The wool weaver

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Weaving history
During the Time Team excavation in the Scottish Borders town of Roxburgh, Nicky Saunders set up her stall to demonstrate how wool was processed and textiles were created in medieval Britain. Nicky belongs to an experimental archaeology group called Lothene Experimental Archaeology.

With about 15 years' experience in experimental archaeology, she has gathered a wealth of knowledge about materials that we know were used by people in the past, yet are hardly ever discovered during excavations. Archaeologists know from a whole range of sources that textiles undoubtedly played an important part in any local economy and there's even evidence for widespread trade in textiles throughout the ancient world. Yet few textiles are found in the archaeological record because they decay very easily unless trapped in very specific stable environmental conditions.

Natural dyes
'All of the wools that I used are dyed with natural dyes,' says Nicky. 'The yellows (from onion skins), greens (from vegetables) and oranges (again from onions) are all relatively cheap and easy dyes to produce because they come from local food plants. Any vegetable matter will give you a brown dye if you mash it up and boil it.'

To fix the dyes a mordant is required. 'A mordant acts as a fixative, and in medieval times they used a moss,' continues Nicky. 'Today we have to use an alum because most of the mosses used in medieval times are now protected because they're endangered and often rare. The mordant basically prepares the wool to accept the dye. If it wasn't used the colour would just wash out.'

Card weaving
After the wool has been prepared and then spun into a thread it can be weaved. 'The type of weaving I was doing at Roxburgh is called card weaving,' continues Nicky. 'It uses small cards with holes, which hold the threads apart. By rotating the cards both backwards and forwards you separate the threads for weaving. The combination of rotations produces different patterns and you can even weave letters into a design.'

Back to Roxburgh

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