Book Review - The Golden Thread

Worm Spit and Surf Dragons to NASA

I'm about half way through this book and feel like I can give a definite thumbs up.

“Some books should be tasted, some devoured, but only a few should be chewed and digested thoroughly.”

― Sir Francis Bacon

Kassia St Clair has written a book that can be read as a taste of history, devoured for it's attention to detail, or chewed thoroughly to understand the role of textiles in human history.

By choosing select textiles to take a closer look at, she has provided insight into the development of textiles and various creation techniques.  From the agriculture, to the processing, to spinning, weaving, and so on, she makes a strong case for knowing the roots of textiles because they so firmly provide support to human beings on our journey through time.   

I have a reasonable understanding of textile history but it was a broad look.  Ms St Clair takes a deeper look at pivotal textiles.  She begins with the earliest known textile finds.  Elizabeth Barber-Wayland talked about textile history in her book Women's Work, the first 20,000 years.  Since that book was published, archaeologists have pushed back that date to around 34,000 years.  It may go back even further, but since textiles degrade and go back to dust, often times the only evidence of human textile work is in remains of things like pottery - the impression of a spun thread impressed into the clay.

From the earliest finds, Ms St Clair then talks about the mummies of ancient Egypt.  Again, I knew a little about them, but she goes into much greater detail than I had learned previously.

Discussing the Silk Roads (there was more than one) she then moves on to Vikings.  I had always assumed that Viking ships had linen sails.  I was fascinated that their sails were made from wool.  Her statistics of the degree of effort to make sails for the fleets of 'dragon boats' was pretty astonishing.

I'm just beginning the chapter on the wool industry in medieval England.  

It seems like I learn something new on every page.  For me this is a book to chew thoroughly. 

I was gifted this book by a friend.  It will no doubt be consulted frequently as I teach/write. 

If you are as interested in the history of textiles as I am, other books you might enjoy are:

Anything written by Elizabeth Wayland-Barber (she has several)
Else Ostergard Woven into the Earth (I think she has updated her finds on the Greenland textiles with a more recent publication but I haven't found it - yet)
Peter Collingwood The Maker's Hand

There are groups who gather who are discussing their findings - Complex Weavers has a study group and there is a group on Facebook devoted to Historical Textiles

There are individuals who have studied specific cultures - from Deborah Chandler and Guatamala, to Paula Gustavson and Salish Weaving, Pattern and Loom by John Becker (Han dynasty and beyond).  Cheryl Samual and Raven's Tail and Chilkat weaving.

People who study specific cultures usually take a deep look at that particular culture and how textiles developed within that culture, given their climate, needs and resources available to them through history.

At our conference we have several events - Sarah Wroot will look at spinning to weave based on her research into historical fabrics.  Dr. Susan Pavel has studied Salish weaving and was a resource person for the UBC Musem of Anthropology exhibit last year focusing on Salish textiles.  Sue Perron will talk about ceinture fleche' the finger woven sashes used by the voyageurs.  Maureen Faulkner will share her textile collection (India, Indonesia and China)

I look forward to reading the rest of the book - in small bites so that I can savour the information.