Suvia’s Letters

A blog dedicated to the Merovingian world and its material culture.

Posts in Category: Card weaving

Tablet woven edges

On August 6, 2013 by thealater With 0 Comments - Card weaving

So this is a technique that I have been wanting to try for some time. It is right for this era and by golly, I’m going to to do it! There are some lovely artisans out there who have done a wonderful job of blogging about their tablet woven edging adventures.

The first is Annika Madejska’s blog entry about her new Viking dress, which puts the weaving into the context of the larger outfit.
This second site is one that you will spend many hours at…. Cathrin Åhlén does an incredible job at using images and descriptions to show us how she made this adorable wee hood with tablet woven edging. I learned so much!
last but certainly not least, is A Magyar Jurta’s photostream on Facebook. *swoon*

I’m sure there is more great web sites about how to do this perfectly period technique which we should all be using much much more often. So let us know what you find by posting links and descriptions of the sites in the comments section!

card weaving, clothing, tablet weaving, Textiles

Say… check out this blog post on the Chelles cardweaving

On March 28, 2013 by thealater With 0 Comments - Card weaving, Merovingian

You’ll thank me later! It’s in French.

Galon de Bathilde de Chelles

Bathilde, cardweaving, Chelles

Reconstructing the Arnegunde Kaftan Card Woven Trim – some background

On June 10, 2012 by thealater With 2 Comments - Archaeology, Arnegundis, Card weaving, Merovingian, Merovingian Women, Uncategorized

I have yet to find an image of the card weaving from the Arnegunde kaftan. I had hoped with the recent conservation work being completed, an image would surface. But no love there. So I will need to piece together the bits and pieces.

The most recent published mention of the card weaving is from Rast-Eicher’s article:

The tablet-woven band is made of at least 100 tablets and is about 6.5 cm wide. Nearly the entire width of one fragment was preserved – with just a few threads missing – but this one is otherwise hardly visible. The band is brocaded with a triple silk thread (z-spun) and displays a pattern of diagonals and lozenges (Fig. 33.3). (2010)

So color me rather intimidated by the “over 100 cards” thingy. I will try a run at the design with fewer cards and make the piece in wool for a test run.

Sadly, Peter Collingwood did not talk about either the Arnegunde or the Bathilde/Bertille weavings in his book. He did describe the similar Snartemo V textiles from the 6th century. For a refresher here are the late 5th/early 6th century card weaving found at Chelles. Both of these were buried with high status women, so would probably be a good source for inspiration.