
Originally Posted by
rosepath
Enjoying reading this thread very much! I've only knitted the mini-gansey from the Beth Brown Retsel book, with my high school students, but we perservered and got them done. Most ended up on teddy bears
Melodi, I am a weaver/spinner/dyer too, and you have a good point about not going at it 10 hours a day, maybe shoulder issues go with the territory. Last night I was thinking of linen, then Viking/Norse (?) sails, and the huge amount of cloth they must have required. Then realizing all the magnitude of the work involved, to raise, pull, rett, dry, break, scotch, hackle and finally spin the linen.....on a drop spindle! THEN to weaving, and am I correct that they'd have used warp-weighted looms? Boggles the mind, those sails would be more valuable than gold for all the time they took. I am in awe of our foremothers!
Yep, they used warp-weighted looms, I know how to use those but have never done so except for demos because of the shoulder issues.
It is highly likely that men did some of the spinnings and weaving for sails and cordage but that isn't certain, we just know other sea-going peoples tended to divide the labor that way; with men at least spinning the cordage (ropes, etc) I suspect it is also likely that like their counterparts until the early 1970s in the British Navy the Norse men probably also nailbinded their own sock, hats, and scarves when on long voyages (or at least knew how to repair them).
When I do demos with either my wheels or my drop spindles I tell children how EVERYTHING in "the old days" was made this way, if it wasn't leather or fur, that means from the pillowcases to the floormat as well as all the clothing. Their eyes tend to get really wide, with little kids I sometimes ask them to touch objects that had to be spun like their jeans, the yarn in front of me, the blankets, etc - it is a real wonder seeing them suddenly comprehend this.
Sometimes when I meet pastors I'll mention "Paul the Tentmaker" most of them have never really thought about what that would mean, much less what goes into making one sail for a Viking ship!
There's a reason it was the WOMEN of Iceland who brought in almost all the actual silver/money economy there was on the Island (and gave them a very high social status in return) they were the ones that did all the famous textile work (including shaggy clokes that were famous and worn by European Kings but we have existing examples of).
Men bought in some limited money by trading furs, leather, and live animals but the textiles and long-staple Icelandic sheep were the real backbones of the economy for centuries, and even the Greenlanders managed to wear wool and keep some of their sheep alive until the colonies folded around the 1400s.
expatriate Californian living in rural Ireland with husband, dogs, horses. garden and many, many cats
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