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abendgulesContinuing my writeup of notes...
Latvian Archeological Textiles, 7th-13th centuries
Hilary Davidson, Museum of London
Reference text ISBN: 9984-653-25-0
Beautiful full-colour book documenting finds and providing reconstructions; text is in Latvian
Welcome to Latvia - info site aimed at visitors
Lots of other links off the Wiki entry at top.
Latvian Archeological Textiles, 7th-13th centuries
Hilary Davidson, Museum of London
Reference text ISBN: 9984-653-25-0
Beautiful full-colour book documenting finds and providing reconstructions; text is in Latvian
I could not have told you where Latvia was til Ms Davidson put up a map; I'll leave you to do your own research as well.
The Christian church arrived in Latvia relatively late 12th century, 1180, and the first Latvian monastic order was founded within that century. It was part of the Hanseatic League in 13th century (and thus was 'plugged in' to the northern European Hansa trading communities).
Pre-christianity, the Latvians were pagan, and tribal. There were 5 major ethnic groups identified in 12th century (speaker provided map - fairly neat geographic divisions across the country). These groups merged slowly into one ethnic group, but retained their traditional regional names.
There still exists a tiny community of 'Liv' , who are are Finno-Hungarian speakers; estimated about 100 native speakers left.
Latvian history and heritage is now proving a useful tool for building a sense of nationality and national purpose - research and recreation gets strong support (presumeably from gov't sources).
Latvia proved an excellent flax-growing region, thus produced lots of linen.
Finds show a mix of S and Z-spin weaving using warp-weighted looms, akin to Viking style looms.
Extant finds include plain (tabby) weave, 2/2 twill, herringbone twill and diamond twills. There's also examples of open weave (ie. that actually leave 'holes' in the finished item).
Range of qualities of linen thread counts from 10/8 to 15/12 to 15/15 (I think: I'm a bit weak on understanding how these measurements work, and would welcome advice!)
Finds also demonstrate four distinguishable qualities of wool from fine white (dyed red or yellow) to the coarsest wool. (To me, this suggests pretty sophisticated management of sheep breeding, plus well-understood processes for sorting, cleaning, and spinning wool.)
The National Museum of Latvia has a dedicated "replicas" department(! insert sighs of approval and envy from audience), where they recreate finds for display, and give high priority to recreating textiles.
This museum is the only source of research from before 1940, because all the rest (of any archeological/textile research done before 1940) was destroyed (not sure if it was in WWII, or by Soviets).
Davidson provided photos of 12th c. reconstruction clothing on models (many photos are taken from the book mentioned above).
Women:
distinctive from other nearby regions because they wear 2 pieces, shirt and skirt - no evidence of single piece full-length gowns, as is common w/ neighbours.
Base layer is a brown wool skirt made of a single piece of wool, wrapped around the waist and tied w/ a patterned belt. Belt patterns (vs. plain belts) are associated w/ fertility, and are restricted to women.
Shirt is plain linen, in rectangular construction w/ gussets.
Virgins wore a circlet w/ unbound hair.
Married women wore a headscarf, intricately beaded and embroidered - source of great pride and distinction depending on wealth and status.
(While there are regional distinctions, Davidson focused on the Liv styles.)
The woman's shawl was the most significant item, and most effort was invested in decoration of it.
Called the 'villaine', example piece 125cmx178cm, diagonal twill w/ edge decoration, very complex ornaments for finishing edges, using all possible weaving finishing techniques to make each shawl distinctive.
The shawl is conventionally deep blue, dyed with woad (a valuable import to the region, and expensive).
Ornaments are red, yellow blue and natural wool colour, w/ some tablet-woven ornament.
From 10th c. onward additional bronze decoration is added to the edges in form of rings or spiral wirework - rows of coils strung between flat bronze strips. Also used long flat strips of bronze actually woven into the shawl, or wrapped wire around the edge of the shawl.
Decoration (woven, embroidered, and metalwork) gets steadily more elaborate from 7-13th c, and you can trace development by comparing shawls (illustrations of reconstructions in book) where the ornament gradually works its way inward from edges until it is spread across the whole shawl.
For the LIv women wearing their skirt and shirt, the skirt sits higher on the body (skirt is already fairly high-waisted), and is pinned at the shoulders, akin to Viking style of apron dress.
Women in grave finds always have a very long metal chain (comes down to navel at least), which is a distinctive feature. Reproductions in museums tend to recreate the grave goods as they were found (ie. 'full bling') but it's not clear if the grave finds represent everyday wear, or full regalia.
Liv women also have a distinctive coat, 'jaka'; large rectangular body, slightly tapered sleeves, with an upside-down-teardrop neckline, quite deep. More metalwork, including dangling strands of coils and rings, are added the the neckline and the point of the neckline.
The Liv women's headscarf, called a 'vainago', is of wool, and is ornamented with wool and bronze: combinations of wool-wrapped wire, with 'tails' of ornaments split into multiple strands, that end in small triangular plates. Over time, the spirals mutate into bands, with metal decoration applied.
An 11th c find included a sprang belt. Belts also grow more ornaments over the time studied.
A 13th c. find included nalbinding gloves, called 'cimdi'
Men
Base layer is linen shirt and (wool?) leggings (not hose).
Wool tunic over top is undyed, or is dark blue (woad dye).
Over leggings add leg wraps (what I'd call winnegas if they were Saxon) of broken twill weave, with ornamented wrap ends, akin to Saxon examples, with style depending on region.
"Knitted" (possibly nalbinding?) stockings come "later" (not sure if this is post-period, or later w/in period of study).
Eastern Latvian men wore a woven belt, Western Latvian men wore a leather belt
Top layer is a short coat decorated at the shoulders.
Men wear round caps of leather, fur or wool, with some bronze ornaments on them.
Many of the elements of dress from this period survived into folk dress; Davidson posted 2 photos, comparing 13th and 19th c. folk styles, and you could see the strong continuity between them. The later version is strongly reminiscent to me of what I'd call Ukranian traditional dress.
Historic and folk dress are now both strongly connected to national identity, with broad participation by residents in recreation of both.
Ordinary folk can distinguish between historic dress, based on archeological finds, and more contemporary folk dress, and you can even buy both in shops (for a price).
The Christian church arrived in Latvia relatively late 12th century, 1180, and the first Latvian monastic order was founded within that century. It was part of the Hanseatic League in 13th century (and thus was 'plugged in' to the northern European Hansa trading communities).
Pre-christianity, the Latvians were pagan, and tribal. There were 5 major ethnic groups identified in 12th century (speaker provided map - fairly neat geographic divisions across the country). These groups merged slowly into one ethnic group, but retained their traditional regional names.
There still exists a tiny community of 'Liv' , who are are Finno-Hungarian speakers; estimated about 100 native speakers left.
Latvian history and heritage is now proving a useful tool for building a sense of nationality and national purpose - research and recreation gets strong support (presumeably from gov't sources).
Latvia proved an excellent flax-growing region, thus produced lots of linen.
Finds show a mix of S and Z-spin weaving using warp-weighted looms, akin to Viking style looms.
Extant finds include plain (tabby) weave, 2/2 twill, herringbone twill and diamond twills. There's also examples of open weave (ie. that actually leave 'holes' in the finished item).
Range of qualities of linen thread counts from 10/8 to 15/12 to 15/15 (I think: I'm a bit weak on understanding how these measurements work, and would welcome advice!)
Finds also demonstrate four distinguishable qualities of wool from fine white (dyed red or yellow) to the coarsest wool. (To me, this suggests pretty sophisticated management of sheep breeding, plus well-understood processes for sorting, cleaning, and spinning wool.)
The National Museum of Latvia has a dedicated "replicas" department(! insert sighs of approval and envy from audience), where they recreate finds for display, and give high priority to recreating textiles.
This museum is the only source of research from before 1940, because all the rest (of any archeological/textile research done before 1940) was destroyed (not sure if it was in WWII, or by Soviets).
Davidson provided photos of 12th c. reconstruction clothing on models (many photos are taken from the book mentioned above).
Women:
distinctive from other nearby regions because they wear 2 pieces, shirt and skirt - no evidence of single piece full-length gowns, as is common w/ neighbours.
Base layer is a brown wool skirt made of a single piece of wool, wrapped around the waist and tied w/ a patterned belt. Belt patterns (vs. plain belts) are associated w/ fertility, and are restricted to women.
Shirt is plain linen, in rectangular construction w/ gussets.
Virgins wore a circlet w/ unbound hair.
Married women wore a headscarf, intricately beaded and embroidered - source of great pride and distinction depending on wealth and status.
(While there are regional distinctions, Davidson focused on the Liv styles.)
The woman's shawl was the most significant item, and most effort was invested in decoration of it.
Called the 'villaine', example piece 125cmx178cm, diagonal twill w/ edge decoration, very complex ornaments for finishing edges, using all possible weaving finishing techniques to make each shawl distinctive.
The shawl is conventionally deep blue, dyed with woad (a valuable import to the region, and expensive).
Ornaments are red, yellow blue and natural wool colour, w/ some tablet-woven ornament.
From 10th c. onward additional bronze decoration is added to the edges in form of rings or spiral wirework - rows of coils strung between flat bronze strips. Also used long flat strips of bronze actually woven into the shawl, or wrapped wire around the edge of the shawl.
Decoration (woven, embroidered, and metalwork) gets steadily more elaborate from 7-13th c, and you can trace development by comparing shawls (illustrations of reconstructions in book) where the ornament gradually works its way inward from edges until it is spread across the whole shawl.
For the LIv women wearing their skirt and shirt, the skirt sits higher on the body (skirt is already fairly high-waisted), and is pinned at the shoulders, akin to Viking style of apron dress.
Women in grave finds always have a very long metal chain (comes down to navel at least), which is a distinctive feature. Reproductions in museums tend to recreate the grave goods as they were found (ie. 'full bling') but it's not clear if the grave finds represent everyday wear, or full regalia.
Liv women also have a distinctive coat, 'jaka'; large rectangular body, slightly tapered sleeves, with an upside-down-teardrop neckline, quite deep. More metalwork, including dangling strands of coils and rings, are added the the neckline and the point of the neckline.
The Liv women's headscarf, called a 'vainago', is of wool, and is ornamented with wool and bronze: combinations of wool-wrapped wire, with 'tails' of ornaments split into multiple strands, that end in small triangular plates. Over time, the spirals mutate into bands, with metal decoration applied.
An 11th c find included a sprang belt. Belts also grow more ornaments over the time studied.
A 13th c. find included nalbinding gloves, called 'cimdi'
Men
Base layer is linen shirt and (wool?) leggings (not hose).
Wool tunic over top is undyed, or is dark blue (woad dye).
Over leggings add leg wraps (what I'd call winnegas if they were Saxon) of broken twill weave, with ornamented wrap ends, akin to Saxon examples, with style depending on region.
"Knitted" (possibly nalbinding?) stockings come "later" (not sure if this is post-period, or later w/in period of study).
Eastern Latvian men wore a woven belt, Western Latvian men wore a leather belt
Top layer is a short coat decorated at the shoulders.
Men wear round caps of leather, fur or wool, with some bronze ornaments on them.
Many of the elements of dress from this period survived into folk dress; Davidson posted 2 photos, comparing 13th and 19th c. folk styles, and you could see the strong continuity between them. The later version is strongly reminiscent to me of what I'd call Ukranian traditional dress.
Historic and folk dress are now both strongly connected to national identity, with broad participation by residents in recreation of both.
Ordinary folk can distinguish between historic dress, based on archeological finds, and more contemporary folk dress, and you can even buy both in shops (for a price).
Welcome to Latvia - info site aimed at visitors
Lots of other links off the Wiki entry at top.
