15th century

Advent calendar 2021- 10 December

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Our tenth Advent calendar post 2021 is:

Today we turn our eyes towards a cope from Ösmö church, south of Stockholm Sweden. Its a cope in green damask silk and with lovely embroideries. But we don’t care about those today. We look at the cool tablet woven fringe. The fringe is woven with 4 tablets. The warp is in silk. The tablets are treaded left-right-left-right. The green and the red ( today orange) weft is a 2-plied silk thread. The white is a single linen thread. The tablets are turned in the same directions and changed when needed. You can see a turn of direction in the red fringe part.

The cope is dated late 15th century.

Today you find the cope in the collections of the Swedish History museum.

With as little as 4 tablets you can weave awesome fringes. More fringes to the people!

/ Amica and Maria

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Advent calendar 2021 – 9 December

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Our ninth Advent calendar post 2021 is:

Once again a detail from the Ärentuna cushion. But this time we focus on the bottom weave. It’s a linen , or hemp, fabric. Quite coarse and very evenly woven. It measures 8 threads per centimeter in both warp and weft, making it perfect for counted embroidery. The thread in the weave is a single thread. If you look closely on the bottom fabric you can see the imprints of the now missing embroidery.

The cushion is dated to 14-15th century. And the original is in the collections of the parish.

We use a 8th/cm in our reconstruction of the Ärentuna embroidery. If weaving a narrow weave with this thread count one could for an example use that narrow weave and make a small purse in counted embroidery.

/ Amica and Maria

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Advent calendar 2021 – 7 December

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Our seventh Advent calendar post 2021 is:

Sewing needles from the lake Furen, Sweden. They come in many sizes. Many of the needles have corroded badly over time and are difficult to separate from one another. The have round eyes and are very delicate and a sign of hand from a skilled crafts person.

The needles are dated 1100-1499 AD.

When sewing one need to have a good needle. To be able to press the metal through the fabric it needs to be sharp and have a small eye. A good steel needle is possibly to sharpen. Therefor we choose needles of high quality when sewing. A good tool makes the task more fun.

Today the needles can be found in the collections of the Swedish History museum. 

/ Amica and Maria

Photos by Swedish History museum. 

Advent calendar 2021- 6 December

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Our sixth Advent calendar post 2021 is:

Red blood drops on Jesus body. The red wool yarn is a 2-plied and have a pretty high twist. Most likely dyed with madder. This is a detail from the Fogdö embroidery, Sweden. The embroidery is BIG and measures 0,9 x 7,9 meters long, originally it believed to have been over 15 meters long. The embroidery shows scenes from the life of Christ. The stitches are long legged cross stitch.

The embroidery is dated 1480-1500 AD.

When sewing long legged cross stitch, we always use a 2-plied thread like the original. And we also sew a bit more like the medieval style, in more or less in all directions. The medieval people were less neurotic then our crafts teachers in school..

Today the embroidery can be found in the collections of the Swedish History museum.

/ Amica and Maria

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Advent calendar 2021- 4 December

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Our forth Advent calendar post 2021 is:

A detail from the Ärentuna cushion embroidery. The embroidery contains wool yarn of many colors on a plain linen weave. Also a white 2-plied thread. Since the white yarn contained more lanolin than the dyed yarns, the moths have prioritized the undyed yarn when feasting on the wool. Therefore the white and the brown yarn are badly damaged on the embroidery.

The cushion is dated to 14-15th century. And the original is in the collections of the parish.

We are working on a reconstruction of the Ärentuna embroidery. And we use a natural white wool thread, 8/2 in our reconstruction. It’s very alike with the original.

/ Amica and Maria

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Advent calendar December 22 2020

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Fulled fabrics. The fabrics during the Middle Ages were often fulled. When fabrics from that time is found in the ground, the majority of the nap is often gone. That means the fabrics that we find give a different surface then the fabric originally had. Also fabrics other than archaeological, may have lost a lot of its fulled surface. Here we can see some evidence of that.

The examples are both from gilded leather coverlets, where the gilded strip ( or a twisted linen strip) has fallen off and exposes a fabric that has significantly more nap than the rest of the fabric.
Both fabrics are dated to 15th or 16th century.

The first fabric is from the Ilsbo embroidery. Now in Hälsinglands museums collections.

The second fabric is from Dalhem II embroidery. Enlarge photo to get a even better view of the nap. Now in the collections of The Swedish History Museum.

/ Amica & Maria

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Advent calendar December 21 2020

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Today we would like to raise the idea of a perfect result. That seems to be a fairly modern approach. We see repeatedly during our analyses that the perfect result is a non existing thing during the Middle Ages. This embroidery from Ärentuna is a good example of that.

Check out the blue square with the yellow pattern in. During the sewing someone ran out of yellow yarn. And continued with a light orange yarn instead. That someone, was also a bit unfocused and turned one of the wings of the pattern upside down.

Misstakes happens all the time when people are doing crafts. But during the Middle Ages people seemed less interested in fixing them. We find this very heartwarming and would like to strike a blow for not correcting things too often. It’s a bit like live TV. Don’t mention it, then the audience will notice it, just move on and everything will be just fine.

The embroidery is dated 14-15th century.
/ Amica & Maria
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Advent calendar December 20 2020

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Today we return to the Grödinge double weave.
But today we focus on the animals of the middle section. We got lions, eagles and the animal combined by the two, griffins. At first sight all animals looks the same, but at a closer look, all the animals have some small individual parts. That menas that the pattern have been picked by hand during the weaving.

The weave is made out of white and dark blue wool and is dated to the 15th century.

Today the double weave can be found in the collections of The Swedish History Museum.
/ Amica & Maria
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Advent calendar December 16 2020

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Down. A material that we know was used a lot during the Middle Ages.
Not very many down filled items are still around. But luckily we have a few cushions in Sweden, still filled with down. Or at least what we believe is down. They have not been opened… yet.

The weight and the fluffiness feels like down. And sometimes even a small down find it’s way out though the cushion fabric. As in this case with the lovely gilded leather embroidery cushion from Aspö church.

Dated to late 15th century. Possibly also early 16th century.
Now in the collections of The Swedish History museum.

/ Amica & Maria
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Advent calendar December 15 2020

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Today’s post is a very basic but very important item, a band or a ribbon. This small band in linen have served it’s owner well. Today it’s very little of it left. Woven in single spun linen thread. Most likely in a rigid heddle. Just 8 mm wide.

It’s a small find from the Secret Italian collection.
Dated 1470-1530

/ Amica & Maria
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