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Tablet Weaving

Double Diamonds My very first attempt. Well ok.. technically it’s my second attempt.. for my first attempt I decided that “this tablet weaving stuff looks easy.. I want to do double faced” and so I did a quick 2-2 warp of black and white. After a night of turning it and getting no where I un-did all the turnings and stared at it for a couple more days. Finally I saw this pattern. It looked like it’d be a nice easy way to ease into tablet weaving…. That and I’d be able to use the threads I already had on my loom.

Anglo Saxon Threaded in pattern I’d actually read Thora’s article many times.. and although it looked kind of interesting.. I wasn’t thrilled by the sample she had up on her site. It was nice but it didn’t make me go “Ohhhh!!! That one!!! I must have it.” Then I stumbled across this other sample on Eve’s web page (no longer active). -That- one got the “must have it” response.

Katie’s Trim Ok, many things at work here. I showed my tablet weaving to a couple of people at the Shire and Katie and Dianora decided that they wanted to try it. At the last Collegium I picked up an extra inkle loom for $5. So we used Gutram’s Tablet Weaving Thingy to work up the pattern. We warped up the little loom and started to weave it.. (insert pain, suffering and curse words). First off the pattern was coming up on the under-side.. so we pulled it off the loom.. reversed it.. and then we couldn’t get it to work for love nor money. After a frustrating time Katie left with the little loom…. and I just fumed and tried to figure out what went wrong. It turns out that Gutram’s tablets are lettered counter clockwise. My cards are lettered clockwise… so if I follow his patterns exactly I always end up with the pattern on the bottom of the band. To fix this I changed all the S’s to Z’s and all the Z’s to S’s. It worked like a charm and I wove up a test patch of Katie’s Trim.. and gave it to her.. so I don’t have a sample to scan.

Dad’s Belt This project is the whole reason I got started with tablet weaving. When I was growing up my Dad had this belt. He loved to wear it.. in fact he wore it until it got so worn and dirty that he couldn’t wear it anymore. So he went looking for another belt just like it. Nowhere could he find the same type of belt but somehow Mom found out that it was tablet woven. This was years and years and years ago.
So we’re coming up to Dad’s birthday this year.. and I’ve just started tablet weaving. While talking with Mom I ask her if Dad still has that belt he really liked.. and Gee could she send it to me. So I worked out a pattern based on the original.. and made it. I hope he likes it.

First Tablet Weaving: Double Diamonds

I found the design for this here: http://www3.sympatico.ca/kirkflowers/tablet5.html (site no longer active)

Front

Back

Threading diagram for use in Gutram’s Tablet Weaving Thingy

Turning sequence:
8 forward
8 backward

Comments:
Using 36 cards of size 10 cotton crochet thread this piece came out to a width of just a little over 1.25 inches. The size 10 cotton crochet thread made this so easy. No stickiness. The threads just slid together.

I’ve since this learned how to keep the weft even and my next pieces are much better.
I think if I were to do this piece again I would turn the three selvelge cards on each side all in one direction to keep it nice and even. This would build up twist but I bought some swivels for that.

This band completed: 10/10/2002

Anglo Saxon threaded in pattern

I found the design for this band in an article by Thora Sharptooth (Carolyn Priest-Dorman) reprinted here: http://www.cs.vassar.edu/~capriest/saxontw.html [1]

This girdle is woven using Thora’s threading sequence. Thora seems to have based her sequence on the original article about the piece by Grace Crowfoot and discussions with Peter Collingwood. In The Techniques of Table Weaving, Collingwood has a similar pattern draft but it doesn’t include the white dashed lines that occur on either side of Thora’s sequence. Peter says that this design was found “on a scrap of a band, adhering to an Anglo-Saxon bronze buckle excavated at Cambridge”. Thora implies that it -is- a belt. I can only assume that she got this information from the original article “Textiles of the Saxon Period in the Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology” written by Grace Crowfoot published in Cambridge Antiquarian Society Proceedings 44 (1950).

Band is the same on front and back

Threading diagram for use in Gutram’s Tablet Weaving Thingy

Turning sequence:

This band is turned only in one direction using a technique Peter Collingwood calls “Pack idling”[2]. Separate the cards into a pack made of even numbered cards and a pack made of odd numbered cards. Insert the first weft from left to right. Turn only the even cards, beat, and insert the next weft from right to left. Leave a little loop on the right-hand side of the weaving.

- Turn only the odd cards, beat, pull the last weft thread taut. Insert the next weft from left to right leaving a little loop on the left-hand side of the weaving.

- Turn only the even cards, beat, pull the last weft thread taut. Insert the next weft from right to left, leaving a little loop on the right-hand side of the weaving.

Alternate turning the packs alternately: even, odd, even, odd until the weaving reaches the desired length.

Comments:

Using 18 cards threaded with four pieces of size 10 cotton crochet thread this piece came out to a width of just a little under 0.5 inches(~1 cm). This pattern is naturally double sided. Because of the alternations, this band weaves up narrower and a little more dense than it normally would with only 18 cards.

I wove this piece out of size 10 cotton crochet thread warped on an inkle loom.

It’s unlikely that the original band was woven in cotton. It’s more likely that it was woven in silk, wool or linen. None of the sources I have access to referenced the material nor colors of the original band.

It’s also unlikely that the original band was woven on an inkle loom as the inkle loom that I’m using wasn’t invented until the 19th century. It’s more likely that it was woven on a warp weighted loom or a backstrap loom. Because this pieces is turned all in one direction there was a great deal of twist build up behind the cards. Three times in the weaving I had to untie everything and release the twist. Given the amount of twist on this piece I suspect it would most easily be woven using a warp weighted loom.
Citations:

Carolyn Priest-Dorman, Pikestaff: The Arts and Sciences Issue (December 1990), reprinted at http://www.cs.vassar.edu/~capriest/saxontw.html.
Peter Collingwood, The Techniques of Tablet Weaving (McMinnville: Robin & Russ Handweavers, Inc., 2002), p. 122.

NOTE: Just last night(4/24/2003) I received a copy of the original article written by G. Crowfoot sent to me by Nancy Spies (Thanks Nancy!!!). OMG!!! I’ve only read it through once.. but here’s the gist. It looks like the original piece was about 1 cm (~.5 inches) wide and was made of a bast fiber.. possibly linen!! Yes, LINEN!!! G. Crowfoot writes that it looks like the original band was done with the outline and the stripes in white with the inner diamonds a light blue and the ground a darker blue (possibly woad dyed). It is “firmly adhered” to a strap end, embedded between the bars in the strap end.

I’ll re-read this some more and update this page when I have more to say.

This band completed: 10/23/2002

Other Resorces
Anglo-Saxon Belt Weaving Instructions by Shelagh Lewins

Tablet Weaving: Dad's Belt

Front

Back

Turning sequence:
Turn forward until you see 5 triangles. On the 6th triangle reverse half way through. Turn backwards until you see 5 triangles.

Comments:
Using 32 cards of size 12 cotton crochet thread this piece came out to a width of just a little over 2.25 inches. The size 12 cotton crochet thread was sticky. This was the toughest band I’ve made yet. I practically bruised my chest trying to beat it.

It’s a little bit wider than the belt should be.. I guess I could have pulled the weft tighter. Someone else has suggested that it’ll stretch/tighten with wear. I hope so.

This band completed: 11/3/2002

Tubular Tablet Weaving

From an email from Henshall, A. 1964. Five tablet-woven seal tags. Archaeological Journal
121:154-162.
5. Multicoloured tablet-woven cord
The charter is by John (de Balliol), King of Scotland, to Nicholas de Haia, of thelands of Erroll, etc. Granted at Lindores, 1 August 1294.
Material. Warp: silk yarn, 2-ply twisted S, dark blue, salmon pink (mainly faded to buff), white and pale yellow-green (white except where protected from the light). The white and green yarns are finer than the others, and the green has been used double.
The weft appears to be of the same white yarn as is used in the warp.
Size and condition. The diameter is 1.5 mm; the remaining length is about 46 cm. The condition is good except that it is somewhat faded.
All the ends are torn and the seal is missing.
The weave. The cord is worked on eight 4-hole tablets (ie 36 warp threads). The weave is plain, all the tablets being given a quarter turn in the same direction for each weft. The weaving is even and closely beaten, there
being about 40 weft threads per inch (16 per cm). All the tablets have been threaded in the
same direction with one exception, the 4th tablet on the diagram, with the result that throughout the cord these
4 threads are twisted in the opposite direction to all the rest. The cord is woven in the same way as a normal braid [band] except that the weft instead of passing backwards and forwards is always passed through the shed in the
same direction and pulled up tight to make the weaving tubular. This is, in fact, quite easy to do.
Reversal of the direction of the twists occurs at intervals of between 1.75 and 2.75 inches, and can be plainly
seen on three of the cords in the photograph.
The pattern. The pattern consists of two vertical rows of small squares, one blue and the other pink, with a green dot in the middle of each, and separated by white lines (unfortunately only the dark blue squares show on the
photograph). This pattern is achieved by the order in which the tablets are threaded with the different
coloured yarns:
1st tablet: 1,2,3 holes pink, 4 white
2nd tablet: 1,3 pink, 2 green, 4 white
3rd tablet: as 1st
4th tablet: all white
5th tablet: 1,2,3 blue, 4 white
6th tablet: 1,3 blue, 2, green, 4 white
7th tablet: as 5th
8th tablet: all white
The work twists spirally of its own accord if the direciton of the spiral made by the weft coincides with the direction of the twists of the tablet threads; for instance if the tablets are giving the threads an S twist then the weft must be
threaded through the shed from right to left and the cord will automatically twist in the opposite direction, Z-wise.
Comment. The method of making a tubular cord by tablet weaving with a spiral weft has not previously been recorded. It is, however, a simple way of producing a smooth cord suitable for seal tags.

Low immersion dying

http://www.pburch.net/dyeing/lowwaterimmersion.shtml

Thread Numbering

what does 60/2, 20/3 etc mean?
http://www.q7design.demon.co.uk/lacenotes/sizes/threads.html

Fiber

Bast fibers

Fibers that are extracted from the stem of a plant are called “Bast” fibers. Flax, hemp, ramie and nettle are “soft” bast fibers that were plausibly used in clothing worn in the SCA period(600-1600 CE).

Flax

The fibers of linen are made from the plant, flax (linum usitatissimum). This plant goes through a complex process that creates soft strong fibers that are then spun into thread. There is some indication that wet-spinning didn’t start until after 1800.

Linen is a very strong cloth that becomes softer the more you wash it. It feels cool to the touch and creases easily. It is prone to wrinkling (wrinkles are period). Flax fibers will rotate clockwise when wetted. It wicks moisture away from the body so it will feel cool in the summer (cooler than the equivalent garment made in cotton).

Hemp

Hemp fibers are made from the plant, cannabis (Cannabis sativa L.). Hemp is another member of the nettle family. Hemp fibers will rotate counterclockwise when wetted.

Nettle

Ramie

Ramie is a fiber extracted from a plant closely related to stinging nettles(with out the stinging part). This fiber was widely used in China. There are some references to it’s presence in “Eighth- and ninth-century grave finds from the northwestern tip of the Caucasus mountains” (“A Medieval Handweaver’s Bibliography”).

Cotton

Protein fibers

Wool

Wool comes from the fur of sheep. Wool fibers have small hooks in them that cause one fiber to cling to another. These hooks also cause wool fabric to shrink.

Wool can absorb up to 30% of it’s weight of water before it starts to feel wet.

Fulled wool, worsted wool, wool gaberdine, wool flannel.

Silk

Silk is the fiber that is made by silkworms to form the cocoon that the worm used to metamorphosize from worm to moth. In most cases the worm is killed in the process of extracting the fiber.

Raw silk is silk that is woven of silk fibers that still have seracin on them. This is -very- hard to find modernly. The fabric that is modernly refered to as “raw” silk is usually either china silk or silk noil.
China Silk
Silk Noil
Tussah silk is a silk fiber that is gathered after the moths emerge from their cocoons. This is “crewlty-free” silk.

Viking Whipcord

Interlocking or Making a Viking Whip-cord
http://genvieve.net/sca/whipcording-howto.html

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