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Textiles and Weaving Appliances in Prehistoric Britain

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 May 2014

Audrey S. Henshall
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Extract

This paper is an attempt to bring together the rather scanty evidence for prehistoric textiles in the British Isles, whether in the form of surviving fragments, impressions on bronze corrosion, or implements associated with spinning and weaving. While the material cannot compare with the rich series from Scandinavia or Switzerland, it has, nevertheless, considerable points of interest in its own right.

Surviving woven textiles are first discussed, with such evidence of spinning and weaving techniques as can be deduced from the fragments. The archaeological material representing weaving appliances (e.g. spindle whorls, loom-weights, weaving combs, etc.) is then reviewed, with a special note on the curious technique of tablet-weaving, and finally there is a consideration of the evidence for basketry and allied fabrics. The material discussed is listed with references in a series of tabular appendices at the end of the paper.

Type
Research Article
Information
Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society , Volume 16 , 1950 , pp. 130 - 162
Copyright
Copyright © The Prehistoric Society 1950

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References

page 130 note 1 My thanks are due especially to Professor Piggott, who encouraged me in this study and whose help throughout has been invaluable, to Dr Margrethe Hald of the National Museum, Copenhagen, whose published work, supplemented in correspondence, has been my chief guide, and to Mr R. B. K. Stevenson, Keeper of the National Museum of Antiquities, Edinburgh, for help while I was working in the Museum. I also wish to thank Mrs Crowfoot, Mr M. Y. Orr, Mr A. W. G. Lowther, and others on the staffs of numerous museums and elsewhere for photographs, information and advice.

paeg 131 note 1 A table of all finds referred to, with details of weave, references, etc., is given in Appendix A (pp. 157–9).

page 131 note 2 cf. Munro, in P.S.A.S., XXXVI (1901–1902), 464–87Google Scholar.

page 135 note 1 The textile impression is not mentioned in the Report, Surrey Archaeological Collections, 50, 9–46Google Scholar; information from Mr A. W. G. Lowther.

page 136 note 1 Unpublished information from Mr A. W. G. Lowther.

page 139 note 1 A piece of it is preserved in the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, J.R.S., II, 230Google Scholar.

page 140 note 1 A remarkable discovery made near Kirkby Malzeard, Yorks., in the last century, is however worth recalling in this connection. The find ‘was made in the spring of 1850, by Edwin and John Grainge, while digging peat on Grewelthorpe Moor, when they came upon the body of a man, in an almost complete state of preservation, and from his dress evidently a Roman, which the peat had tanned and dried, in a remarkable manner, somewhat like an Egyptian mummy. The robes were quite perfect when found, the toga of a green colour, while some portions of the dress were of a scarlet hue; the stockings were of yellow cloth, and the sandals of a finely artistic shape, one of which was preserved, and we believe is now in the museum of the Yorkshire Philosophical Society. The flesh was tanned into a kind of white fatty substance, and had a very offensive smell. No coins or weapons were found about the body … The remains were finally interred in the churchyard of Kirkby Malzeard.’

(Verbatim extract from The Ripon Millenary Record, pub. 1892: Preface to Part II, II, page IX; the preface is signed W.G., probably William Grainge). The sock and shoe are how in the Museum of the Yorkshire Philosophical Society.

page 141 note 1 Noted in Manchester Museum in cloth from the Fayum of Early Dynastic date.

page 144 note 1 These types are fully discussed in the Maiden Castle Report, page 294.

page 150 note 1 For list, see Appendix C., p. 161.

page 151 note 1 For details and references to all finds, see list in Appendix D., p. 162.

page 153 note 1 In a note by Mr Mann in the Museum with the Corsewall moss.

page 154 note 1 My comments are on a piece, probably from Robenhausen, in York Museum.

page 155 note 1 Note with plait in the Museum.