I'm not doing a lot of writing on this post - I really wanted to share this link:
http://vikingeskibsmuseet.dk/index.php?id=1313&L=1.
In my world, this is really fascinating stuff. I think being able to re-create historic textiles really does give us a connection to our past ~ it makes it more personal... almost intimate... when we, as modern people, use the tools, techniques, and materials of our ancestors to make the things that they did.... it allows us, in a very limited way, to really know them and get inside of their world.
Two things in particular that struck me when reading this were: 1) that it took five people a year to spin and weave the cloth for one sail.... but that sail would last 30 - 50 years. To me, among many other things, that denotes skilled craftsmanship. How many fabrics that are machine mass-produced in our modern world would stand up to that kind of rigorous use for 30- 50 years??? I don't know the answer to that, but I'm betting that there aren't many. 2) And that, in the case of the iconographic checkered sail, "perhaps that every household in the area produced a 'square' ". All I could think when reading that was that it really did take a village.... just to survive and provide for the necessities of life.... and that we are all that much poorer to not have to really work together as a community to meet those needs in this modern world. Which is all the more reason to celebrate and encourage those times when we do come together.
I hope you enjoy it!
