Ancient Textiles
Publisher: Oxbow Books

Ancient Textiles is a long-running and very successful series established in collaboration between Oxbow Books and the Centre for Textile Research (CTR) of Copenhagen University. Initially a vehicle for publishing CTR’s research, in recent years the series has expanded to include submitted titles from a wide range of institutional and independent scholars. Titles cover many aspects of textile and clothing research from detailed analyses of specific cloths, weaves or dyes to discussions of technological developments in textile manufacture and production from prehistory to the medieval period, the use of textiles in specific contexts, and techniques of conservation.

Textiles and Cult in the Ancient Mediterranean Cover
Format: Hardback
Pages: 320
ISBN: 9781785706721
Pub Date: 30 Sep 2017
Imprint: Oxbow Books
Description:
Twenty-four experts from the fields of Ancient History, Semitic philology, Assyriology, Classical Archaeology, and Classical Philology come together in this volume to explore the role of textiles in ancient religion in Greece, Italy, The Levant and the Near East. Recent scholarship has illustrated how textiles played a large and very important role in the ancient Mediterranean sanctuaries. In Greece, the so-called temple inventories testify to the use of textiles as votive offerings, in particular to female divinities.
Treasures from the Sea Cover
Format: Hardback
Pages: 224
ISBN: 9781785704352
Pub Date: 15 Apr 2017
Imprint: Oxbow Books
Illustrations: b/w and colour
Description:
This interdisciplinary volume presents a collection of 17 papers which treat the current state of research on two marine resources used in ancient textile manufacture, shellfish purple dye and sea silk. Purple dye is extracted from the glands of the molluscs Hexaplex trunculus, Bolinus Brandaris and Stramonita Haemastoma which through a chemical reaction of photosynthesis produces hues ranging from dark red to bluish purple colour. The importance of purple dye since ancient times as a status symbol, a sign of royal and religious power is well documented.
RRP: £38.00
Silk Cover Silk Cover
Format: 
Pages: 152
ISBN: 9781785702792
Pub Date: 12 Jan 2017
Imprint: Oxbow Books
Illustrations: bw and colour
Pages: 152
ISBN: 9781789255515
Pub Date: 15 Nov 2020
Imprint: Oxbow Books
Description:
Already in Greek and Roman antiquity a vibrant series of exchange relationships existed between the Mediterranean regions and China, including the Indian subcontinent, along well-defined routes we call the Silk Roads. Among the many goods that found their way from East to West and vice versa were glass, wine spices, metals and precious stones as well as textile raw materials and fabrics of wool and silk, a precious fibre that was highly appreciated in many of the cultures along the roads that were named after it by modern scholars. These collected papers bring together current historical, philological and archaeological research from different areas and disciplines in order highlight the use, circulation and meaning of silk as a commodity, gift, tribute , booty, and status symbol in varying cultural and chronological contexts between East and West, including technological aspects of silk production.
RRP: £29.95
Gods and Garments Cover
Format: Hardback
Pages: 384
ISBN: 9781785703553
Pub Date: 31 Dec 2016
Imprint: Oxbow Books
Illustrations: b/w and colour
Description:
Textiles comprise a vast and wide category of material culture and constitute a crucial part of the ancient economy. Yet, studies of classical antiquity still often leave out this important category of material culture, partly due to the textiles themselves being only rarely preserved in the archaeological record. This neglect is also prevalent in scholarship on ancient Greek religion and ritual, although it is one of the most vibrant and rapidly developing branches of classical scholarship.
RRP: £40.00
Iconic Costumes Cover Iconic Costumes Cover
Format: 
Pages: 216
ISBN: 9781785702150
Pub Date: 30 Nov 2016
Imprint: Oxbow Books
Pages: 216
ISBN: 9781789255478
Pub Date: 15 Nov 2020
Imprint: Oxbow Books
Description:
This richly illustrated book presents a selection of the rich and varied iconographic material from the Scandinavian Late Iron Age (AD 400-1050) depicting clothed human figures, from an archaeological textile and clothing perspective. The source material consists of five object categories: gold foils, gold bracteates, helmet plaques, jewellery, and textile tapestries and comprises over 1000 different images of male and female costumes which are then systematically examined in conjunction with our present knowledge of archaeological textiles.In particular, the study explores the question of whether the selected images complement the archaeological clothing sources, through a new analytical tool which enables us to compare and contrast the object categories in regard to material, function, chronology, context and interpretation.
Textile Production in Classical Athens Cover
Format: Hardback
Pages: 256
ISBN: 9781785702525
Pub Date: 30 Sep 2016
Imprint: Oxbow Books
Illustrations: b/w and colour
Description:
Textile technology is older than any other ancient craft and is an instance of cognitive archaeology that provides vital information about society. In ancient Greece, textiles were considered among the principal and most fundamental cultural expressions. Athena, the goddess of the city, of intelligence and of skill was also the patron goddess of weaving.
RRP: £40.00
Spinning Fates and the Song of the Loom Cover Spinning Fates and the Song of the Loom Cover
Format: 
Pages: 300
ISBN: 9781785701603
Pub Date: 31 Jul 2016
Imprint: Oxbow Books
Pages: 360
ISBN: 9781789259865
Pub Date: 31 Jan 2023
Imprint: Oxbow Books
Description:
Textile imagery is pervasive in classical literature. An awareness of the craft and technology of weaving and spinning, of the production and consumption of clothing items, and of the social and religious significance of garments is key to the appreciation of how textile and cloth metaphors work as literary devices, their suitability to conceptualise human activities and represent cosmic realities, and their potential to evoke symbolic associations and generic expectations. Spanning mainly Greek and Latin poetic genres, yet encompassing comparative evidence from other Indo-European languages and literatures, these 18 chapters draw a various yet consistent picture of the literary exploitation of the imagery, concepts and symbolism of ancient textiles and clothing.
The Dyer's Handbook Cover
Format: Hardback
Pages: 160
ISBN: 9781785702112
Pub Date: 13 Jun 2016
Imprint: Oxbow Books
Description:
Persian blue, pomegranate flower, spiny lobster, wine soup, pale flesh, dove breast, golden wax, grass green, green sand, rotten olive, modest plum, agate, rich French gray, gunpowder of the English..
Woven Threads Cover
Format: Hardback
Pages: 264
ISBN: 9781785700583
Pub Date: 31 Dec 2015
Imprint: Oxbow Books
Description:
Woven textiles are produced by nearly all human societies. This volume investigates evidence for patterned textiles (that is, textiles woven with elaborate designs) that were produced by two early Mediterranean civilisations: the Minoans of Crete and the Mycenaeans of mainland Greece, that prospered during the Aegean Bronze Age, c. 3000-1200 BC, contemporary with pharaonic Egypt.
Tools, Textiles and Contexts Cover Tools, Textiles and Contexts Cover
Format: 
Pages: 484
ISBN: 9781842174722
Pub Date: 31 Oct 2015
Imprint: Oxbow Books
Illustrations: 210 illus
Pages: 416
ISBN: 9781789259896
Pub Date: 15 May 2023
Imprint: Oxbow Books
Illustrations: 210 illus
Description:
Textile production is one of the most important crafts in Aegean and Eastern Mediterranean Bronze Age societies and recent interdisciplinary and collaborative work offers crucial new perspectives into this field. The new and updated catalogue of archaeological textile finds presented here clearly demonstrates, even from the few extant finds, that knowledge of the use of fibres and of elaborate textile techniques that were used to produce textiles of different qualities was well developed. The functional analysis of spindle whorls and loom weights can be explored through experimental archaeology employing newly developed methodologies.
Weben und Gewebe in der Antike / Texts and Textiles in the Ancient World Cover
Format: Hardback
Pages: 192
ISBN: 9781785700620
Pub Date: 31 Oct 2015
Imprint: Oxbow Books
Illustrations: black/white & colour illustrations
Description:
Texts and Textiles in the Ancient World: Materiality – Representation – Episteme – Metapoetics presents 12 papers arranged under the four headings of the title which focus on the process of textile manufacture, the weaving process itself, and the materiality of fabric. Contributions adddress the problematic issues of cognitive archaeology, consumer research, literary theory and themes addressing both philosophical history and the history of reception of ideas and practice. The contributions seek both to close the critical gaps with respect to weaving, a broad and complex field in the area of ancient cultural techniques, and to identify new themes.
RRP: £38.00
North European Symposium for Archaeological Textiles X Cover
Format: Paperback
Pages: 328
ISBN: 9781785701566
Pub Date: 06 Jul 2015
Imprint: Oxbow Books
Illustrations: 299 illus, 31 tables
Description:
The NESAT symposium has grown from the first meeting in 1981 which was attended by 23 scholars, to over 100 at the tenth meeting that took place in Copenhagen in 2008, with virtually all areas of Europe represented. The 50 papers from the conference presented here show the vibrance of the study of archaeological textiles today. Examples studied come from the Bronze Age, Neolithic, the Iron Age, Roman, Viking, the Middle Ages and post-Medieval, and from a wide range of countries including Norway, Czech Republic, Poland, Greece, Germany, Lithuania, Estonia and the Netherlands.
Prehistoric, Ancient Near Eastern & Aegean Textiles and Dress Cover
Format: Hardback
Pages: 224
ISBN: 9781782977193
Pub Date: 08 Jan 2015
Imprint: Oxbow Books
Illustrations: b/w and colour illustrations
Description:
Textile and dress production, from raw materials to finished items, has had a significant impact on society from its earliest history. The essays in this volume offer a fresh insight into the emerging interdisciplinary research field of textile and dress studies by discussing archaeological, iconographical and textual evidence within a broad geographical and chronological spectrum. The thirteen chapters explore issues, such as the analysis of textile tools, especially spindle whorls, and textile imprints for reconstructing textile production in contexts as different as Neolithic Transylvania, the Early Bronze Age North Aegean and the Early Iron Age Eastern Mediterranean; the importance of cuneiform clay tablets as a documentary source for both drawing a detailed picture of the administration of a textile industry and for addressing gender issues, such as the construction of masculinity in the Sumerian kingdoms of the 3rd millennium BC; and discussions of royal and priestly costumes and clothing ornaments in the Mesopotamian kingdom of Mari and in Mycenaean culture.
Ancient Textiles Cover
Format: Paperback
Pages: 304
ISBN: 9781782978305
Pub Date: 30 Sep 2014
Imprint: Oxbow Books
Illustrations: b/w and col illus
Description:
An understanding of textiles and the role they played in the past is important for anyone interested in past societies. Textiles served and in fact still do as both functional and symbolic items. The evidence for ancient textiles in Europe is split quite definitely along a north-south divide, with an abundance of actual examples in the north, but precious little in the south, where indirect evidence comes from such things as vase painting and frescoes.
Fashionable Encounters Cover
Format: Hardback
Pages: 256
ISBN: 9781782973829
Pub Date: 30 May 2014
Imprint: Oxbow Books
Illustrations: Colour illustrated throughout
Description:
At the heart of this anthology lies the world of fashion: a concept that pervades the realm of clothes and dress; appearances and fashionable manners; interior design; ideas and attitudes. Here sixteen papers focus on the Nordic world (Denmark, Norway, Sweden Finland, Iceland, the Faroe Isles and Greenland) within the time frame AD 1500–1850. This was a period of rapid and far-reaching social, political and economic change, from feudal Europe through political revolution, industrialisation, development of international trade, religious upheaval and technological innovation; changes impacting on every aspect of life and reflected in equally rapid and widespread changes in fashion at all levels of society.
Silk for the Vikings Cover
Format: Paperback
Pages: 120
ISBN: 9781782972150
Pub Date: 23 Apr 2014
Imprint: Oxbow Books
Illustrations: b/w and col. illustrations
Description:
The analysis of silk is a fascinating topic for research in itself but here, focusing on the 9th and 10th centuries, Marianne Vedeler takes a closer look at the trade routes and the organization of production, trade and consumption of silk during the Viking Age. Beginning with a presentation of the silk finds in the Oseberg burial, the richest Viking burial find ever discovered, the other silk finds from high status graves in Scandinavia are discussed along with an introduction to the techniques used to produce raw silk and fabrics. Later chapters concentrate on trade and exchange, considering the role of silk items both as trade objects and precious gifts, and in the light of coin finds.