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wild silk 1000 years before Celtic context - richsc - 11-28-2009
Got this from a Minoan costume research article, almost in passing:
Quote:Less likely, although possible,
are silk and cotton. According to Kenoyer, Indus cities
cultivated cotton, produced cotton cloth, and traded
with the Mesopotamian cities of Susa and Ur during
the Harappan civilization, ca. 2600–1900 B.C.E.48 Panagiotakopulu
noted that a wild silk cocoon was discovered
in Akrotiri, and there is evidence that cotton
cloth was woven in the Indus Valley at Mohenjo-Daro
in the early second millennium and that cotton was
cultivated in Egypt ca. 2500 B.C.E.; therefore, both
cotton and silk may have been imported to Akrotiri.49
"New Reconstructions of the “Mykenaia” and a
Seated Woman from Mycenae"
BERNICE R. JONES
This puts silk in the Mediterranean 1500 years before the Principate.
Re: wild silk 1000 years before Celtic context - PMBardunias - 01-06-2010
Quote:This puts silk in the Mediterranean 1500 years before the Principate.
There are "wild" silk cocoons in your back yard, for moths and many other insects use silk to spin cocoons. Some cultures use this wild silk and other sources such as spider silk, but this is a far cry from an industry. Do you know if there is any reason they believe it to be imported? Maybe it is intact enough to tell something about the species that spun it.
Re: wild silk 1000 years before Celtic context - Dan Howard - 01-06-2010
A single wild silk cocoon is far more likely to be a straying caterpillar than evidence for a proto silk industry.
Re: wild silk 1000 years before Celtic context - Eleatic Guest - 01-12-2010
Quote: Some cultures use this wild silk and other sources such as spider silk, but this is a far cry from an industry.
Reminds of the case of wine where collecting wild grapes also preceded viniculture by centuries, if not millenia. What counts is the mass production of the product (within the technical limits of the ancient economy).