Tidbits from NESAT XIV

Didn't make it to NESAT (North European Symposium for Archaeological Textiles) XIV a few weeks ago, in mid August?  Me either.  But today (now that the symposium is over), I found some wonderful summaries, and photographs, of presentations from NESAT XIV on the symposium's Instagram account.  The list of posters featured on the Instagram account may be found on the NESAT XIV website here, and the NESAT XIV Instagram account is here.

Among the most fascinating presentations on the Instagram account are those about an early medieval textile finds in Finland.  The find, at Ravattula, is going to be the subject of a head-to-toe reconstruction project, starting with weaving the wool for the garments as well as making the jewelry and characteristic bronze spiral clothing decoration.  It dates to approximately 1200 CE.  One of the Instagram posts features grave find diagrams as well as photographs of the Ravattula textile and jewelry finds, including woven garters.  I cannot wait to see the results of the reconstruction project!  

Also fascinating to those of us interested in early costume is a post about the braided armband found in Dartmoor, United Kingdom, dating to about 1730-1600 BCE.  This armband is now believed to have been made by fingerloop braiding, though the horsehair used was stiff and springy enough that the strands needed to be manipulated with "handles" of yarn instead of directly by the fingers.  A reconstruction apparently was made using fingerloop braiding techniques.  (Andy M. Jones published a book in 2017 about the Dartmoor find called Preserved in the Peat which is available, and currently on sale, from its publisher Oxbow Books.)

It will be several years before the printed NESAT XIV volume is published, but these Instagram posts are a wonderful taste of what to expect from that volume.