History of clothing and textiles

Genetic analysis suggests that the human body louse, which lives in clothing, may have diverged from the head louse some 107,000 years ago, evidence that humans began wearing clothing at around this time.

Possible sewing needles have been dated to around 40,000 years ago. The earliest definite examples of needles originate from the Solutrean culture, which existed in France from 19,000 BC to 15,000 BC. The earliest dyed fibers have been found in a cave the Republic of Georgia and date back to 36,000

The earliest evidence of weaving comes from impressions of textiles and basketry and nets on little pieces of hard clay, dating from 27,000 years ago and found in Dolni Vestonice in the Czech Republic.

At a slightly later date (25,000 years) the Venus figurines were depicted with clothing. Those from western Europe were adorned with basket hats or caps, belts worn at the waist, and a strap of cloth that wrapped around the body right above the breast. Eastern European figurines wore belts, hung low on the hips and sometimes string skirts.

Archaeologists have discovered artifacts from the same period that appear to have been used in the textile arts: (5000 BC)

Ancient textiles and clothing

The first actual textile, as opposed to skins sewn together, was probably felt. Surviving examples of Nålebinding, another early textile method, date from 6500 BC. Our knowledge of ancient textiles and clothing has expanded in the recent past thanks to modern technological developments. Our knowledge of cultures varies greatly with the climatic conditions to which archeological deposits are exposed; the Middle East and the arid fringes of China have provided many very early samples in good condition, but the early development of textiles in the Indian subcontinent, sub-Saharan Africa and other moist parts of the world remains unclear. In northern Eurasia can also preserve textiles very well.

Early woven clothing was often made of full loom widths draped, tied, or pinned in place.

Ancient Near East

The earliest known woven textiles of the Near East may be fabrics used to wrap the dead excavated at a Neolithic site in Anatolia, carbonized in a fire and radiocarbon dated to c. 6000 BC. Flax cultivation is evidenced from c. 8000 BC in the Near East, but the breeding of sheep with a wooly fleece rather than hair occurs much later, c.3000 BC in Turkey has also been claimed as the site of the oldest known cloth, a piece of woven linen wrapped around an antler and reported to be from around 7000 BC.

Ancient India

The inhabitants of the Indus Valley Civilization used cotton for clothing as early as the 5th millennium BC – 4th millennium BC. According to The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition:

"Cotton has been spun, woven, and dyed since prehistoric times. It clothed the people of ancient India, Egypt, and China. Hundreds of years before the Christian era cotton textiles were woven in India with matchless skill, and their use spread to the Mediterranean countries. In the 1st cent. Arab traders brought fine Muslin and Calico to Italy and Spain. The Moors introduced the cultivation of cotton into Spain in the 9th cent. Fustians and dimities were woven there and in the 14th cent. in Venice and Milan, at first with a linen warp. Little cotton cloth was imported to England before the 15th cent., although small amounts were obtained chiefly for candlewicks. By the 17th cent. the East India Company was bringing rare fabrics from India. Native Americans skillfully spun and wove cotton into fine garments and dyed tapestries. Cotton fabrics found in Peruvian tombs are said to belong to a pre-Inca culture. In color and texture the ancient Peruvian and Mexican textiles resemble those found in Egyptian tombs."

Ancient Egypt

Queen Nefertari in a sheer, pleated linen garment, Egypt, c. 1298–1235 BC

Woven silk textile from tombs at >Mawangdui, Changsha, Hunan province, China, from the Western Han Dynasty, 2nd century BC

Evidence exists for production of linen cloth in Ancient Egypt in the Neolithic period, c.5500 BC. Cultivation of domesticated wild flax, probably an import from the Levant, is documented as early as c.6000 BC Other bast fibers including rush, reed, palm, and papyrus were used alone or with linen to make rope and other textiles. Evidence for wool production in Egypt is scanty at this period.

Spinning techniques included the drop spindle, hand-to-hand spinning,and rolling on the thigh; yarn was also spliced. A horizontal ground loom was used prior to the New Kingdom, when a vertical two-beam loom was introduced, probably from Asia.

Linen bandages were used in the burial custom of mummification, and art depicts Egyptian men wearing linen kilts and women in narrow dresses with various forms of shirts and jackets, often of sheer pleated fabric.

Ancient China

The earliest evidence of silk production in China was found at the sites of Yangshao culture in Xia, Shanxi, where a cocoon of bombyx mori, the domesticated silkworm, cut in half by a sharp knife is dated to between 5000 and 3000 BC. Fragments of primitive looms are also seen from the sites of Hemudu culture in Yuyao, Zhejiang, dated to about 4000 BC. Scraps of silk were found in a Liangzhu culture site at Qianshanyang in Huzhou, Zhejiang, dating back to 2700 BC. Other fragments have been recovered from royal tombs in the Shang Dynasty (ca. 1600 BC – c. 1046 BC).

Under the Shang Dynasty, Han Chinese clothing or Hanfu consisted of a yi, a narrow-cuffed, knee-length tunic tied with a sash, and a narrow, ankle-length skirt, called shang, worn with a bixi, a length of fabric that reached the knees. Clothing of the elite was made of silk in vivid primary colours.

Ancient Japan

The earliest evidence of weaving in Japan is associated with the Yayoi period (弥生時代, Yayoi-jidai?) , from about 300 BC to 250.

The textile trade in the ancient world

The exchange of luxury textiles was predominant on the Silk Road, a series of ancient trade and cultural transmission routes that were central to cultural interaction through regions of the Asian continent connecting East and West by linking traders, merchants, pilgrims, monks, soldiers, nomads and urban dwellers from China to the Mediterranean Sea during various periods of time. The trade route was initiated around 114 BC by the Han Dynasty, although earlier trade across the continents had already existed. Geographically, the Silk Road or Silk Route is an interconnected series of ancient trade routes between Chang'an (today's Xi'an) in China, with Asia Minor and the Mediterranean extending over 8,000 km (5,000 miles) on land and sea. Trade on the Silk Road was a significant factor in the development of the great civilizations of China, Egypt, Mesopotamia, Persia, the Indian subcontinent, and Rome, and helped to lay the foundations for the modern world.

Classical antiquity

Greek chiton (left) and chiton worn under himation

Dress in classical antiquity favored wide, unsewn lengths of fabric, pinned and draped to the body in various ways.

Ancient Greek clothing consisted of lengths of wool or linen, generally rectangular and secured at the shoulders with ornamented pins called fibulae and belted with a sash.Typical garments were the peplos, a loose robe worn by women; the chlamys, a cloak worn by men; and the chiton, a tunic worn by both men and women. Men’s chitons hung to the knees, whereas women’s chitons fell to their ankles. A long cloak called a himation was worn over the peplos or chlamys.

The toga of ancient Rome was also an unsewn length of wool cloth, worn by male citizens draped around the body in various fashions, over a simple tunic. Early tunics were two simple rectangles joined at the shoulders and sides; later tunics had sewn sleeves. Women wore the draped stola or an ankle-length tunic, with a shawl like palla as an outer garment. Wool was the preferred fabic, although linen, hemp, and small amounts of expensive imported silk and cotton were also worn.

Iron age Europe

Medieval clothing and textiles

The history of Medieval European clothing and textiles has inspired a good deal of scholarly interest in the twenty-first century. Elisabeth Crowfoot, Frances Pritchard, and Kay Staniland authored Textiles and Clothing: Medieval Finds from Excavations in London, c.1150-c.1450 (Boydell Press, 2001). The topic is also the subject of an annual series Medieval Clothing and Textiles (Boydell Press) edited by Robin Netherton and Professor Gale R. Owen-Crocker of Anglo-Saxon Culture at the University of Manchester.

Byzantium

The Byzantines made and exported very richly patterned cloth, woven and embroidered for the upper classes, and resist-dyed and printed for the lower. By Justinian's time the Roman toga had been replaced by the tunica, or long chiton, for both sexes, over which the upper classes wore various other garments, like a dalmatica dalmatic, a heavier and shorter type of tunica; short and long cloaks were fastened on the right shoulder.

Leggings and hose were often worn, but are not prominent in depictions of the wealthy; they were associated with barbarians, whether European or Persian.

[edit] Early medieval Europe

Edgar I of England in short tunic, hose, and cloak, 966

European dress changed gradually in the years 400 to 1100. People in many countries dressed differently depending on whether they identified with the old Romanised population, or the new Migration period wiki/Migration_period">invading populations such as Franks, Anglo-Saxons, and Visigoths. Men of the invading peoples generally wore short tunics, with belts, and visible trousers, hose or leggings. The Romanised populations, and the Church, remained faithful to the longer tunics of Roman formal costume.

The elite imported silk cloth from the Byzantine, and later Moslem, worlds, and also probably cotton. They also could afford bleached linen and dyed and simply patterned wool woven in Europe itself. But embroidered decoration was probably very widespread, though not usually detectable in art. Lower classes wore local or homespun wool, often undyed, trimmed with bands of decoration, variously embroidery, tablet-woven bands, or colorful borders woven into the fabric in the loom.

High middle ages and the rise of fashion

14th century Italian silk damasks

Clothing in 12th and 13th century Europe remained very simple for both men and women, and quite uniform across the subcontinent. The traditional combination of short tunic with hose for working-class men and long tunic with overgown for women and upper class men remained the norm. Most clothing, especially outside the wealthier classes, remained little changed from three or four centuries earlier.

The 13th century saw great progress in the dyeing and working of wool, which was by far the most important material for outer wear. Linen was increasingly used for clothing that was directly in contact with the skin. Unlike wool, linen could be laundered and bleached in the sun. Cotton, imported raw from Egypt and elsewhere, was used for padding and quilting, and cloths such as buckram and fustian.

Crusaders returning from the Levant brought knowledge of its fine textiles, including light silks, to Western Europe. In Northern Europe, silk was an imported and very expensive luxury. The well-off could afford woven brocades from Italy or even further afield. Fashionable Italian silks of this period featured repeating patterns of roundels and animals, deriving from Ottoman silk-weaving centres in Bursa, and ultimately from Yuan Dynasty China via the Silk Road.

Cultural and costume historians agree that the mid-14th century marks the emergence of recognizable "fashion" in Europe. From this century onwards Western fashion changes at a pace quite unknown to other civilizations, whether ancient or contemporary. In most other cultures only major political changes, such as the Muslim conquest of India, produced radical changes in clothing, and in China, Japan, and the Ottoman Empire fashion changed only slightly over periods of several centuries.

In this period the draped garments and straight seams of previous centuries were replaced by curved seams and the beginnings oftailoring, which allowed clothing to more closely fit the human form, as did the use of lacing and buttons. A fashion for mi-parti or parti-coloured garments made of two contrasting fabrics, one on each side, arose for men in mid-century, and was especially popular at the English court. Sometimes just the hose would be different colours on each leg.

Renaissance and early modern period

Renaissance Europe

Bold floral patterned silks, 15th century.

Wool remained the most popular fabric for all classes, followed by linen and hemp. Wool fabrics were available in a wide range of qualities, from rough undyed cloth to fine, densebroadcloth with a velvety nap; high-value broadcloth was a backbone of the English economy and was exported throughout Europe. Wool fabrics were dyed in rich colours, notably reds, greens, golds, and blues.

Silk-weaving was well-established around the Mediterranean by the beginning of the 15th century, and figured silks, often silk velvets with silver-gilt , are increasingly seen in Italian dress and in the dress of the wealthy throughout Europe. Stately floral designs featuring a pomegranate or artichoke motif had reached Europe from China in the previous century and became a dominant design in the Ottoman silk-producing cities of IstanbulBursa, and spread to silk weavers in Florence, Genoa, Venice,Valencia and Seville in this period.

As prosperity grew in the 15th century, the urban middle classes, including skilled workers, began to wear more complex clothes that followed, at a distance, the fashions set by the elites. National variations in clothing increased over the century.

Early Modern Europe

Slashing at its height: Henry IV, Duke of Saxony, c. 1514.

Spanish fashion with elaborate reticella ruff, 1609

By the first half of the 16th century, the clothing of the Low Countries, German states, and Scandinavia had developed in a different direction than that of England, France, and Italy, although all absorbed the sobering and formal influence of Spanish dress after the mid-1520s.

Elaborate slashing was popular, especially in Germany. Black was increasingly worn for the most formal occasions. Bobbin lace arose from passementerie in the mid-16th century, probably in Flanders. This century also saw the rise of the ruff, which grew from a mere ruffle at the neckline of the shirt or chemise to immense cartwheel shapes. At their most extravagant, ruffs required wire supports and were made of fine Italian reticella, a cutwork linen lace.

By the turn of the 17th century, a sharp distinction could be seen between the sober fashions favored by Protestants in England and the Netherlands, which still showed heavy Spanish influence, and the light, revealing fashions of the French and Italian courts.

The great flowering of needlelace occurred in this period. Geometric reticella deriving from cutwork was elaborated into true needlelace or punto in aria (called in England "point lace"), which reflected the scrolling floral designs popular for embroidery. Lacemaking centers were established in France to reduce the outflow of cash to Italy.

According to Dr. Wolf D. Fuhrig, "By the second half of the 17th century, Silesia had become an important economic pillar of the Habsburg monarchy, largely on the strength of its textile industry.

During the industrial revolution, production was mechanised with machines powered by waterwheels and steam-engines.

Sewing machines emerged in the nineteenth century.

Clothing and textile manufacture expanded as an industry so that such unions as the Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America and the Textile Workers Union of America formed early in the twentieth century. Later in the twentieth century, the industry had expanded to such a degree that such educational institutions as UC Davis established a Division of Textiles and Clothing, The University of Nebraska-Lincoln also created a Department of Textiles, Clothing and Design that offers a Masters of Arts in Textile History, and Iowa State University established a Department of Textiles and Clothing that featurs a History of costume collection, 1865–1948. Even high school libraries have collections on the history of clothing and textiles.

Alongside these developments were changes in the types and style of clothing worn by humans. During the 1960s, had a major influence on subsequent developments in the industry.

Textiles were not only made in factories. Before this that they were made in local and national markets. Dramatic change in transportation throughout the nation is one source that encouraged the use of factories. New advances such as steamboats, canals, and railroads lowered shipping costs which caused people to buy cheap goods that were produced in other places instead of more expensive goods that were produced locally. Between 1810 and 1840 the development of a national market prompted manufacturing which tripled the output’s worth. This increase in production created a change in industrial methods, such as the use of factories instead of hand made woven materials that families usually made.

The vast majority of the people that worked in the factories were women. Women went to go work in textile factories because of some of the following reasons. Crowding at home was indeed a cause for them to leave and be on their own. The need to save for future marriage portions also motivated these women to decide to work in the millhouses. The work enabled them to see more of the world, to earn something in anticipation of marriage, and to ease the crowding within the home. They also did it to make money for family back home. The money they sent home was to help out with the trouble some of the farmers were having. They also worked in the millhouses because they could gain a sense of independence and growth as a personal goal. [52]

External links

• Textile production in Europe, 1600–1800, at the Metropolitan Museum of Art
• Things to Wear — A History of Japanese Clothing
• Spindle, Loom, and Needle – History of the Textile Industry
• Australian Museum of Clothing And Textiles Inc. – Why have a Museum of Clothing and Textiles?
• Linking Anthropology and History in Textiles and Clothing Research: The Ethnohistorical Method by Rachel K. Pannabecker – from Clothing and Textiles Research Journal, Vol. 8, No. 3, 14–18 (1990)
• The drafting history of the Agreement on Textiles and Clothing
• American Women's History: A Research Guide Clothing and Fashion
• Historical Clothing/Fabric
• History of Clothing Around the World
• All Sewn Up: Millinery, Dressmaking, Clothing and Costume
• Gallery of English Medieval Clothing from 1906 by Dion Clayton Calthrop
• A Short History of Japanese Cotton Textiles

Notes

Bibliography

• Alexander, Jonathan, and Paul Binski, eds., Age of Chivalry, Art in Plantagenet England, 1200–1400, Royal Academy/Weidenfeld & Nicholson, London 1987
• Ashelford, Jane: The Art of Dress: Clothing and Society 1500–1914, Abrams, 1996. ISBN 0-8109-6317-5
• Arnold, Janet: Patterns of Fashion: the cut and construction of clothes for men and women 1560–1620, Macmillan 1985. Revised edition 1986. (ISBN 0-89676-083-9)
• Arnold, Janet: Queen Elizabeth's Wardrobe Unlock'd, W S Maney and Son Ltd, Leeds 1988. ISBN 0-901286-20-6
• Barber, E.J.W. (Elizabeth Wayland): Prehistoric Textiles: The Development of Cloth in the Neolithic and Bronze Ages with Special Reference to the Aegean, Princeton University Press, 1992 (Barber 1992)
• Barber, Elizabeth Wayland, Women's Work: The First 20,000 Years: Women, Cloth, and Society in Early Times, W. W. Norton & Company, new edition, 1995 (Barber 1995)
• Robin L.: "Reticella: a walk through the beginnings of Lace" (2004) (PDF)
• Black, J. Anderson and Madge Garland: A History of Fashion, Morrow, 1975. ISBN 0-688-02893-4
• Braudel, Fernand, Civilization and Capitalism, 15th–18th Centuries, Vol 1: The Structures of Everyday Life, p 312-3 and 323, William Collins & Sons, London 1981
• Crowfoot, Elizabeth, Frances Prichard and Kay Staniland, Textiles and Clothing c. 1150 -c. 1450, Museum of London, 1992, ISBN 0-1129-0445-9
• Darwin, George H., "Development in Dress", Macmillan's magazine, vol. 26, May to Oct. 1872, pages 410–416
• Elisseeff, Vadime, The Silk Roads: Highways of Culture and Commerce, UNESCO Publishing / Berghahn Books, 2001, ISBN 978-92-3-103652-1
• Favier, Jean, Gold and Spices: The Rise of Commerce in the Middle Ages, London, Holmes and Meier, 1998, ISBN 0841912327
• Gordenker, Emilie E.S.: Van Dyck and the Representation of Dress in Seventeenth-Century Portraiture, Brepols, 2001, ISBN 2-503-50880-4
• Jenkins, David, ed.: The Cambridge History of Western Textiles, Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2003, ISBN 0521341078
• Kliot, Jules and Kaethe: The Needle-Made Lace of Reticella, Lacis Publications, Berkeley, CA, 1994. ISBN 0-916896-57-9.
• Kõhler, Carl: A History of Costume, Dover Publications reprint, 1963, from 1928 Harrap translation from the German, ISBN 0-4862-1030-8
• Koslin, Désirée and Janet E. Snyder, eds.: Encountering Medieval Textiles and Dress: Objects, texts, and Images, Macmillan, 2002, ISBN 0-3122-9377-1
• Laver, James: The Concise History of Costume and Fashion, Abrams, 1979*Lefébure, Ernest: Embroidery and Lace: Their Manufacture and History from the Remotest Antiquity to the Present Day, London, H. Grevel and Co., 1888, ed. by Alan S. Cole, at Online Books , retrieved October 14, 2007
• Montupet, Janine, and Ghislaine Schoeller: Lace: The Elegant Web, ISBN 0-8109-3553-8
• Netherton, Robin, and Gale R. Owen-Crocker, editors, Medieval Clothing and Textiles, Volume 1, Woodbridge, Suffolk, UK, and Rochester, NY, the Boydell Press, 2005, ISBN 1843831236
• Netherton, Robin, and Gale R. Owen-Crocker, editors, Medieval Clothing and Textiles, Volume 2, Woodbridge, Suffolk, UK, and Rochester, NY, the Boydell Press, 2006, ISBN 1843832038
• Netherton, Robin, and Gale R. Owen-Crocker, editors, Medieval Clothing and Textiles, Volume 3, Woodbridge, Suffolk, UK, and Rochester, NY, the Boydell Press 2007, ISBN 9781843832911
• Østergård, Else, Woven into the Earth: Textiles from Norse Greenland, Aarhus University Press, 2004, ISBN 8772889357
• Owen-Crocker, Gale R., Dress in Anglo-Saxon England, revised edition, Boydell Press, 2004, ISBN 1-8438-3081-7
• Payne, Blanche: History of Costume from the Ancient Egyptians to the Twentieth Century, Harper & Row, 1965. No ISBN for this edition; ASIN B0006BMNFS
• Payne, Blanche; Winakor, Geitel; Farrell-Beck Jane: The History of Costume, from the Ancient Mesopotamia to the Twentieth Century, 2nd Edn, p1 28, HarperCollins, 1992. ISBN0060471417
• Piponnier, Françoise, and Perrine Mane; Dress in the Middle Ages; Yale UP; 1997; ISBN 0300069065
• This article is about textile weaving.
  

  Warp and weft in plain weaving

  Weaving is a textile craft in which two distinct sets of yarns or threads, called the warp and the filling or weft (older woof), are interlaced to form a fabric or cloth. The warp threads run lengthways on the piece of cloth, and the weft runs across from side to side, across the bolt of cloth.

  Cloth is woven on a loom, a device that holds the warp threads in place while filling threads are woven through them. Weft is an old English word meaning "that which is woven".

  The way the warp and filling threads interlace with each other is called the weave. The majority of woven products are created with one of three basic weaves: plain weave, satin weave, or twill.

  Woven cloth can be plain (in one colour or a simple pattern), or can be woven in decorative or artistic designs, including tapestries. Fabric in which the warp and/or weft is tie-dyed before weaving is called ikat.

  The ancient craft of handweaving, along with hand spinning, remains a popular craft. The majority of commercial fabrics in the West are woven on computer-controlled Jacquard looms. In the past, simpler fabrics were woven on dobby looms, while the Jacquard harness adaptation was reserved for more complex patterns. Some believe the efficiency of the Jacquard loom, with its Jacquard weaving process, makes it more economical for mills to use them to weave all of their fabrics, regardless of the complexity of the design.

  Process

  

  An Indian weaver preparing his warp
  

  A woman weaving with a manual loom

  In general, weaving involves the interlacing of two sets of threads at right anglesto each other: the warp and the weft. The warp are held taut and in parallel order, typically by means of a loom, though some forms of weaving may use other methods. The loom is warped (or dressed) with the warp threads passing through heddles on two or more harnesses. The warp threads are moved up or down by the harnesses creating a space called the shed. The weft thread is wound onto spools called bobbins. The bobbins are placed in a shuttle that carries the weft thread through the shed. The raising and lowering sequence of warp threads gives rise to many possible weave structures.

  Both warp and weft can be visible in the final product. By spacing the warp more closely, it can completely cover the weft that binds it, giving a warpfaced textile such as rep weave. Conversely, if the warp is spread out, the weft can slide down and completely cover the warp, giving a weftfaced textile, such as a tapestry or a Kilim rug. There are a variety of loom styles for hand weaving and tapestry. In tapestry, the image is created by placing weft only in certain warp areas, rather than across the entire warp width.

  Ancient and traditional cultures

  

  Prehistoric woven objects and weaving tools
  

  Weaving in ancient Egypt
  

  Women weaving. Detail from an Ancient Greek Attic black-figure epinetron, ca.500 BC, from Athens. Louvre Museum, Paris.

  There are some indications that weaving was already known in the Palaeolithic era. An indistinct textile impression has been found at Pavlov , Moravia. Neolithic textiles are well known from finds in >pile dwellings in Switzerland. One extant fragment from the Neolithic was found in >Fayum , at a site dated to about 5000 BCE. This fragment is woven at about 12 threads by 9 threads per cm in a plain weave. >Flax was the predominant fibre in Egypt at this time and continued popularity in the Nile Valley , even after wool became the primary fibre used in other cultures around 2000 BCE. Another Ancient Egyptian item, known as the Badari dish, depicts a textile workshop. This item, catalogue number UC9547, is now housed at the Petrie Museum and dates to about 3600 BCE. Enslaved women worked as weavers during the Sumerian Era and then dried them. Next, they beat out the dirt and the wool. The wool was then graded, bleached , and spun into a thread. The spinners pulled out fibers and twisted them together. This was done either by rolling fibers between palms or using a hooked stick. The thread was then placed on a wooden or bone spindle and rotated on a clay whorl , which operated like a flywheel.

  The slaves then worked in three-woman teams on looms, where they stretched the threads, after which they passed threads over and under each other at perpendicular angles. The finished cloth was then taken to a fuller.

  Easton's Bible Dictionary (1897) points to numerous Biblical references to weaving in ancient times:

  Weaving was an art practised in very early times (Ex. 35:35). The Egyptians were specially skilled in it (Isa. 19:9; Ezek. 27:7), and some have regarded them as its inventors.
  
  In the wilderness, the Hebrews practised it (Ex. 26:1, 8; 28:4, 39; Lev. 13:47). It is referred to in subsequent times as specially the women's work (2 Kings 23:7; Prov. 31:13, 24). No mention of the loom is found in Scripture, but we read of the "shuttle" (Job 7:6), "the pin" of the beam (Judg. 16:14), "the web" (13, 14), and "the beam" (1 Sam. 17:7; 2 Sam. 21:19). The rendering, "with pining sickness," in Isa. 38:12 should be, as in the Revised Version , "from the loom," or, as in the margin, "from the thrum." We read also of the "warp" and "woof" (Lev. 13:48, 49, 51–53, 58, 59), but the Revised Version margin has, instead of "warp," "woven or knitted stuff."

  American Southwest

  

  Navajo rug

  Textile weaving, using cotton dyed with pigments, was a dominant craft among pre-contact tribes of the American southwest, including various Pueblo peoples, the Zuni, and the Utetribes. The first Spaniards to visit the region wrote about seeing Navajo blankets. With the introduction of Navajo-Churro sheep, the resulting woolen products have become very well known. By the 1700s the Navajo had begun to import yarn with their favorite color, Bayeta red. Using an upright loom, the Navajos wove blankets and then rugs after the 1880s for trade. Navajo traded for commercial wool, such as Germantown, imported from Pennsylvania. Under the influence of European-American settlers at trading posts, Navajos created new and distinct styles, including "Two Gray Hills" (predominantly black and white, with traditional patterns), "Teec Nos Pos" (colorful, with very extensive patterns), "Ganado" (founded by Don Lorenzo Hubbell, red dominated patterns with black and white, "Crystal" (founded by J. B. Moore), Oriental and Persian styles (almost always with natural dyes), "Wide Ruins," "Chinlee," banded geometric patterns, "Klagetoh," diamond type patterns, "Red Mesa" and bold diamond patterns. Many of these patterns exhibit a fourfold symmetry, which is thought to embody traditional ideas about harmony, or hózhó.

  Amazonia

  In Native Amazonia, densely woven palm mosquito netting, or tents, were utilized by the Panoans, Tupí, Western Tucano, Yameo, Záparoans, and perhaps by the indigenous peoples of the central Huallaga River basin (Steward 1963:520). Aguaje palm-bast (Mauritia flexuosa, Mauritia minor, or swamp palm) and the frond spears of the Chambira palm Astrocaryum chambira, A.munbaca, A.tucuma, also known as Cumare or Tucum) have been used for centuries by the Urarina of the Peruvian Amazon to make cordage, net-bags hammocks, and to weave fabric. Among the Urarina, the production of woven palm-fiber goods is imbued with varying degrees of an aesthetic attitude, which draws its authentication from referencing the Urarina’s primordial past. Urarina mythology attests to the centrality of weaving and its role in engendering Urarina society. The post-diluvial creation myt accords women’s weaving knowledge a pivotal role in Urarina social reproduction. Even though palm-fiber cloth is regularly removed from circulation through mortuary rites, Urarina palm-fiber wealth is neither completely inalienable, nor fungible since it is a fundamental medium for the expression of labor and exchange. The circulation of palm-fiber wealth stabilizes a host of social relationships, ranging from marriage and fictive kinship (compadrazco, spiritual compeership) to perpetuating relationships with the deceased.

  Islamic world

  

  Girls weaving a Persian rug, Hamadan, circa 1922. Note the design templates ( called 'cartoons') at top of loom.

  Hand weaving of Persian carpets and kilims has been an important element of the tribal crafts of many of the subregions of modern day Iran. Examples of carpet types are the Lavar Kerman carpet from Kerman and the Seraband rug from Arak.

  An important innovation in weaving that was developed in the Muslim worldduring the Islamic Golden Age was the introduction of foot pedals to operate a loom. The first such devices appeared in Syria, Iran and Islamic parts of East Africa, where "the operator sat with his feet in a pit below a fairly low-slung loom." By 1177, it was further developed in Al-Andalus, where having the mechanism was "raised higher above the ground on a more substantial frame." This type of loom spread to the Christian parts of Spain and soon became popular all over medieval Europe.

  Europe

  Dark Age and Medieval Europe

  Weighted-warp looms were commonplace in Europe until the development of more advanced looms around the 10th–11th centuries. Especially in colder climates, where a large floor loom would take up too much valuable floor space, the more primitive looms remained in use until the 20th Century to produce "homespun" cloth for individual family needs. The primary material woven in most of Europe was wool, though linen was also common, and imported silk thread was occasionally made into cloth. Both men and women were weavers, though the task often fell to the wife of a farming household. Fabric width was limited to the reach of the weaver, but was sufficient for the tunic-style garments worn in much of Europe at the time. A plain weave or twill was common, since professional weavers with skills to produce better fabrics were rare.

  Weaving was a strictly local enterprise until later in the period, when larger weaving operations sprung up in places like Brugges, in Flanders. Within this setting, master weavers could improve their craft and pass skills along to apprentices. As the Middle Ages progressed, significant trade in fine cloth developed, and loom technology improved to allow very thin threads to be woven. Weaver's guilds (and associated craft guilds, like fullers) gained significant political and economic power in some of the bigger weaving cities.

  Colonial America

  Colonial America was heavily reliant on Great Britain for manufactured goods of all kinds. British policy was to encourage the production of raw materials in colonies. Weaving was not prohibited, but the export of British wool was. As a result many people wove cloth from locally produced fibers in Colonial America.

  In Colonial times the colonists mostly used wool, cotton and flax (linen) for weaving, though hemp fiber could be made into serviceable canvas and heavy cloth also. They could get one cotton crop each fall, but until the invention of the cotton gin it was a labor-intensive process to separate the seeds from the cotton fiber. Flax and hemp were harvested in the summer, and the stalks rendered for the long fibers within. Wool could be sheared up to twice yearly, depending on the breed of sheep.

  A plain weave was preferred in Colonial times, and the added skill and time required to make more complex weaves kept them from common use in the average household. Sometimes designs were woven into the fabric but most were added after weaving using wood block prints or embroidery.

  Industrial Revolution

  Before the Industrial Revolution, weaving remained a manual craft, usually undertaken part-time by family craftspeople. Looms might be broad or narrow; broad looms were those too wide for the weaver to pass the shuttle through the shed, so that the weaver needed an assistant (often an apprentice). This ceased to be necessary after John Kay invented the flying shuttle in 1733, which also sped up the process of weaving.

  Great Britain

  The first attempt to mechanise weaving was the work of Edmund Cartwrightfrom 1785. He built a factory at Doncaster and obtained a series of patents between 1785 and 1792. In 1788, his brother Major John Cartwight built Revolution Mill at Retford (named for the centenary of the Glorious Revolution. In 1791, he licensed his loom to the Grimshaw brothers of Manchester, but their Knott Mill burnt down the following year (possibly a case of arson). Edmund Cartwight was granted a reward of £10,000 by Parliament for his efforts in 1809. However, success in power-weaving also required improvements by others, including H. Horrocks of Stockport. Only during the two decades after about 1805, did power-weaving take hold. Textile manufacture was one of the leading sectors in the British Industrial Revolution, but weaving was a comparatively late sector to be mechanised. The loom became semi-automatic in 1842 with Kenworthy and Bulloughs Lancashire Loom. The various innovations took weaving from a home-based artisan activity (labour intensive and man-powered) to steam driven factories process. A large metal manufacturing industry grew to produce the looms, firms such as Howard & Bullough of Accrington, and Tweedales and Smalley and Platt Brothers. Most cotton weaving took place in weaving sheds, in small townscircling Greater Manchester and worsted weaving in West Yorkshire– men and women with weaving skills emigrated, and took the knowledge to their new homes in New England, in places like Pawtucket and Lowell.

  The invention in France of the Jacquard loom, enabled complicated patterned cloths to be woven, by using punched cards to determine which threads of coloured yarn should appear on the upper side of the cloth.

  America, 1800–1900

  

  Jacquard loom

  The Jacquard loom attachment was perfected in 1801, and was becoming common in Europe by 1806. It came to the US in the early 1820's, some immigrant weavers bringing jacquard equipment with them, and spread west from New England. At first it was used with traditional human-powered looms. As a practical matter, previous looms were mostly limited to the production of simple geometric patterns. The jacquard allowed individual control of each warp thread, row by row without repeating, so very complex patterns were suddenly feasible. Jacquard woven coverlets (bedspreads) became popular by mid-century, in some cases being custom-woven with the name of the customer embedded in the programmed pattern. Undyed cotton warp was usually combined with dyed wool weft.

  Natural dyes were used until just before the American Civil War, when artificial dyes started to come into use