Common Thread

The Ancient Egyptians used it for both the living and the dead, the Greeks and Romans used it to signal their status, and it aided the Vikings in reaching the far shores of Europe and Eurasia. Textiles have surrounded us, literally and figuratively for millennia, but this common thread has long been ignored in scholarly research. With the inception of the Centre for Textile Research at the University of Copenhagen in 2005, however, this approach changed fundamentally, and today, every type of research discipline comes together to begin unravelling the stories told by textiles. How do we understand textiles and how do we talk about them? Who produced textiles, where, and for what purposes? How do we conduct research into the origins of materials? How did cultivating flax or raising sheep change the ancient landscape? How have we researched textiles so far? What can we learn from textiles about society, gender, and production? This volume engages with these questions and explores how the fabric of society has changed through researching textiles in all its facets, from archaeology and history to natural sciences. Taking as its starting point the research interests and career of its honorand, Eva Andersson Strand, this meticulously researched volume consists of three parts, covering the tools and techniques that form the basis of all research explores; how craftspeople made use of tools and techniques; and how textiles have been used over millennia to signify identity and status.