Useful References

I've been gone all weekend, so I don't have the energy to post original thoughts.  Instead, I'll pass on some useful links I found recently.

Here is a detailed, illustrated description of how to "self sew" a linen garment, which means to sew the garment with thread drawn from a piece of the fabric used in making the garment.  I have yet to attempt this technique, but the description sounds inspiring.  The only surprising fact in it is that it's better to use short pieces of thread for such sewing, rather than long ones.  (Thanks to the author of the Opus Anglicanum blog, and to the 12thcGarb list on Yahoo, for directing me to this useful essay.)

I also found a free PDF copy of an interesting article entitled, "Immortal Maidens: The Visual Significance of the Colour White in Girls’ Graves on Viking-Age Gotland," by Susanne Thedéen, which appears in a book called Making Sense of Things: Archaeologies of Sensory Perception at pages 103 to 120.  Thedéen's article discusses finds of white beads and cowrie shells in female graves in Gotland, and notes that most of these finds involve graves identified as containing females who died between the ages of five and fifteen. It is interesting, both with regard to the sociological and costume-related implications of these finds.

I hope my readers find these articles as interesting as I do.