Weaving linen fabric to create a tunic based on the 11th century Viborg Shirt

The first full weaving project on my warp-weighted loom is finished: a Viking age apron dress for my wife. I figured that the second project should be something that I can wear myself. The apron dress was woven with wool, so I decided to give linen a try to advance my weaving skill on the warp-weighed loom in a different direction. A further practical reason for linen is my intolerance to wearing wool garments. With our Viking personas in mind, I researched the literature for archeological evidence of a male Viking tunic. The most striking extant piece that closely represents our personas’ time frame and location is an 11th century linen tunic found near the town of Viborg in the center of Jutland, Denmark. So I decided to start weaving linen fabric for a reproduction of this piece.

Historic background

Weaving wool or linen for clothing on a warp-weighted loom has a very long history. The first comprehensive study of this type of loom from archeological evidence and literature available to her at that time was given by Marta Hoffmann in 1964. Since then many other researchers have contributed to a further understanding in the use, history, products, and living history of this ancient loom. I particularly like a recent publication by Hildur Hákonardóttir, Elizabeth Johnston and Marta Kløve Juuhl that tells the story of three women who through six years of work and research contributed an extensive first hand knowledge of weaving on a warp-weighted loom. It also serves well as a reference to research that has been published since Marta Hoffmann’s book.

Most of our hands-on knowledge of Viking age fabrics and garments derives from textile fragments found in graves. There are very few well preserved remains of tunics from the Viking age. The two most extraordinary exceptions are of a whole tunic found at the edge of the recently retreated Landbreen glacier in Oppland County, Norway and the greater part of tunic found near the town of Viborg in the center of Jutland in Denmark. The first one was found in 2011 by archaeologists from Oppland’s Glacier Archaeology Rescue Program. They discovered a crumbled-up piece of textile approximately 0.58 by 0.29m in size in a pit at the upper edge of the ice patch exposed by the thawing of the glacier (Figure 1).

Figure 1: The Lendbreen tunic in situ.

Closer examination revealed a whole tunic made from wool and woven in diamond twill. The fabric is partly bleached where exposed to the sun and wind (Figure 2). Radiocarbon dating shows that the tunic was made between AD 230 and 390. The tunic is relatively short and constructed from a simple cut. The chest girth measures approximately 1.08m. By modern size standards, the tunic would thus fit a slender man, 1.7–1.76m in height.

Figure 2: The front of the Lendbreen tunic. Museum of Cultural History, University of Oslo.

The second one was found during the Viborg stiftsmuseum’s excavation near the town of Viborg in the center of Jutland in Denmark in 1984/85. The excavation site was located on the shore of Søndersø, which was inhabited from about 1000 until about 1300 AD. The fabric fragments (Figure 3) were found in a pit that most likely was a post hole. They were dated to the 11th century by stratigraphical analysis of the pit. The damp conditions at the Søndersø site favored preservation of organic materials and although the linen shirt is not preserved in one piece, it was still an extraordinary find.

Figure 3: The preserved parts of the front (left) and the back (right) of the shirt.

Fiber and weaving analysis shows that the Viborg shirt was made of single ply Z/Z-spun natural linen thread, woven in tabby weave with a density of about 20/12 per cm. The warp thread is a little thicker and somewhat more tightly spun than the weft thread . Analyses of the fabric fragments and the seams lead to the following reconstruction (Figure 4): A rather slim-fit poncho without seams on top of the shoulders, a skirt that is open on both sides and a neck lining that is continued into two ribbons for tying. The upper part of the shirt has a band, which is radially stitched to the outer garment. It is presumed that the shirt had long sleeves.

Figure 4: Reconstruction of the Viborg shirt.

Recreating the Viborg shirt

The fact that the Viborg shirt was woven from linen fabric and dated more closely to my persona’s time frame tipped the balance in favor of recreating this shirt rather than the Lendbreen tunic. I started setting up my warp-weighted loom to weave fabric enough for a shirt that will fit me based on the pattern reconstruction as presented by Mytte Fentz (Figure 5). Given my chest size of 23 inch and the maximum weaving width of my loom of about 3 feet, I decided to warp the loom for a width of the widest piece of the pattern. Allowing for seams, shrinkage after washing and possible narrowing of the warp during weaving, I created a warp with a width of 28 inch. I then compensated for the need of the remaining pieces by creating a longer warp.

I bought unbleached natural single ply z-spun linen thread in two thicknesses, 12/1 for the warp and a slightly thinner 20/1 for the weft. A small sample test weave resulted in a warp count of 17 threads per cm and a weft count of 8 threads per cm, reasonably close to the 20/12 per cm in the extant piece.

Figure 5: The reconstructed pattern for the Viborg shirt.

Warping the Warp Weighted Loom

I created a tablet woven starter band on ten tablets. The warp of the starter band was the same 12/1 linen thread as used for the warp of the fabric. At each turn of the tablets, I passed a loop of the 12/1 linen thread through the shed. The weft of the started band becomes the warp for the loom. One advantage of having two threads in each shed in the starting border is a closer warp. Another is that the ball of yarn that forms the weft of the starting border does not have to pass through the shed. Instead a loop is pulled from the cone of yarn and passed through the shed and around a series of pegs, while the cone itself remains where it is. Each loop is wound around pegs to a length equal to the desired length of fabric plus a margin for the loom waste and shrinkage after washing. I turned the cards in sets of 25 picks. After each set, I cut the loops of the threads at the last peg and split them in two bundles. I made sure to wind the threads around the last peg in the same direction for each pick. So after cutting the loops, the two bundles split naturally into the two parts that form the natural shed of the warp.

Warping setup (left) and half completed starter band (right).

Next, I transferred and secured the finished starting border to the cloth beam. First, I tied the band firmly in place by threading a 12/1 linen cord through the selvage side of the band and the holes in the cloth beam. Next, I tied additional loops at a closer spacing to prevent sagging of the header band due to the fairly high tension in the warp threads once the weights were attached.

The starter band secured to the cloth beam.

After transferring the warp to the loom I knitted the heddles for tabby weave. You can tie each heddle individually, but it is more convenient to knit continuous heddles. I placed a helper rod behind the warp to ensure equal length heddles and knitted the heddles by looping around each thread of the back warp around the heddle rod and the helper rod, making sure to pass each end of the loop between the same two threads of the front warp.

Knitting the heddles.

Finally, I attached the loom weights to the warp and created the spacing cords. The loom weights were made from unfired clay. They are about 320 gram each with minimal weight variation. I started out with 25 warp threads tied to each loom weight, but found the tension in the warp threads to be a bit low for a good shed. So I reduced the number to 20 threads per loom weight. Since the total warp length is significantly longer than the height of the loom, the surplus warp was braided. To make tying and untying to feed more warp after weaving a bit more efficient, the braids are not knotted directly to the loom weights directly, but instead each one is secured by a loop, which is in turn attached to the loom weight. After the weights were tied to the bundles, the warp was split into the natural shed. I tied a crochet chain across the back threads and after that a similar one across the front threads. This so-called spacing cord helps to distribute the individual warp threads evenly over the full width of the weave. Each time the cloth is rolled onto the cloth beam, the spacing cord will slide down along the warp threads to just below the shed rod.

Attaching the weights.

Knitting the crochet spacing cord.

Weaving

With the loom warped it was time to start weaving. The tricky part is figuring out how much weft to give in each pick to prevent the weave getting narrower and narrower as you go along. I loosely looped the weft at each pick instead of pulling it tight. Too loose and you get loops in the weave, too tight and the fabric narrows. Right now the selvages are straight and the width is constant, but I have not woven enough to see if tightening becomes an issue. The selvages are straight so far. The other tricky part is how hard to beat the weft after each pick. Right now I beat it as tight as I feel comfortable doing resulting in a weft thread count that is just slightly lower than that in the extent piece.

The natural shed (left) and the counter shed (right).

The first two inches of fabric.

To be continued after weaving is complete 😀

Bibliography

Ejstrud, Bo (Editor) (2011) “From Flax to Linen - Experiments with flax at Ribe Viking Centre” Maritime Archaeology Programme, University of Southern Denmark.

Fentz, Mytte (1993) “Vikingeskjorten fra Viborg”, Viborg Stiftsmuseum
https://vk.com/doc-32206289_294592421?dl=971c82b3a61faf9e5f

Fentz, Mytte (1987) “An 11th century linen shirt from Viborg”, translated by Maggie Mulvaney. This article appeared as "En hørskjorte fra 1000-årenes Viborg" in KUML 1987; Årbog for Jysk Arkælogisk Selskab.
http://www.forest.gen.nz/Medieval/articles/Viborg/VIBORG.HTM

Hoffman, Marta (1974) “The Warp-Weighted Loom: Studies in History and Technology of an Ancient Implement”, Robin and Russ Handweavers.

Hákonardóttir, Hildur, Johnston, Elizabeth, and Kløve Juuhl, Marta (2016) “The Warp-Weighted Loom”, Randi Andersen and Atle Ove Martinussen (Editors).

Petty, Christina (2014) “Warp Weighted Looms: Then and Now Anglo-Saxon and Viking Archaeological Evidence and Modern Practitioners”, Ph.D. thesis, University of Manchester, Manchester, UK

Plunkett, Steven J. (1999) “The Anglo-Saxon Loom from Pakenham, Suffolk” Proceedings of the Suffolk Institute of Archaeology and History, Volume XXXIX Part 3.

Priest-Dorman, Carolyn (1997) “Viking Tunic Construction”
http://www.cs.vassar.edu/~capriest/viktunic.html (last updated 04/17/97).

Priest-Dorman, Carolyn (2001) “Weaving on the Warp-Weighted Loom: Some Source Materials” http://www.cs.vassar.edu/~capriest/wwloom.html (last updated 06/17/02).

Uusitalo, Ulla-Mari (last accessed at 10/25/17) “Male linen shirt of 11th century, from Viborg, Denmark”
http://utankamari.net/wp-content/uploads/2011/06/viborgshirt.pdf

Vedeler, Marianne and Bender Jørgensen, Lise (2013) “Out of the Norwegian Glaciers: Lendbreen – a tunic from the early first millennium AD”, Antiquity, Vol. 87 No. 337 pp. 788–801.

Verberg, Susan (2016) “A fencing tunic based on the 11th century Viborg Shirt”
https://www.academia.edu/27845542/An_SCA_approved_fencing_tunic_based_on_the_11th_century_Viborg_Shirt

Apron dress trim inspired by the Birka bands; 800-975 CE Sweden

I really enjoy tablet weaving and after completing my greenbelt I was looking for another project to practice and grow my tablet weaving skill. The Aethelmearc Wardrobe Project was the perfect excuse. I loved the idea of working together with a group of people to make a complete outfit, so I volunteered to weave trim for the top of the apron dress for Her Majesty, Queen Juliana Delamere.

The partially completed band on the loom.

Weaving in progress

Historical background

Archeological research conducted by Hjalmar Stolpe in the years 1871 to 1881 showed with all certainty that the Viking settlement Birka on the island of Björkö in the Lake of Mälar in present-day Sweden was the commercial center of Sweden during the Viking Age. For almost two centuries, from about 800 to 975 CE, Birka served as an important trading center between Viking age Scandinavia and Western Europe and with the Orient through the trade routes in Russia. Die Kungl. Vitterhets Historie och Antikvitets Akademien commissioned Holger Arbman in 1931 to catalogue the enormous wealth of artifacts found in the Birka archeological sites. Agnes Geijer republished an extensive survey of the textile fragments from the Birka graves. This publication contains a complete chapter on the Birka bands (see Figure 1 for examples of some of these bands).

Technique, material and design

Virtually all the Birka bands are woven on tablets with four holes. A large variation of designs can be created by using differently colored threats in the different holes and turning the cards in a specific order, backward or forward, as individual cards or in groups. An alternative, and for me a more attractive, way of creating a pattern is by brocading with a contrasting color or with gold or silver thread. The bands that inspired this project are of the latter type. They consist of: (a) the basic ground weft that binds the warp threads together, hidden by them in the usual way, and (b) a second, brocading weft of double drawn silver wire, creating the actual pattern or design. The brocading weft consists of a pattern of floats and hidden sections by passing the weft underneath one or more warp threads of one or more cards.

Most of the Birka bands show a mix of repeating patterns, like diamonds, stars, swastikas or geometric patterns of diagonals lines (Figure 2). Giving the nature of the project I wanted to combine a typical Birka pattern with the Aethelmearc escarbuncle. I started out creating a pattern for the escarbuncle. The number of tablets determines the resolution of the pattern and to capture the details of the escarbuncle I decided that 75 cards were needed. I then searched for patterns that would make a pleasing match with the escarbuncle and that could be modified to fit on 75 cards. I initially gravitated towards a combination of diagonal lines and crosses as seen on several Birka bands and an intricate pattern found on the B22 band (Figure 3, top). The downside of this combination was that it would result in only three escarbuncles over a length of 17 in, two of them likely partially covered by the shoulder band broaches. I therefore decided to skip the B22 band pattern in favor of a combination of only the diagonal lines with crosses and the escarbuncle (Figure 3, bottom).

Using 75 cards for the band is about three times more than used for the typical Birka bands, so I used a finer silk thread to partially compensate for the number of cards and keep the final width of the band somewhat closer to the extant pieces. Both the warp and the structural and brocading weft are store bought 60/2 silk, which resulted in a width of about 30 mm and a warp count of 100/cm. The warp tension was approximately 10g/thread resulted in a weft count of 32/cm. The final woven length of band was 17 in.

Figure 1: Examples from several bands: Left: (1) B6-7, grave 965, (2) B21, grave 943, and (3)-(4) B19, grave 965; Right: (1) B17, grave 735, (2) B22, grave 824, (3) B11, grave 943, (4) B14, grave 845, and (5) B10, grave 1076.

Figure 2: Examples of several patterns: Left: (1) B5, (b) B9, (c) B14, (d) B16, (e) B17, (f) B2, (g) B7, (h) B13, and (i) B12; Right: (a) B6, (b) B22, (c) B20, (d) B19, and (e) B21.

Figure 3: The initial design (top) and the actually used pattern (bottom).

Weaving the belt

The band was woven on a warp weighted tablet weaving loom that I designed and build for an earlier project. The loom is designed to use on the top of a table, with the warp ends weighted down and dropping freely over the fixed rod at the end of the loom (Figure 4, left). The other end of the warp is attached to a ratcheted rod, which stores the finished band. The initial warp length was about 80 in, enough to create the required length of band for the current project as well as an additional piece that I want to weave based on the first design. Any surplus length of warp has to be braided or looped to keep the warp ends suspended freely above the ground. With the initial warp length I could avoid this by using the loom in the long direction of our kitchen table as shown on the right in Figure 4. Hence, I started weaving in this fashion and switched to the usual setup on the left in Figure 4 after the unwoven part of the warp was short enough to hang freely.

Figure 4: Loom setup used as intended (left) and as initially used for this project to accommodate a longer warp (right).

The warp was created one card at the time, threading back and forth twice per card. The cards were warped alternating S and Z (to eliminate fouling of the warp threads during turns). The brocading weft passed under two of the four threads of the cord creating a smooth and uniform underside. As in the original bands, all cards are collectively rotated forward one quarter turn for each successive passage of the ground and brocading weft. The unfinished warp ends were periodically untwisted to eliminate the build-up twist.

Figure 5: A test weave to check the pattern dimensions and the tension in the warp.

Figure 6: The finished trim, the test strip, and the loom setup for the second band.

Figure 7: The completed second band.

Figure 8: Closeup of the finished second band.

Learning points

The correct tension in the warp is crucial for the final weft count and the “look” of the brocaded pattern. The initial setup and tension created a pattern that was slightly elongated in the warp direction. A thinner structural warp thread would likely have reduced this elongation, but since that was not available to me and the distortion was modest, I decided to move on with the current setup. After completing about 13 in of
finished band I changed the weaving setup from the initial setup (Figure 4, right) to the one for which the loom was designed (Figure 4, left). To my surprise, this increased the tension sufficiently to narrow the band from about 30 mm to about 26 mm. This was clearly not intended and serves as a good lesson to stick with a setup for the duration of a project or to carefully monitor the tension and width and adjust the weights if needed.

Find a downloadable version of this post at:
https://www.academia.edu/35090763/Apron_dress_trim_inspired_by_the_Birka_bands_800-975_CE_Sweden

Bibliography

Arbman, Holger (1940) “Birka I: Die Gräbern”, Kungl. Vitterhets Historie och Antikvitets Akademien (Uppsala).

Burchardt, Silvester (2016) “Who’s afraid of brocade” (class handout)

Collingwood, Peter (1982) “The Techniques of Tablet Weaving”, Echo Points Books & Media (Vermont)

Geijer, Agnes (1938) “Birka III: Die Textilfunde aus then Gräbern”, Kungl. Vitterhets Historie och Antikvitets Akademien (Uppsala).

Stolpe, Hjalmar (1878, 1880) “Meddelanden frän Björkö”, Kungl. Vitterhets Historie och Antikvitetsak-ademiens Mänadsblad.

Tabletwoven Oseberg band as trim for a Viking tunic

I had the honor to serve as lieutenant of Her Majesties Guard during the last reign of Her Grace Gabrielle van Nijenrode and His Grace Timothy of Arindale and that called for new outfits for us to wear at Their coronation. Their colors are red and black, so my wife made matching Viking outfits for the three of us in black and red linen. It was up to me to weave the trim: for the top of her apron dress and at the edge of the facing and the cuffs of the tunics. I decided on a narrow Oseberg band, since I was looking for a historically correct pattern for our persona's and one that would not be too overly time consuming to weave.

The pattern for the band was downloaded from Sherlagh Lewin's website. The tunic was red with black facings and cuffs, so I used red as the main color and black for the pattern. The band is woven with 10 tablets, which are turned together in the same direction. The pattern is set by using black threads in some or all of the holes of tablets 4 to 8 and red in all others. Red and black 20/2 silk thread was used for the warp resulting in a width slightly less than 6 mm, close the 5 mm width of the extant piece. The same red 20/2 silk thread was used for the weft, resulting in a reasonably square pattern.

The band was woven on my warp-weighted tablet weaving loom. Steel washers were used as weights, two washers of 40 gr each for each tablet. The starting length of the warp was 180 in, which gave me 137 in of finished band.

Warping the loom.

 

Weaving the band.

A closeup of the band after sewing it to the tunic.

The finished tunic.

The proud owners of the new outfits.

Bibliography

Anton Wilhelm Brögger (1921) "The Oseberg Ship", The American-Scandavian Review, Vol. 9, pp. 439-447.

Shelagh Lewins (last accessed 11/09/17) "The Narrow Oseberg Band"
http://www.shelaghlewins.com/tablet_weaving/patterns_past.php
www.shelaghlewins.com/tablet_weaving/Oseberg_narrow/Oseberg_narrow.pdf