Campania; San Salvatore,
Montescaglioso, Difesa San Biaggio, and Pisticci in Basilicata; Rutigliano and
Bitonto in Puglia; and Torre Galli in Calabria (see Gleba 2008:61).
At Canosa, in Puglia, Tomba degli Ori dated to the third-second century BC
contained organic textile fragments of extremely ine quality with traces of
gold thread. At least three qualities of weft-faced tabby have been noted (De
Juliis 1984:329-330, 339). Other examples of gold thread have been found in
Taranto, dated to the second-irst centuries BC (De Juliis 1984:330, 339-340).
As in the case of southern Italy, few textiles from Sicily have been analysed
but their presence has been noted, indicating that many examples survive. For
example, numerous iron knives and daggers found in tombs at Vassallaggi were
wrapped in bands of textile and usually deposited inside a crater or other vessel
(Orlandini 1971). A small rope fragment on a sixth or ifth-century BC iron
object from Colle Madore is interesting in that its ibre has been identiied as
hemp (Terranova & Lo Campo 1999). Hemp was also identiied as the ibre
of a z/z tabby, found in a ifth-century BC burial at Himera (Di Scalafani et
al. 2005). Finally, at Marsala, a Punic shipwreck dated to the third century BC
156
Italian textiles from prehistory to Late Antique times
produced large quantities of string and rope made of esparto grass, including
strings of medium to thick plait, plaited cord and a rope piece 30 m long ending
in an eye-splice (Frost 1981). Esparto is not native to Italy and its presence
suggests that the ship was kitted out in Iberia.
Iron Age textiles in Italy represent a wide spectrum in terms of the weaves
utilized and include z/z and spin patterned 2/2 twills, z/z balanced and weftfaced tabbies and one s/s weft-faced(?) tabby. While there is a prevalence of
z-twist, spin-patterning is quite common. Tablet weaving, used to decorate
borders of various garments, is quite common and is already well developed at
the beginning of the period. he material is predominantly wool, but linen was
also utilized and other ibres such as hemp and asbestos have been identiied.
Already in the early part of the period there is evidence of familiarity with
sophisticated dyeing techniques.
Roman period (first century BC-fourth century AD)
While much is known about the textiles produced in Italy during Roman
times from the written sources (e.g. Vicari 2001), Roman textiles excavated
throughout Italy have not been systematically catalogued, making it diicult to
provide here a detailed survey. In particular, the large number of textiles found
on sites buried by the Vesuvian volcanic eruption of AD 79, still remain largely
unpublished (see Bender Jørgensen 1992:109), although some of the material
from Pompeii has been recently analysed (Médard, Borgard & Moulhérat 2011).
Sheep wool and lax linen were identiied as the two main materials. Linen
textiles have s-twisted yarn while wool textiles are woven in z-twisted yarn.
Linen textiles are all tabbies while wool textiles include a variety of tabbies and
twills. A much wider spectrum of materials, including Angora wool, cotton,
sea-silk, hemp, broom and kapok, was previously published for other textile
material from the site, although the lack of ind inventory numbers and unclear
methods of identiication render these data rather problematic (D’Orazio et
al. 2000). Some of the old inds have recently been published by the DressID
project and include the supposedly earliest knitted textile made of purplecoloured silk, raw sea-silk ibres, a wool 2/2 twill fragment with an in-woven
gamma shape and a calciied fragment preserving traces of purple colour and
gold thread (Paetz gen. Schieck et al. 2014). Asbestos textiles have also been
mentioned (see Bender Jørgensen 1992:109).
Many other Roman sites, primarily burials, in Italy yielded textile fragments of
diverse nature, although they are generally fewer than Iron Age examples due
to changes in burial customs, whereby fewer metal objects that would favour
textile mineralization were included with the dead.
Bender Jørgensen noted the linen shroud with fringes found in a funerary urn of
the mid-irst century AD, excavated in 1928 at Ponte Fratta on the Rome-Ostia
157
Margarita Gleba
road (Soler Villabella 1937) and recently re-analysed (Mitschke & Paetz gen.
Schiek 2012:117-121). he cloth survives in its entirety, measuring 183x72.5
cm, and has 14-17 threads/cm in both systems. It is decorated with two purple
wool stripes in one corner, and self bands and long fringes at the borders (Fig.
10). he linen warp and weft threads of the ground weave measure 0.2-0.3
mm in diameter and are s-twisted; the coloured wool weft threads are 0.8-1
mm in diameter and z-twisted. he new analysis suggests Egyptian origin of
the cloth (Mitschke & Paetz gen. Schiek 2012:120). Similar ‘towel-like’ Roman
cloths from the Lateran Basilica are conserved in the Vatican Museums (Soler
Villabella 1937:80)
Numerous coins from various irst-third century AD funerary contexts in
Rome produced traces of linen tabbies in s-twisted yarn (Giuliani et al. 2011).
Meanwhile objects of personal use in metal preserve wool tabbies and even
silks.
he rather unique Roman mummy of an eight-year-old girl found in a secondcentury AD grave at Grottarossa near Rome, was buried with linen wrappings
of various qualities, woven in z-twisted yarn, indicating local production
(Ascenzi et al. 1996:215). In addition, silk fragments of a possible tunic
were identiied. Another second-century AD burial of a young girl, Crepereia
Tryphaena, found at Valerano south of Rome, contained mineralized traces of
linen tabby (Portoghesi 1983). Meanwhile, a man found in a third-century AD
grave in Brescia, was wrapped in z/z tabby (Castiglioni & Rottoli 2004). Recent
examination of several burials from the catacomb of Sant’ Agnese in Rome
identiied silk textiles among the materials used to dress the dead of the third
century AD (Mitschke & Paetz gen. Schiek 2012:121-124). he same study also
identiied two kinds of rare silk block damask among the textiles buried with
man in Tomb 7 found under the loor of the church of San Sebastiano on Via
Appia, dated to the late second-early third century AD (Mitschke & Paetz gen.
Schiek 2012:125-130). he silks were likely imported from Syria.
Fig. 10 Details of a linen shroud from Ponte Fratta, mid-irst century AD: a) purple wool wet
stripes; b) close-up of the ground weave (Photo: courtesy of Sylvia Mitschke, rem/ CEZA).
158
Italian textiles from prehistory to Late Antique times
hanks to a micro-excavation approach, one of the best-investigated Roman
burials from Italy is the so-called ‘Lady of the Sarcophagus’, dated to the
early third century AD (Rossignani et al. 2005). Several thousand tiny textile
fragments were documented. At least ive diferent textile types were identiied,
including: A) z/z tabby with 16/41-43 threads/cm; B) z/z tabby with 20-22/2629 threads/cm; C) z/z and s/s tabbies with 30-40 threads/cm in both systems;
D) s/s tabby with 12/12 threads/cm; and E) 2s/2s tabby with 17.5/4.5 threads/
cm (Maspero & Rottoli 2005:74). he burial also contained numerous fragments
of a very ine reticulum made in gold thread.
Sarcophagus found in Piazza Mateotti of Modena contained remains of tabbies,
identiied as silk (Tusa 1948:35 note 1). One of the samples had a thread count
35/32 threads/cm, while others 20/18 threads/cm. In addition the burial
contained extremely ine, spun gold threads, with their organic core no longer
identiiable.
Many Italian gold thread inds of the Roman period, primarily from Rome, have
been well analysed and published (Bedini et al. 2004). All of these were made
with metal strips z-twisted around some organic core, which in most cases does
not survive. he gold thread has been used for weaving, sprang, embroidery
and twisting techniques. Among the more unique inds is an almost complete
hairnet or reticulum made in sprang technique, an item also known from
Pompeian frescoes. To these should be added several inds from the so-called
tomb of St Peter at the Vatican, Rome, which include gold thread with a wool
core dyed red as well as gilded copper thread with vegetal core (Guarducci 1965:
30, 182 nos. 2-4, ig. 9, pl. 43). Several other inds of gold thread of imperial
date have been found in the Vatican necropolis (Guarducci 1965:33). Similar
inds are mentioned in old excavations reports of burials in Perugia (Guarducci
1965:32, 34). Another ind of Italian provenance but currently located in the
National Museum in Copenhagen, Denmark, consists of three small fragments
of gold weaving (Gleba 2008). A relatively large piece of ribbon woven with
gold thread has been found in the barrel vault number 5 of the ancient port of
Roman Herculaneum (D’Orazio & Martuscelli 1999: 177 no. 202).
Late Antique textiles woven in tapestry are known from Italian churches, as for
example the silk damask dalmatic from the Sant’ Ambrogio in Milan, discussed
by Bender Jørgensen (1992:109-110). he National Museum of Ravenna
preserves several examples of silk taqueté from the church and tomb of San
Giuliano in Rimini, dated to the fourth-sixth century AD (Staufer 2000).
From non-burial context, a textile fragment measuring 13.7x7cm was excavated
in 1982 in a waterlogged reclamation ill (boniica) in the Retratto locality of
Adria (De Min 1986). Based on thousands of pottery fragments, the ill is dated
to the late irst century BC – early irst century AD. he textile is made in what is
probably a weft-faced tabby with approximately 8 warp threads/cm and 28 weft
159
Margarita Gleba
threads/cm. he warp yarn is z-twisted with a hard twist and measures 0.6-0.7
mm in diameter. he weft yarn is also z-twisted with medium-hard twist but
is iner and measures 0.3-0.4 mm in diameter. he textile was originally dyed
using madder and possibly some other red dye.
Last but not least, numerous cordage fragments and a fragment of z/z tabby
made of wool have been excavated from a rare shipwreck context at Pisa San
Rossore, dating from Etruscan-Roman times (Lentini & Scala 2002, 2005).
Cordage materials include hemp, Hybiscus sp., Calotropis sp., Musa sp., Asclepias
sp., Gossipium sp., Spartium junceum, Lygeum spartum, Chamerops umilis. Some
linen textiles, used as caulking, were found during early excavations of ships in
the lake of Nemi (Soler-Vilabella 1937:74). Textiles reused as caulking were also
found in the Roman shipwreck of Comacchio (Castelletti et al. 1990).
he major change observable during the Roman period is a wider range of the
materials used to make textiles, including silk. Tabbies - balanced and weftfaced, z/z and s/s - seem to have dominated, but twills were still widely used.
Z-twist was still dominant, but s-twist occurred more frequently than in the
preceding periods, particularly in linen tabbies and in silk. Tablet weaving,
generally used to create starting borders when weaving on a warp-weighted
loom, is virtually absent and may possibly be explained by the fact that, by the
early Empire, the warp-weighted loom was being displaced by the vertical twobeam loom (Wild 1970:69). Tapestry and other complex weaving techniques,
on the other hand, are known to have been popular in Roman times, although
few actual examples survive in Italy. Sprang and other twining techniques were
used for the precious gold-thread hairnets.
Conclusions
As the material presented above illustrates, sophisticated technologies were
being utilized by ancient inhabitants of the Italian peninsula for textile
production by the Bronze Age, and by the Early Iron Age Italic populations
were familiar with diverse ibres, dyes and weaving techniques. In Roman
times, Rome (and Italy) was a major centre of the Western world, which not
only produced textiles on a large scale but also imported a variety of exotic
materials from as far away as India and China (cf. e.g. Vicari 2001; Liu 2013;
Albaladejo Vivero 2013; Droß-Krüpe 2013). Despite the fact that the majority
of extant textiles have not been analysed systematically, some conclusions can
be drawn on the basis of the corpus reviewed above.
In terms of materials, as elsewhere in continental Europe according to Bender
Jørgensen (1992: 114), plant ibres dominated during prehistory, but appear to
have been somewhat supplanted by wool by the irst millennium BC. In addition
to the primary materials of lax linen and wool, a variety of other ibres were
utilized in textile production in ancient Italy. hese include: hemp, esparto,
160
Italian textiles from prehistory to Late Antique times
various tree basts and mineral asbestos. By Roman times, silk and cotton made
their appearance, imported over vast distances from Asia. his variety relects
not only availability of raw materials – whether locally or through exchange –
but also the knowledge of technologies to convert them from their raw state to
usable ibre.
While plied yarn is characteristic for the Bronze Age – possibly due to the splicing
technique used to make linen yarn - single yarns are most common during the
irst millennium BC, when wool ibre predominates. Z-twisted yarn appears
to be prevalent throughout all periods but it is not exclusive. During the Early
Iron Age, there is a clear tendency to combine yarns of opposite twists to create
spin-patterned textiles, such as those of Verucchio and Sasso di Furbara. he
reason for this may be aesthetic, but it also relects the knowledge of technique
and appreciation of the subtlety of spin pattern. During Roman times, linen in
s-twisted yarn was possibly imported from Egypt.
If one considers the quality of textiles as relected by their thread counts, i.e.
density of threads per cm, the majority of the Bronze Age textiles have a relatively
narrow range, between 10 and 20 threads/cm and the textiles are relatively
balanced, i.e. they have similar numbers of threads in warp and weft. During the
Early Iron Age, the thread counts increase to 30-40 threads/cm, with even higher
numbers in some cases, demonstrating a wider variety of qualities. his relects
not only the more advanced raw materials and more developed skills in their
processing, spinning and weaving techniques, but also possibly a wider range of
specialized functions that textiles were being produced for, as well as a developing
creativity and aesthetic appreciation of the textile craft. By Roman times, textiles
had become more standardized on the one hand, likely due to the much more
industrial level of their production, while on the other, very high quality luxury
textiles were being produced and imported, such as silks.
A variety of techniques were used to create textiles, including loom weaving,
tablet weaving, soumak, sprang and other types of twining. he loom weaves
include a variety of tabbies and twills. Tabbies, characterized by plied yarn in
one or both systems and deined by Bender Jørgensen (1992:122) as ‘Döhren
type’, are characteristic for the Neolithic/ Bronze Age Italian inds. Plain
linen z/z tabby seems to be prevalent in Italy during the Iron Age and Roman
period, just as in the eastern area of Central Europe (Bender Jørgensen 1992:
125). Many of the Roman tabbies are not balanced and weft-faced tabbies are
especially common.
Although regarded as an Iron Age feature of textile technology, twill developed
during the Bronze Age (Bender Jørgensen 1992:120; Rast-Eicher 2005:128)
and by the Early Iron Age, complex twills were ubiquitous throughout Europe.
he sophistication of Early Iron Age twills points to a well-established and
settled technology. Prominent among them is Bender Jørgensen’s (1992:122)
161
Margarita Gleba
‘Vače type’, a spin-patterned twill in single yarns. his technique is probably
illustrated in the numerous Etruscan artistic representations showing a variety
of plaids, diagonals, chevrons, diamonds and elaborate borders, and, to a certain
extent, is one of the deining features of Etruscan textiles.
Borders woven in tablet technique are found on textiles from the rich Iron
Age burials in Italy (Verucchio, Sasso di Furbara) as well as in Central Europe
(Hallstatt, Austria; Hochdorf and Hohmichele, Germany). he recent ind of
a complex tablet-woven textile in a ninth-century BC tomb at Santa Palomba
near Rome (De Santis et al. 2011), demonstrates that the technology was
already well developed in Italy in the Early Iron Age.
Sophisticated dyeing techniques were also known in Italy at least since the
Early Iron Age. Among the identiied dye sources are woad, madder, some type
of yellow dye and shellish purple. In the later periods, gold thread was used for
decorative purposes.
he overview presented here not only ills in an important gap in our knowledge
of Italian archaeological textiles but also demonstrates that Bender Jørgensen’s
general conclusions regarding textile development in Europe are still valid, once
again conirming the importance of her contributions to textile archaeology.
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