The History of Spinning--Shorter than we'd thought?

Archaeology has a way of taking what we thought we knew of history and changing it so that our understanding of human history and technology is broader and deeper than it was before.

A recent study by Dr. Margarita Gleba, of the University of Cambridge, and Dr. Susanna Harris, of the University of Glasgow, of European and Near Eastern archaeological textiles from over 30 different locations and spanning the time period from 4000-500 BCE, has brought to light an astounding fact.  The threads in those textiles were not produced by spinning!

They were spliced.

Producing thread by splicing means that pieces of fiber are twisted together, one at a time, to make the thread, instead of being twisted together continuously with the aid of a spinning spindle.

It is highly significant that the textiles which Drs. Gleba and Harris analyzed were all made from linen. Linen fiber is significantly more difficult to spin into thread with a spindle.  But if the linen plant is partially processed by retting--a controlled rotting process--the fibers that are produced can be spliced into thread.

A spliced thread is not as strong as one that is spun.  So if one was splicing thread to be woven into cloth, it would be important to strengthen the thread.  The simplest way to do so is by plying--twisting one or more spliced threads together.  And when Drs. Gleba and Harris examined the threads in the linen textiles (ranging in age from the Neolithic to the early Iron Age), that is exactly what they found.  Their paper notes that when thread that has been spliced in one direction is plied with another thread in the same direction, the resulting thread may look as though it had been spun.

Aside from requiring us to reconsider the age of spinning as a thread making technique, the analysis of Drs. Gleba and Harris explains something that had always puzzled me, namely, why linen fabric seems to have been so common in early Europe and the Near East. The use of spliced thread to create linen textiles goes along way toward explaining that.  Such linen did not need the invention of the spindle, or the elaborate fiber preparation process necessary to create spinnable flax fibers.

An article from Current Archaeology reporting on the discovery of Drs. Gleba and Harris can be read here. Dr. Gleba's and Dr. Harris's article can be read and downloaded on the Springer website (it was published as Open Access) here. Thanks to Katrin Kania for posting the link to the Current Archaeology article.

A Tiny Epiphany

I had a tiny epiphany last week.

I saw a YouTube video about handspinning--(not sure if it was the same video I'm attaching to this post) and I realized something that hadn't occurred to me before.

A hand spindle is nothing more than a stick--often a  stick that is tapered at both ends and thickest in the middle.  It's used to twist raw fiber into a smooth strong thread.  During the Middle Ages, whorls (the weight that makes the spindle spin at a particular rate to twist the fiber) were not permanently glued to the stick.  That not only means they could be easily replaced if the whorl broke, but they could be swapped out for different whorls.  Being able to change whorls matters because in general, the lighter the whorl is, the more twist it imparts to the fiber, and the finer the resulting thread is likely to be.  Heavier weights tend to result in slower spinning, the better to make thicker threads that need less twist.

All of that I had known before.  But what I realized in watching the video is that a spinner could use more than one whorl to obtain the particular speed of spin of a spindle.  (Take a look at the video above starting at about 1:47).  That means she could, at least in theory, change the spindle weight in tiny increments to achieve the type of thread she wanted to make.  It could also be used to improve the performance of a particular spindle/whorl combination, as Lois Swales indicates in the video.

It goes to show that one should never assume one knows everything about a particular subject; thinking about a topic from a different angle can result in new knowledge.

Learning to Spin? Part One

Today, after receiving an encouraging message from one of my readers that she is learning how to spin after reading my post about my new spindle, I hauled out the wool I bought recently on EBay and looked up the URLs to the tutorial videos I had previously found about spinning with a drop spindle.

At that point, I hit my first snag (pun intended).  The videos I had found presume that the student will begin by obtaining carded (i.e., combed so that all the fibers run straight and in the same direction) wool that has been formed into rolags (i.e., long strands of carded wool arranged for easy spinning).  The wool I purchased very cheaply on EBay ($2.50 USD) appears to be clean, but uncarded, wool fleece in an assortment of natural colors.  The picture on the left shows all 103 grams of my tiny fleece-hoard.

So I went back to the Internet. After a quick search, I found this video on how to card wool, and then this video on how to both card it and form it into rolags.  Neither process looked difficult, so I started browsing for a pair of hand cards, which are a kind of specialized comb for carding wool.  They can be expensive--the cheapest ones I've found so far, on this site, are $18.00 USD apiece, and the most common price is about $50 USD for a pair.  Somehow, I have a hard time bringing myself to spend $36.00 plus shipping to prepare $2.50 worth of wool.  (I'm beginning to think I should have spent the extra money for pre-carded rolags.)  

While I was thinking about the carding issue, I took some pieces of fleece that matched in color and texture and seemed to be almost the right shape as a rolag and began stretching and shaping them together.  My crudely-improvised rolag is shown on the right.

Then I found this forum thread about the pros and cons of using pet slickers (small wire brushes used to groom certain breeds of dogs and cats) for carding.  The gist of the discussion was that proper carders last longer and are more efficient, but that slicker brushes work well enough and are better for a beginner than the so-called "student" carders sold by some companies.  (They even have the same shape as wool carding combs!) That was good news to me.  I've seen slicker brushes at my local pet supply store for about $8 USD apiece.  (I don't own any, despite having a very generously furred cat, because it's more efficient to use a metal comb to groom her.  However, I have saved a quantity of her fur combings--maybe I will be able to spin some of them into yarn once I learn the spinning process!)

So now I should probably buy a pair of slickers, card and form a quantity of the wool into rolags, and see what I can learn about spinning.

My New Spindle

For no reason I can easily explain, I recently decided that I needed to own a drop spindle, preferably one with a soapstone whorl, like some of the Viking finds.

So I bought the spindle shown in the photo from a nice neopagan who trades as Mengloth's Market. I received the spindle on Friday. Upon opening the box, I saw that the spindle I had received both was and wasn't what I was hoping for. On the plus side, the soapstone whorl is beautiful in shape, and (so far as I can tell) has good balance and spin. But the minus side is that the spindle stick is an ordinary lacquered dowel with hooks screwed on both the top and the bottom. I don't have a problem with the two hooks, since I think it will be easier to learn to spin with the hooks present, and the fact that there are hooks on both top and bottom will let me experiment with both top and bottom whorl spinning. Moreover, I have discovered by careful experiment that I can simply remove the hooks by unscrewing them, if I want to cut notches in the stick at a later date. No, the disappointing part is that the whorl appears to be glued in place. So much for my buying a spindle stick from Katrin to use with it. :-( But for better or worse, I now own a spindle.

Now that I own a spindle, I need to learn how to spin. Since I can't imagine trying to learn this craft, which requires the continuous use of two hands, from a book (that would need to be held open, and have pages turned from time to time), I went looking on YouTube for good video tutorials. Of the video tutorials I've found so far, this one by Megan LaCore and this one by Abby Franquemont appear to be the clearest and easiest to understand. Though I also enjoyed this one, titled simply and anonymously "Spinning on a Drop spindle While Arguing With my mother"; it shows what the teenage spinner is doing almost as clearly as the videos intended to be tutorials.

When I actually obtain some roving, I will sit down with one of the videos one day when I have time and energy, and see what I can manage to learn. In the meantime, if any of my readers have any suggestions 1) for tutorials to look for; 2) sources of roving, or 3) any other advice. I'm always eager to listen!