Thanks Lena for providing the quote. Quoting "Museum of London: Textiles and clothing", page 2: "...surviving textiles are biased by the types of deposit in which they are preserved. They occur most frequently where anaerobic conditions prevail, along the Thames waterfront, for example, and occasionally in cesspits. These acid conditions have the effect of causing cellulose fibres to break down very rapidly, particularly through fungal attack, and linen is, therefore, poorly represented."
I think there is another reason why very little linen survives in any medieval context, and that is paper. Paper was made of rags. These days good quality rag paper is mostly cotton fibres, but in period linen was more common at least in northern Europe. People didn't need to throw away even the most worn pieces of linen, or offcuts, because it could all be recycled into paper (especially since it was usually not dyed). Soft worn linen was also sought for the making of those oft-quoted 30-layer jacks. On a side note, I have prepared a sample for one of these jacks, using a 10-year-old linen teatowel. The 32 layers, when quilted together, become a flexible, but impenetrable material which would provide good arrow portection. 32 layers of new linen is almost rigid, and very hard to sew. It would stop arrows, but it also stop you making a wearable garment :-) So the absence of thread in a seam may be due to linen thread having distintegrated, but the scarcity of linen in any deposits is, I think, because it was rarely dumped in the first place. Small or damaged pieces go to the paper mills, larger pieces can be used again, including in "armour" Annette Wilson If you have received this transmission in error please notify us immediately by return e-mail and delete all copies. If this e-mail or any attachments have been sent to you in error, that error does not constitute waiver of any confidentiality, privilege or copyright in respect of information in the e-mail or attachments. _______________________________________________ h-costume mailing list [email protected] http://mail.indra.com/mailman/listinfo/h-costume
