Old Textiles, New Possibilities

Archaeological textiles bear important testimony to everyday life, farming, trade, migration of nations, religious rituals, art and technical culture. The main reason we know very little about them is that textiles are very impermanent, fragile, and can survive well only in very good conditions. Most of them become nearly completely destroyed due to ageing in an extremely hard archaeological environment . However, it is possible to determine and identify the properties that archaeological textiles had in the past. Research undertaken by us resulted in the development of methods of analysis and visualisation of archaeological textiles in the form they were originally made, which will be presented in our next paper. This paper is to present the main problems scientists have to face when dealing with archaeological textiles .

Archaeological textile studies are now recognized as a robust source of information for anthropological inquiry. Over the last decade several important developments have taken place, enabling an integrated approach to the study of archaeological textiles. Topics range from the development of analytical methods for the analysis of degraded fibers to the comparative study of specific histories of textile and clothing traditions. Archaeological textile studies address relevant issues ranging from aesthetics and style to gender; from technological development to production and exchange economics. This chapter presents an overview of current research in the growing field of archaeological textile studies. Both Old World and New World textile projects are examined, allowing for a balanced assessment of the various directions which have been taken in methodology, research objectives, and data procurement.

2022

Following the growth in textile studies over the past decade, we aim to present a comprehensive update of the state-of-the-art summarised in the seminal 2010 paper “Old Textiles – New Possibilities” by E. Andersson Strand, K. M. Frei, M. Gleba, U. Mannering, M.-L. Nosch and I. Skals. The diverse developments of the last decade, along with the increased recognition of the importance of textile studies in adjacent fields, now merit a dedicated, full-length publication entitled “Ancient Textile Production from an Interdisciplinary Perspective: Humanities and Natural Sciences Interwoven for our Understanding of Textiles”. With this volume, we also wish to illustrate the current impact of textile archaeology on the scholarly perception of the past (not limited to archaeology alone). The volume presents new insights into the consumption, meaning, use and re-use of textiles and dyes, all of which are topics of growing importance in textile research. As indicated by the title, we demonstrate the continued importance of interdisciplinarity by showcasing several ‘interwoven’ approaches to environmental and archaeological remains, textual and iconographic sources, archaeological experiments and ethnographic data, from a large area covering Europe and the Mediterranean, Near East, Africa and Asia. The chronological span is deliberately wide, including materials dating from c. 6th millennium BCE to c. mid-14th century CE.

2019

This Habilitationsschrift (University Vienna) “Archaeological Textile Research: Technical, economic and social aspects of textile production and clothing from Neolithic to the Early Modern Era” reflects two decades of applied research on archaeological textiles and related sources. The motivation is to improve understanding of the role of textile production and textile products in the history of humankind. Embedding finds and their context information into socio-economical and cultural discourse contributes to a cultural anthropology of textile use. For pre- and protohistory in the region of Central Europe, it is a challenge that textiles are among those organic materials that are rarely preserved under the prevailing climatic conditions. Despite the scarcity of organic finds, nevertheless, for the studies of the author the analysis of actual textiles from archaeological contexts serves as main source of knowledge. This are mainly textiles from grave contexts that survived attached to metal artefacts, as well as textiles from saltmines. Minor importance for my research play waterlogged and dry conditions. Textile finds, together with tools, pictorial and written sources, yield information on the chaîne opératoire of textile production. Thus one of the research foci is to help identify different production processes and sequences such as preparing raw materials, making threads, weaving (and other methods of constructing fabrics), patterning and sewing techniques. Textile techniques and their uses in different periods of time are studied to gain information about developments in techniques such as inventions, innovations, traditions, and the various modes of production. This research about the technological aspects of textile craft is also set in context with the social and economic background of innovation in Central European Prehistory. The period from the 3rd to 1st millennium BC is specifically the focus of studies on textile technology. Besides textile technology, the most important research undertaken by the author are about functions, resource management, dress and identity, as well as creativity and design. The function of textiles in Prehistory and Antiquity is identified from context information and the properties of the textiles. Finds consist of clothing, soft furnishings, textiles used for technical purposes (e.g. linings of scabbards), including grave goods or textiles as tools (e.g. carry sacks in mines). Research about resource management, use, reuse and “recycling” addresses questions which are also important today. The same applies to the field of dress and identity and the social value of clothing and textiles from the Bronze Age to the Medieval era. The material can also be studied in terms of representation and appearance of textile surfaces and patterns, visual codes, creativity and design – such as the relevance for non-verbal communication.

Archaeological Textiles-Links Between Past and Present, NESAT XIII), Hrsg. M. Bravermanová, H. Březinová, J. Malcome-Davies, Liberec-Praha, 2017

S. Jansone: Textile Imprints in Grobiņa Fabrics and their possible uses M. Brunori-V. Sonnati-I. Degano-S. Bracci: The Coffin Cloth of Henry VII, Holy Roman Emperor (†1313) A diagnostic investigation and conservation intervention III. MIDDLE AGES E. Retournard: Textiles for Miners and Mining Archaeological textiles from the 12th to 14th centuries from Brandes-en-Oisans,

Settimana della lingua italiana nel mondo. Università di Losanna, 14 ottobre 2024

2018

Purpose: the metals and industrial minerals contained in the tailings produced by mining and quarrying activities, are cause of environmental damage. The objective of this experimental work is the application of innovative technologies for the treatment and exploitation of mining tailings in Romania, in order to recover materials high grade raw to be placed on the market, reducing the volume of the wastes. Further objective, is to optimize some parameters relating to the dissolution of gold and the subsequent recovery from purified solutions, determining beforehand the technical feasibility of the scheme of process developed on a laboratory scale. Methods: the study is focused on hydrometallurgical process for the recovery of gold. The innovative treatment chosen is the thiosulphate process that, compared to conventional cyanide, has several advantages, first of all the most eco-friendly and nontoxic to humans. The conventional process shows operating limits in the case of auriferou...