The Weaver’s Art

 

  The Weaver’s Art

Spinning and weaving were vital crafts in ancient Greece, especially for women, and made up a central and essential part of their daily lives. Women were expected to be highly skilled at these activities and learned how to accomplish them from an early age. There were practical family clothing benefits to spinning and weaving as well as economic ones, because textile production offered women an opportunity to generate income and wealth. There were few other such opportunities available to them. There was also a cultural aspect to textile manufacturing, as this activity was closely associated with femininity, religion, mythology and social expectations. Woven patterns could carry symbolic, religious and mythological meanings and thereby preserve the cultural narrative and reflect the values and the traditions of ancient Greek society.

Sheep were shorn, usually one a year, to collect the rough wool, and the raw fleece was cleaned by removing dirt, twigs and dung and then washed thoroughly to remove traces of sweat and oils. The wool was then spun into yarn using a spindle, which was a shaft weighted with a whorl made from clay, stone or metal. The wool was treated with a mordant or fixative like alum or iron to increase colour absorption and then plant and animal-based dyes were used to colour the wool into various colours and shades. Women used a vertical, warp-weighted loom with the vertical threads held taut by weights at the bottom. The horizontal threads (weft) were passed through the vertical (warp) and then pushed down into place with a beater or a comb, with more and more rows being added until the cloth was finished. Different coloured wools were used to create geometric and floral patterns or complex mythological scenes in the cloth. Slaves and servants most often did the preparatory work, while the women of the household did the actual weaving, often gathering together in the women’s quarters to weave and socialize, similar to a modern-day quilting-bee or sewing circle.

Both the Iliad and the Odyssey contain key references to weaving and the activity is presented by the bard as a central and symbolic act, most often associated with women. Homer uses the image of weaving to represent the peaceful world of women and contrasts this world sharply with the strife of warfare and chaos found in the world of men. Weaving is used as a powerful metaphor by Homer and we watch women weave narratives with their textiles, whereas men weave plots and strategies with their speeches and decisions. (But when they started to weave the fabric of their words and plans, then Menelaus spoke fluently to the assembly.) Odysseus, known for his cleverness, is the expert weaver of plots and schemes, while his wife Penelope uses her loom to weave her own deceptive and delaying scheme against the arrogant suitors.

In Book III of the Iliad we are introduced to Helen as she weaves a tapestry illustrating the Trojan War. The Bayeux Tapestry from the 1070’s CE, which depicts the Norman Conquest and the Battle of Hastings, is in the same tradition.

Disguised as her husband’s sister who was the wife of the son of Antenor, the goddess Iris went to white-armed Helen. She appeared as Laodice, wife of lord Helicaon the son of Antenor and the loveliest of the daughters of Priam. She found her in a large hall where she was toiling away weaving a great double-folded tapestry which featured the battles of the horse-taming Trojans and the bonze-clad Achaeans that on her behalf they had endured at the hands of Ares.

As Homer indicates, into the fabric she weaves images of the various struggles and hardships that both the Trojans and the Achaeans face and have endured for her sake. In her own way, Helen has become a bard and is weaving the narrative of the war in cloth instead of in song.

Near the end of the Iliad we find Andromache, the wife of Hector, sitting inside her home weaving a double-folded cloak and waiting for her husband to return from the battle.

Thus she spoke lamenting but the wife of Hector knew nothing of his demise for no true messenger had come to advise her that her husband was outside the gates. She was in the middle part of the house weaving a purple garment with a double fold and embroidering flowers on it of various colours.

The cloak that she is weaving has a dappled flower design and is meant as a love offering for Hector. This quiet and domestic act of weaving stands in direct contrast to the violence of the war being waged around her and predicts how her tranquility is about to be shattered by the news of the death of her husband. In her own way, Andromache weaves the story of peace as an alternative to strife and thereby, like Helen before her, takes on the role of epic narrator. The act of weaving is a powerful symbolic parallel to oral story-telling, and both Helen and Andromache weave their own experiences into tangible and visible narratives, as they engage in this very womanly act of self-reflection.

In the Odyssey, the enchantress Circe is presented as singing beautifully and working on a large loom in her palace when the crew members first approach her house.

They stood in the entrance of the house of the goddess with the beautiful locks and from within they heard Circe singing with a lovely voice as she went back and forth at her great immortal loom creating a web of shimmering glory such as only a goddess could create.

Circe’s weaving is a symbol of the enchanting power that she possesses, much like her singing and her dangerous potions. She has great skill and is a powerful goddess, though she uses her power for evil purposes. Odysseus is only able to overcome her power by using an antidote provided to him by a god, but Circe is able to weave a tale of seduction and manage to keep the hero on her island and in her bed for a year.

When he came to Ogygia and the home of the nymph Calypso, Odysseus found her singing with a sweet voice and moving back and forth in front of her loom with a golden shuttle.

But when he had reached the far away island, he came from the violet sea to the land and went to the great cave where the fair-haired nymph lived and he found her there. A great fire was kindling in the fireplace and over the island lay the smell of cut cedar and juniper as they burned. She was inside the cave singing with a sweet voice as she worked back and forth at the loom with a golden shuttle.

Like Circe, Calypso was an enchanting seductress and she managed to enthrall Odysseus to the point that he spent seven years in her company. She used her craft and her skill to make him forget his desire to return to his home and his wife. Finally she was convinced by the gods to allow him to leave her island and presented him with a cloth that she had woven to use as a sail for the boat that he constructed in her woodlands.

But the master weaver of both epics is surely Penelope, the wife of Odysseus. The faithful wife of the hero used weaving to hold off the suitors and to bide time until the return of Odysseus to Ithaca. She had promised to choose one of them as a bridegroom once she had completed the task of weaving a burial shroud for her father-in-law Laertes. For three years she managed to lead them on and gain time by weaving the burial shroud during the day and then unraveling her work by night. Her cunning deception allows her to stall the suitors and protect her home and is seen as a symbol of her faithfulness and a demonstration of her loyalty to Odysseus. Her trick was uncovered by a disloyal maid and she was forced to complete the work on the shroud.

In a male-dominated world, Penelope’s weaving represents her intelligence and loyalty and a craftiness, equal to that displayed by her husband, the man of many wiles. By controlling her work weaving on the loom, she takes control of her own fate and asserts her will against those who oppose her. Like her husband, Penelope is able to weave her own plots and schemes and with this feminine domestic craft, is able to put herself on the same footing as a man and in doing so, achieves equality. All of the epics’ weavers, Helen, Andromache, Circe, Calypso and Penelope, find a voice through weaving in a culture where women had little public presence.