It's time for Seyðisfjörður!

The tablet-woven band found in Seyðisfjörður, that is.  It's interpreted to be the trim on a 9th-10th century smokkr.  It was found in a recent-ish Icelandic archaeological dig.  Everyone was making it back in late 2023.  Well, I guess now it's my turn.  It's intended as a gift for a friend.

Here's the link to a description of the find along with a pretty decent photo of the original band: https://fornleifur.blog.is/blog/fornleifur/entry/2284555/ 

Here's a description (and a reconstruction plus chart) from Aisling's website: https://aisling.biz/index.php/galerie/historisch/fruehmittelalter/333-die-borte-von-seydhisfjoerdhur.  She links to her Twisted Threads pattern page, too.

Elewys made this as well.  Her description and chart is here: http://ladyelewys.carpevinumpdx.com/2023/03/13/weave-along-with-elewys-ep-33-seydisfjordur-smokkr-weave/.   She credits at least part of the chart to Marcelo Oliveira.  I found a chart (maybe even the same chart) credited to Marcelo Oliveira on pinterest: https://i.pinimg.com/originals/e8/87/bc/e887bc81473afb72031649725648288d.jpg

There are a few other versions floating around, too, along with minor variations on the little leaf and flower motifs.

I'm mostly using the Oliveira pinterest chart.  Aisling's Twisted Threads chart doesn't quite match the band in her photograph, and I'm not in the mood to rechart it myself.

The "Chart B" on Elewys's blog seems to match the flower/leaf orientation in the original photo, so I started with that.  I don't give a flying flip about pattern neutrality since I use a warp-weighted loom, but I'll probably do some of the flower/leaf motifs from Chart A, and might well chart up the inverse of both of them (i.e. stems going down instead of up).

My friend requested green and blue, so I changed the red of the original to green.  I added an extra edge tablet on each side (in green) to make the band a little wider.  Even so, I'm not gonna match the 1.5cm width of the original, not with Aunt Lydia's 10 crochet cotton.

So...  14 tablets -- 8 for the pattern, 3 on each side for the edges.  Each pattern repeat is 64 turns, though a lot of it is Xs and Os.

Oh, it's a two-hole pattern, too.  That's always fun!  The original, of course, was wool, and I'm still working through my cotton stash.

It's going well so far.  I like how it looks and it's relatively quick and straightforward to weave.  Hopefully my friend likes it.

------------

I taught the 4-loop Makusua/Maize Blossoms fingerloop braid over the weekend.  That too went well.