Some idle thoughts

No tablet weaving is currently happening, alas.  My tablet weaving space is not currently available.  I've been doing other things but not tablet weaving.

I am thinking about a Next Project, though.  I'm thinking it's going to be the practice band for the tie-down technique, #50 in Tablet Woven Treasures.  Not because I specifically want practice, but because I rather like the motif.  Mervi Pasanen posted a pic of it done in different colors and that sent me looking...

Here's an instagram pic of it:  https://www.instagram.com/p/DMUzit3t7Kj

I do not plan on doing tubular selvedges at this point though it's possible I could change my mind.  I might do the wrapped/braided tassels, though.

I'm also considering some other potential tablet weaving projects.  Nothing I can remember offhand, but I do remember that they're all less fiddly techniques.  Eh, we'll see what happens once the tablet-weaving area is available again.

Speaking of Finnish Iron Age bands, Applesies and Fox Noses has been reprinted, yay!  It's available through a couple of different sources.

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I was going to be teaching some fingerloop braiding this weekend, but a conflict came up so that won't be happening.

I did do some impromptu teaching/demos a few weeks ago.  I showed/taught the 2-loop loop-exchange braid, the 4-loop loop exchange braid (in two colors, for a spiral), and then the 4-loop sinnet (the Skjoldehamn 4-loop braid), also in a two-color spiral.

Although I haven't done much other braiding recently, I was having fun going through some online museum archives and spotting the braids, whether or not I could get enough resolution to see what was going on or not.

One of them is the International Dunhuang Programme.  Here are a couple of links to braids in the collection, including a couple of slings!

https://idp.bl.uk/collection/D244E5464D954BE2855CEDF81EF4077D/

https://idp.bl.uk/collection/EE55C581E46942499DD8DAB5455B588A/

https://idp.bl.uk/collection/1B110B210B104CBC9AAE6E407CE0A7A2/

https://idp.bl.uk/collection/B7289C7590C441ABAA857511168C12A9/

https://idp.bl.uk/collection/48FF9807471C4CD896A5796DB6694AA9/ is a cute little purse that does have some cordage.  I can't quite tell from the photo if it's a twisted cord or a small braid, though my first impression is twisted cord.

The collection has some cool shoes and sandals, too, made from cordage and weaving/interlacing techniques.  There are a bunch of "strings" in the collection as well, most of which appear to be simple bast-fiber cordage.

Ack, there was some other site I'd been wandering through recently with either bands or braids or both, but it's slipped my mind for the moment.  What a reminder to me to keep good notes, perhaps even in this here blog!

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For some reason, I recently watched a few Youtube videos on World War I archaeology, which included a project where the bones of unknown soldiers were recovered.  What was interesting to me (in addition to everything else in the videos) is how badly preserved any textiles are.  It's only been a century (less than a century when some of the digs happened) and not much is left, and what is left is usually fragmentary and filthy.  That gives me a bit of perspective on the much older sites where textiles or textile fragments have been preserved, both the ones where anything left is in bad shape and ones where the preservation is excellent (such as the Dunhuang textiles in the above paragraph).  It also gives me a bit of perspective on the effectiveness of Our Microscopic Friends and how efficiently and effectively they go about their recycling work, and ditto for natural chemical processes.

Leather tended to be better preserved than cloth, or rather, boots often at least partially survived their long decades underground.  Some metal was preserved with a lot being very corroded.  No soft body tissues seemed to be present but bones were still in pretty good shape, some showing terrible injuries that no doubt contributed to the deaths of the people whose bones they were.

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I don't remember if there was anything else I wanted to write down.  I can always add to this post later.  Or write another.

Rib weave tablet woven band from Maksu, Humikkala (a 2-hole pattern from Tablet-Woven Treasures)

This one has appealed to me for a while.  I'm not sure why I decided to do it now, but that's fine.  It was a pretty straightforward project.

The band is in Tablet Woven Treasures by Maikki Karisto and Mervi Pasanen.  It's on p.131, 15. Maksu, Humikkala (KM 8656:H30:1).  They call it a rib-weave pattern.  It's a two-threaded pattern with all the threads in holes A and C, not offset like a lot of other 2-hole patterns.  There are 7 pattern tablets.  Each side has 3 four-threaded edge tablets which are tubular-woven.  (In other words, both sides have tubular edges and all 3 edge cards on each side are part of the tubular edge.)  That makes 13 tablets total, 6 edge and 7 pattern tablets.

It's pretty adorable!  Unblocked, it's about 7/16" wide and about 65" long.

A warp thread snapped in the middle, yikes!  I have no idea whether to blame the cats, the thread quality, or happenstance.  I'm glad I already have experience with this, and indeed, it was not an issue to attach a new warp thread and keep going.  There's one spot where apparently I forgot to do the tubular edge on one of the sides.  I tried to fix that, too, a bit less successfully.  It looks fine on the top but is slightly visible on the bottom if one knows it's there and looks at the right spot.  Or if one runs fingers along the band -- the repair spot feels a bit different, but that's also true of the unrepaired area before I tried to fix it.

The width varies slightly.  I really wanted the red on the edge tablet to show.  But I had to balance that against pulling the weft tight enough for the pattern to look right.  I'm a trifle disappointed that the red edge is not too visible most of the time.  Oh, well, it can be a secret, I guess.  Or I can use this as a strap since both sides of the band are very cute.  Or attach it at the very edge of something and/or attach it loosely so the red can be glimpsed.

I'm glad I did this band, but I think I'm tired of tubular edges for a while.

I have no idea what I'll do next.  Something, I'm sure!

Brocade Sampler, 8th and maybe the last post -- it's finished!

Done!

Here are the last few in-progress pics:

The top photo is a 13-tablet pattern taken from Ecclesiastical Pomp & Aristocratic Circumstances, p.120.  It's the border from band "2. Band on the chasuble attributed to St. Wolfgang, Bishop of Regensburg, 11th/12th century".  I did two repeats.

The middle photo has two motifs.  The one on the left is a 9-tablet pattern from the Saxon Rabbit handout, from Grave 44 mid 6th century, Lyminge, Kent, pattern 10 in the Crowfoot paper.  I did 4 pattern repeats.  The longer one on the right is a 13-tablet pattern from Anna Neuper's Modelbuch, No. 76 (fol 79v), p.56.  I did 4 pattern repeats.

I ran out of background weft at this point.  The new stuff is the same color but maybe a bit thicker and softer.  It doesn't matter.

The bottom photo has the last two motifs.  The motif on the left is a 9-tablet pattern from Roslein und Wecklein, #214, p.179.  I did 2 repeats.  (Hmm, it would look nice with a pearl or pretty bead in the spot between motifs.)  The motif on the right, the last one, is a 13-tablet pattern, a motif adapted from EC&AC, p. 134, pattern "17. Bands on a pontifical skull cap, 11th/12th century".  I did the little diamond motif on the upper left part of the chart, 2 diamonds and then one more row to close up the upper diamond.

I maybe could have gotten one more small motif in, but I decided that was enough, and so endeth my first brocade sampler band.

Fresh off the tablets, unblocked, the band is about 5/8" wide and about 63" long.

There are 25 different motifs.  Wow.  I didn't even get to all of the charts I'd printed out, and also didn't end up making up more of my own patterns.

Many of the motifs look better in person.  The brocade weft is shiny enough that it affects how the pics look.  Not surprisingly, the later motifs tend to look better than the earlier ones I did.

I'm still working on consistency though I'm getting better.  Adding a brocade border stripe, as many of the historic patterns did, probably helps with that since then the slight angle difference at the turning points will be in the edge stripe rather than in the main motif.

I really like the interplay of positive and negative space -- both the brocade and the tiedowns (in the background warp) make interesting patterns.

I'm pretty sure I managed to not accidentally weave any swastikas.

Brocade is pretty easy as tablet-weaving techniques go, at least for the basics, and really about the same, time-wise, as other fiddly tablet-weaving techniques.

I'll definitely do brocade again!  It'll be interesting to do it with silk and/or metallic threads, similar to the materials used for many of the historic bands.

Now to decide what project I feel like doing next.  So many possibilities but nothing is screaming at me.  So I'll do some thinking and browsing of books and websites and what-not to see what appeals.

Brocade sampler, 7th post (and still going....)

Another three samples in my brocade sampler are in this pic.

The left one is  a 13-tablet pattern from Roslein und Wecklein, #169 on p.151.  I did 4 pattern repeats.  The middle one is a 13-tablet pattern from Anna Neuper's Modelbuch, pattern No. 74 (fol 78v), p,54.  I did 3 pattern repeats.  Since the left is 12 rows long and the middle 16, each one is 48 rows long.

The one on the right is a 13-tablet motif from Roslein und Wecklein, #164 on p.147.  I did one repeat because I didn't feel like doing two.  I assume this little motif is a standalone star rather than a repeating motif.  And of course I could have added pearls!

I like all of these.  I'm also able to unweave fairly quickly when I notice a problem, assuming the problem isn't so far back that I prefer to ignore it.  I feel fairly comfortable doing brocade, so this band achieved its hoped-for purpose.  I can add brocade to the list of techniques I have experience with.  I'll do it again, for sure.

What next for this sampler?  Possibly a few more 13-tablet patterns from R+W and ANM.  Maybe another coptic.  Maybe some free-association stuff, or another Birka (if there are others that fit into my band's number of tablets).  I'm also going to see if anything from Ecclesiastical Pomp is narrow enough.

I probably won't bother switching brocade thread since I still have plenty of this stuff left.  But you never know.  And if nothing else appeals, I can plain-weave until the end, or play around with texture patterns on the monochrome warp

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Brocade sampler, sixth post

Wow, I'm really spamming my own blog with every little bit of progress on this sampler brocade band!

This is the brocade motif from the 10th-century Chernigov, Ukraine band.  I used the chart from Aisling's website.  Here is where she discusses it (with a link to the chart): https://aisling.biz/index.php/galerie/historisch/fruehmittelalter/262-chernigov-ukraine and here is the chart: https://aisling.biz/images/brettchenweben/Anleitung/Chernigov.pdf

This is a fairly popular band -- I found a good half-dozen or so examples of it that people have woven.  What is interesting to me is that most of the ones other people have done use a thinner brocade weft that lies flatter, so that the background-warp tiedowns are more prominent and noticeable.

Hmmm.  That is something to ponder for future bands.  I know that the interaction of background warp and brocade weft threads are one of the issues people deal with when weaving brocade.  I might not be doing those kinds of experiments with this sampler band since I don't have thin metallic thread lying around.  But I wanted to note this specifically so that I am reminded on future tablet-woven brocade projects.

The ones I see online also have the extra strip of brocade as part of the edge pattern (19 tablets total rather than the 11 needed for the center motif).  I have no idea if or how that affects things.

There are three repeats above, each 26 rows, and it's an 11-tablet pattern.  I messed up a bit on the first repeat, oops, but it's not too noticeable.  It's a cute pattern.  I like it, though I do prefer other people's versions, where the background tiedowns really stand out against the gold and silver bling.

This was another chart where the tick marks referred to the tiedown and blanks were brocaded squares.  This means I'll be confused for a few rows on the next motif if it's charted in the opposite way!  But again, it's interesting to think about positive vs negative space and how brocading can emphasize either the pattern of the brocade weft or the pattern of the background-warp tiedowns.

I'm probably more than half down with my sampler band.  It's not going to be particularly long or anything.  Most of these little snippets of motifs are a mere few inches long.  I believe all of them are fewer than 100 row, each with 2-4 rows of plain tablet-weaving between them.

Dunno if I'll do any more brocading today.  If not, then there will be another post after the next few motifs are done!  (or if there's something I particularly want to mention, as I did today)

Brocade sampler, fifth post

I might do another motif or two today, but just in case I don't, here's what I've done recently on my little brocade sampler band.

The one on the left is another 6th century Saxon band, from the Saxon Rabbit handout.  (I don't think it's in the Crowfoot paper.)  It's from Sarre, Kent.  I think I did about 6 repeats.

The middle one is Birka B18.  I used the chart on Aisling's website, not that it really needs a chart.  I did 5 repeats.

The one of the right is from Anna Neuper's Modelbuch, pattern number 85 (fol 83r), the middle pattern on p.47.  I did 2 repeats.

Birka B18 is a 10-tablet pattern and the other two are 9-tablet patterns.

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Random free-association verbiage:

These Saxon patterns are still a bit hard for me to do well with this particular brocade thread.  The over-1-tablet vs over-3 tablet sections don't quite have the same consistency in the way they look, which obscures the pattern somewhat.  They look good at some angles but not all angles.  Looking back at the earlier ones I did, the little ones where most of the brocading went over 1 tablet are the most effective, at least for this brocade thread and my current level of competence (near-novice).

I like the Anne Neuper pattern.  The pattern of the background is interesting and sufficiently contrasting with the brocade.  And most of the brocade is over 2 or more tablets so the pattern appears more consistent.  A lot of the smaller patterns in the Modelbuch are these kinds of zigzags and diamonds -- they've very distinctive and self-consistent in their design sensibilities.  And yeah, it would have been cool to see the original patterns with their distinctive notation in addition to the modern charting.  I like that Claudia Wollny did that for the Col. Pad. Germ. 551 patterns.

The Birka B18 pattern is also nice.  Simple and easy, but effective.

I don't know how many Birka patterns I'll want to do (not now, but eventually).  Some people have a goal of weaving all of them.  Many of them are not particularly appealing/attractive to me.  Several have swastikas, which are too poisoned by modern political horrors, and I won't knowingly weave that motif.

I like the version of B2 I've seen, where there are interlocking braids separated by Xs, sometimes alternating with a stretch of the variation that is shown in fragment f (figure 19 f) in the Birka report.

B12 (figure 19 i) is something I've woven as a 4-threaded diagonals pattern, many years ago.  I didn't know it was originally a brocaded band from the Birka find.  I don't know if I'd want to do it again as a brocade.

B22 (figure 20 b) is kind of interesting, both the lower part (the interlocking brickwork) and the more elaborate upper part.  The lower part of B6 (figure 20 a) is cute, but the upper part has too many swastikas.

None of the others that are in the Birka report on p.82-83 interest me at the moment.  Hmm, I wonder where the other bands can be seen, since B18 is not in the sketches on p.82-82.  Oh, duh, they're photographed in the back of the book, in the various tables.  I should see if there are more motifs that look fun, though it's kind of hard for me to make out the patterns except for a few fairly clear areas.  I greatly respect the people who decipher and re-create the patterns in these archaeologic specimens.

There are some cool patterns I want to do from the Nancy Spies Ecclesiastical Pomp & Aristocratic Circumstance book.  That might be another warp, since a lot of the ones I want to try are a minimum of 15 tablet patterns and I only warped up 13 tablets.

There are other patterns that are on Aisling's website I want to try.  Some require more than 13 tablets, alas, but a few are narrower.  They're on my list...  And maybe I'll do more from her Egyptian tablet weaving book.

Now that I'm starting to feel comfortable with basic brocade, I'm thinking about "what next?"  Do I want to try anything else new with this band beyond a sampling of motifs, such as a second brocade color or a different brocade thread?  What kind of brocade do I want to make an entire band from, if anything?  Or should I do shorter sections?  Something that could be fun is a belt with occasional brocaded motifs, possibly made with little metal studs every now and then between the brocade.  Or I could do short lengths for cuffs or keychains or bookmarks.

Also, what do I want to tablet-weave next?  (and that's in addition to thoughts about sprang, fingerloop braiding, kumihimo on the marudai, spinning, knitting, and other semi-obsessions)  Icelandic double-cloth or pebble weave?  More brocade?  Some 2-hole or Sulawesi or 3/1 twill?  More cords?  Or something else entirely?

Here's a close-up of the Anna Neuper pattern no 85 again, just because:

No, it's not perfect, and yes, my cat has been sitting on it.  But it is cute.  And it shows that I am improving.

I'm glad that brocade is now something I've tried, that I'm comfortable doing, and that I'm willing to do again.