- chapter 42: The world of Etruscan textiles –
and other utilitarian textiles are frequently represented in Etruscan tomb paintings.^5 A
rather unique use of textiles in Etruria was for books, the libri lintei, which were made of
linen and used for recording religious rituals. Fragments of one such book, the so-called
“Zagreb mummy wrappings,” were preserved in Egypt.^6 Another important utilitarian
use of textile fi bers was for sails and ship rigging. Etruscans were well known throughout
the Mediterranean as sailors and – according to their enemies – notorious as pirates. Their
ship-building technology was among the most sophisticated of their era, including the
use of the earliest foresail.^7 The production of this multitude of textiles used on a daily
basis by the Etruscans required considerable skills, resources, organization and planning.
TEXTILE FIBERSThe creation of a textile involves raw material acquisition and preparation, spinning,
weaving, dyeing and fi nishing. Since resources for making textiles include plant
and animal products used for fi bers and dyes, textile production is closely linked to
agriculture (e.g. fl ax cultivation), animal husbandry (e.g. sheep farming) and exploitation
of environmental resources (e.g. fi bers from nettle and tree bast, wild dye plants such as
woad and madder and minerals for mordants used in dyeing such as alum).
Fiber is a basic unit of raw material having suitable length, pliability and strength for
conversion into yarns and fabrics. In Etruria, two basic fi ber groups, divided on the basis
of their origin into plant and animal, were used in textile manufacture. Plant fi bers were
derived from the bast of linen, hemp, nettle, esparto and from trees such as linden, oak
and willow. Cotton arrived in Europe only during the Roman period. The major animal
fi ber of antiquity was sheep’s wool, with occasional use of goat hair. The other important
animal fi ber, silk, did not come into use in Italy until Roman times. Asbestos, an unusual
mineral textile fi ber derived from a mineral amphibole was used for special fabrics such as
funeral shrouds due to its unique quality of withstanding extremely high temperatures.^8
The most sumptuous textiles incorporated gold thread.^9
The most common fi bers, fl ax and wool, were obtained from cultivated plants and
domesticated animals, cultivation and husbandry of which in itself required expenditure
of signifi cant resources: land, labor and time. Additional time and effort went into the
preparation of fi bers for textile production. Wool had to be removed from sheep, sorted into
various qualities and combed to prepare it for spinning. Flax had to be harvested, retted
in standing water or dew, and then processed to remove the unwanted parts of the plant.
Once procured and prepared, the fi ber mass could be spun into yarn, which in turn was
woven into cloth. Several Etruscan iconographic documents illustrate these production
stages of textile manufacture, underlining the economic and social importance of the
craft for the Etruscan society. Spinning and weaving women are carved on the wooden
throne found in Tomb 89 at Verucchio, dated circa 700 bce (Fig. 42.1).^10 A bronze
rattle or tintinnabulum found in Tomb 5 of Bologna’s Arsenale Militare necropolis, dated
circa 600 bce (Fig. 42.2) illustrates the processes of dressing the distaffs, spinning,
preparation of the warp and, fi nally, weaving on an unusual two-storied warp-weighted
loom.^11 Both of these iconographic documents indicate that various textile production
stages are associated with particular tools. Unlike the textiles themselves, many textile
implements are ubiquitous on Etruscan archaeological sites. This great number of
implements associated with textile manufacture can be used to study the craft and its
technological and economic aspects.