[blam]

This is an excellent book about the 4,000 year old Caucasian mummies found in China. Elizabeth Barber has a PhD in textiles and she talks at length about the fabrics, weaves,knits, ect found on these folks. Some of the plaids compare to the Scottish plaids of today. They also compare exactly to the Celtic fabrics found in the salt mines of Halstatt, Austria...1,000 years and 5,000 miles apart.

[Knitting A Conundrum]

They didn't have real knitting that early...nalbinding which looks like knitting, though, was done all over the ancient world...it's done with a single needle with an eye like a sewing needle and short sewing lengths of thread. The Romans made striped socks that look something like modern athletic socks with that technique. But you could do a lot more textures with nalbinding than with knitting.

The book sounds very interesting...

[pinz-n-needlez]

Fantastic book! Great photos of textiles, too.

Barber's other books, Women's Work: the First 2,000 Years is a great look at primitive spinning and Weaving. It is a popular cut down of her thesis book, Prehistoric Textiles.

Textile historians rock!

Knitting a Conundrum, I'm coming to the conclusion that circular needles aggravate my tendinitis (an old knitting injury lol), and I'm about to invest in a drawer full of longer and larger dp needles. The vision of you working on your hat is soothing, but then, I'm warped. (About to fire up the cd burner, thanks for your patience.)

Pinz