Overview

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. Both could boast of specialists in textile production. Together with their wine, oil, and art, Minoan and Mycenaean textiles were much desired as trade goods. Artistic images of their fabrics preserved both in the Aegean and in other parts of the Mediterranean show elaborate patterns woven with rich decorative detail and colour. Only a few small scraps of textiles survive but evidence for their production is abundant and frescoes supply detailed information about a wide variety of now-lost textile goods from luxurious costumes and beautifully patterned wall hangings and carpets, to more utilitarian decorated fabrics. A review of surviving artistic and archaeological evidence indicates that textiles played essential practical and social roles in both Minoan and Mycenaean societies.

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9781785700583

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Reviews

The core idea-and it is a very good one-is to investigate how the elaborate patterned textiles that appear in Minoan and related artistic traditions might have been produced. This volume provides a convincing body of evidence and scholarship to demonstrate that almost all of them could have been made with the tools available to Bronze Age weavers, particularly in the setting of palatial workshops... Scholars of the later Bronze Age Aegean will find this a useful volume. * Antiquity * To the great virtues of this publication, beyond its rich informative content, counts the excellent quality of the edition including many colour photographs presenting the pictorial evidence in much detail. * Journal of Greek Archaeology *

The core idea-and it is a very good one-is to investigate how the elaborate patterned textiles that appear in Minoan and related artistic traditions might have been produced. This volume provides a convincing body of evidence and scholarship to demonstrate that almost all of them could have been made with the tools available to Bronze Age weavers, particularly in the setting of palatial workshops... Scholars of the later Bronze Age Aegean will find this a useful volume. -- Lin Foxhall * Antiquity *

The core idea-and it is a very good one-is to investigate how the elaborate patterned textiles that appear in Minoan and related artistic traditions might have been produced. This volume provides a convincing body of evidence and scholarship to demonstrate that almost all of them could have been made with the tools available to Bronze Age weavers, particularly in the setting of palatial workshops... Scholars of the later Bronze Age Aegean will find this a useful volume. * Antiquity *

Author Information

Maria Shaw was formerly Professor at the University of Toronto where she taught for more than 30 years until retirement. She specialises in many aspects of Minoan Crete and Greek archaeology in the Aegean area, is a leading expert on Minoan and Mycenaean wall painting and has intesets raging from Aegean-Egyptian interconnections to representations of natural landscapes in Aegean frescoes to the reconstruction of civic life in Crete. Anne. P. Chapin is Professor of art history and Archaeology at Brevard College, North Carolina where she specialises in the field of Bronze Age Aegean painting, particularly Minoan and Mycenaean and is actively involved in field research and excavation at Gournia, an important Minoan palace and town site on Crete.

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