Chamber Graves

While I was thinking about the implications of the fact that there are other chamber graves in Russia that have similar textile and birchbark box fragments to the Pskov find, I found the following article on line. (It is from a German-titled and thus probably mostly German language publication, though the article itself is in English, so I apologize in advance if the name of the publication and the publisher aren't in the correct format.)

Andrzej Janowski, Early medieval chamber graves on the south coast of the Baltic Sea. Beiträge zur Urund Frühgeschichte Mitteleuropas 60, Der Wandel um 1000, pp. 257-267 (Beier & Beran 2011).  [Go here for a PDF of the article; you may need to start an account on academia.edu to get to the page, but the account is free even if you're just a random interested person and not an academic or student.]

The main theme of Mr. Janowski's article is that quite a large number of chamber graves have been found, not just in Russia  and along the Baltic Sea coast, but in Scandinavia itself.  He reports that the academic consensus has been that over the past 100 years the cultural source of this type of grave was deemed to be Russian, but now the source is thought to be Scandinavian.

Mr. Janowski does not discuss any textile finds, and the graves for which he includes sketches of artifacts are male.  What he does is discuss a number of finds, made over the past 30 years, in northern Germany and Poland.  He states that while the (relatively) newly discovered graves in Poland and Germany bear a strong resemblance to the the Scandinavian chamber graves, in physical structure, most of the artifacts found therein, particularly the female jewelry found in them, are Slavic in style:

All other artifacts discovered in the chamber graves at the Southern Baltic Sea Coast, especially silver female jewelry (temple-rings, ear-rings, “kaptorgi”, i. e. amulet cases suspended on a neck), are typically Slavic. It seems then, that the equipment discovered in the discussed graves, although of luxurious character and proving high social status of the persons or their community, does not prove their foreign origins. Furthermore, while in case of graves from Pień, Kałdus, Sowinki, Dziekanowice or Oldenburg, dated for the 10th – beginning of 11th century Scandinavian attribution of the buried persons would be acceptable, since they come from the period of the highest Scandinavian activity in Eastern and Central Europe (cf. Leciejewicz 1995), graves from Western Pomerania, and Mecklenburg, 100–150 years younger, have no relation to it.  (page 265).

So it can't be assumed that an occupant of a chamber grave in, say, Poland for example, was dressed like the Pskov woman, or a Birka woman, unless the jewelry in the grave matches the types found in Pskov and Birka--and even then we can't be sure because the Pskov find was found separately stored and not on a human body.  Or it may just be that the Polish and German graves are different for some reason. Clearly, I have to do some more thinking and research on chamber graves, and what appears within them, before I can try to draw defensible conclusions about what they say about women's costume.  In the meantime, I commend the article in question to the attention of anyone interested in material culture in early medieval northern Europe.

La Dama de Baza

While on my vacation, I have managed to read most of the latest issues of the Archaeological Textiles Newsletter, which I received as a result of my purchase of a membership. One of the most intriguing issues in the issue is one of the shortest.  Here is the citation:

Demant, Ida.  From Stone to Textile:  Constructing the Costume of the Dama de Baza.  Archaeological Textiles Newsletter, No. 52, pp. 37-40 (Spring 2011).

La Dama de Baza (i.e., The Lady of Baza) is the name given to a statue that is on display in the National Archaeological Museum in Madrid, Spain. According to Ms. Demant's article, it was originally found in a necropolis near Granada and dates approximately from the 3rd century BCE; Wikipedia indicates that it is one of a number of similar sculptures found on the Iberian peninsula of similar date.  A photograph of the statue appears to the left.  

La Dama de Baza (photo from Wikimedia Commons)

Ms. Demant and Anne Batzer have been engaged for several years in an attempt to use general knowledge of costume of the period and the statue itself to recreate the textile portions of the Lady's costume. Since the statue, like most ancient period statues, had been painted, it was possible to discern the basic color scheme of the costume--namely, blue and red, with blue and red checkered borders.  Aware that ancient period costumes often used dyed wools for outer layers and undyed linen for the underlayers, Demant and Batzer used dyed blue wool, with red and blue woven, checkered trim, for the outer portions of the Lady's costume, and plain white linen for her underwear.  They concluded that, to best match the draperies visible on the statue with such layering, the Lady's costume likely would be made of four pieces; a long, woolen mantle, which is draped partly over her head, and trimmed with the red and blue checkered pattern; a long outertunic, which they concluded had long, wide sleeves; an undertunic in linen, and an underskirt, also in linen, which peeps out beneath the tunics in front.  Their recreation strikes me as a plausible match for the statue (though the reconstructors did not attempt to recreate the Lady's heavy and elaborate jewelry).

However, the Baza reconstruction reminded me of a different reconstruction:  the reconstruction of a woman's costume based on the finds from one of the Lønne Hede graves in west Jutland. No linen survived in that grave, but substantial fragments of a blue and red woolen costume did. It has been reconstructed, and appears in the National Museum of Denmark, as a short blouse, worn with a long blue skirt with red and blue checkered trim, and a red and blue plaid shawl.  The grave finds included a silver crossbow brooch that is usually shown in the middle of her chest, pinning nothing despite the existence of the shawl. A picture of the Lønne Hede reconstruction can be found here. It is dated to the beginning of the first century CE, or about three hundred years after the Lady of Baza.

Still, I wonder about the similarity of blue costume with blue and red checkered borders. Could the Lønne Hede costume be a distant descendant, as it were, of the Lady of Baza's costume?  Did they have anything in common other than being female?  Were they both priestesses, or had a similar rank or role in their respective communities?  Any such connection is sheer speculation on my part. Even so, I think that I'll keep an eye out for other late Roman statues, and other blue and red textile finds. to see whether any kind of pattern emerges.

Another Plug for ATN

A couple of months ago, on her blog, Katrin Kania posted on her blog about the Archaeological Textiles Newsletter, or ATN.  She urged readers who were interested in seeing ATN continue to sign up for at least a year's membership because ATN needs a "few" more members to be eligible for external funding.

I have read a couple of prior issues of ATN, and knew how useful and interesting its articles could be to the researcher interested in early period costume.  So as soon as I was able to pay the 20 Euro membership fee, I bought an annual membership at ATN's website.

Part of the quid pro quo for my membership, namely, the current issue of ATN, arrived on Saturday. I was extremely impressed.  It contains a significant number of fascinating articles, such as:  

• An article about a 13th century female grave of the "Golden Horde" period with enough finds to permit a reconstruction of her entire burial outfit--including the underwear.  It includes color photographs of some of the silk brocades that comprise her costume;
• An article about a recreation of the costume of a female depicted in a statute found in Spain and dated to the 3rd century BCE that strongly resembles the Lonne Hede costume;
• An article about the author's research in Armenia to reconstruct early loom set ups, including the upright loom believed to have been used to weave the Huldremose peplos.

In addition, the books reviewed in this issue include three volumes in which I am fairly strongly interested.  

I brought the issue with me despite my busy vacation plans because I am eager to find out more about all of these topics. If I have time, I'll write about them while I'm away.   In the meantime, if you haven't yet bought a membership to ATN, reconsider--especially if early period costume fascinates you.  I think you'll find that it's worth the price.

EDITED to correct some misapprehensions in the article descriptions above.

SECOND EDIT:  At present, only back issues 46-51 (the new issue I discuss above is issue no. 52) can be purchased as back issues (at a price of 10 Euros each).  In Issue No. 52, it says that ATN is planning to make earlier back issues available.  That's wonderful, because many of the back issues have fascinating articles also.  There is a list of contents for all the back issues here (click the link "Issues").

Thinking About Period (Costumed) Dolls

My mini-Viking

Tonight, I ran across an interesting tutorial for making dolls from cloth. The author based her technique upon a Roman doll found in Egypt, dated 1st-5th century CE, that is now in the British Museum.

Now why should I care about cloth dolls? Because they can be used as models for historic costume, as Heather Rose Jones did here on her "Dig that Doll!" page, featuring dolls dressed in little replicas of costumes from different archaeological sites ranging from the prehistoric to the medieval. My friend pearl dug up these pictures of a doll modeling the costume of the woman from Eura, Finland, c. 1000 CE. Here's a page with pictures of dolls in Viking costume, by a museum in Iceland.

Speaking of dolls in Viking costume, I have my own cloth Viking doll. I bought her at a science-fiction convention, of all places, about 20 years ago, and I've been improving her costume bit by bit ever since. The body, hair, face and dress were done by the woman I bought her from, but the jewelry (the brooches are 18k gold post earrings; the armbands are a pair of silver earrings, somewhat tarnished), belt (a snippet from an old belt of mine) ,and shoes (hand sewn from real leather!) are my additions. Finding the doll tutorial is making me think about whether it would be useful/entertaining for me to make in doll form some of the costumes I've been planning to make for myself, such as my Vendel or Byzantine outfits. It would be quicker than a Cathy-size costume, of course, but more difficult, because cloth made for people clothing is usually too stiff to drape well on the size-scale of a doll's body. But it's something to think about, while work and vacation plans conspire to keep me away from costuming.

On Sunday, I head off to spend two weeks in Michigan, visiting friends and attending Polaris Fellowship of Weapons Study's Summer Weapons Retreat. I don't expect to work on any of my costuming projects, and I probably will blog very little, if at all. I'll return about July 24, hopefully full of renewed vigor and costuming zeal.