Tapestry

From Metapedia

Tapestry The Gr. Tarns and Lat. tapesium, from which our word " tapestry " is descended, implied a covering to both furniture and floors, as well as curtains or wall hangings, and neither of them really defines the particular way in which such articles were made. The decorations on these Greek and FIG. I. - Gobelins high-warp tapestry frame, with weaver (18th century), holding in right hand (a) bobbin with weft thread wound round its thick end, and with his left hand taking (e) some of the lisses or strings with a loop at one end of each of them, through which a warp thread is passed, and thus pulling forward those warp threads in between which he will pass his weft. mm is the tapestry he has woven, which has been wound round (p) the cylinder. The other letters in this diagram relate to details in the frame which are of subsidiary interest. The description of them would not further elucidate the act of weaving which is here in question.

Roman coverings were effected by painting, printing, embroidery, or a method of weaving with coloured threads; and specimens and other conclusive evidence show that early Egyptians, Babylonians, Chinese, Indians, Greeks and Romans employed some at least of the means above-named.

The purpose of this article is to give some account of those decorated stuffs which are produced by weaving coloured threads on to warp threads in a manner that differs from shuttle-weaving, and at the present day is. called tapestry-weaving, such for instance as is practised at the famous Gobelins and Beauvais tapestry manufactories in France. At the Gobelins, the warp threads are stretched in frames standing vertically (high warp or haute lisse) : at Beauvais in frames placed horizontally with the ground (low warp or basse lisse). - In the one case the worker sits up to his work, in the other he bends over it. In each he is supplied with the design according to which he weaves, and notwithstanding the varied positions the method of weaving is the same. The thread-supply of each separate colour required in the design is wound upon its appointed peg or bobbin, which is a simpler implement or tool than a loom weaver's shuttle. Fig. i shows a Gobelins high-warp tapestry weaver of the i 8th century at work. With his left hand he is pulling above his head a few of the looped strings (lices or lisses) through which the warp threads (chaine) pass, so as to bring forward the particular warp threads, in between and around which he has to place the weft threads of the selected colour. In fig. 2 the workman's left hand pulls forward groups of warp threads upon the lower part of which the weaving has been finished; and with a comb-like implement in his right hand he presses down and compacts the weaving. In the story of the competition between Minerva and Arachne (Metamorphoses, vi. 55-69), Ovid appears to be describing this very process, and a great number of specimens of 2nd to 5th century EgyptoRoman workmanship corroborate the presumption of its existence in Ovid's time. The absence of evidence to show that loom and shuttle weaving was capable at that period of producing elaborate figured fabrics is remarkable, and supports the probability that the tapestry-weaving process was that FIG. 2. - Gobelins tapestry-weaving, showing (a) the left hand of the weaver pulling forward (c) a group of warp threads, into which with (b) the comb in his right hand he is compressing at point (d) the weft threads which have been passed around and in between the warp threads; (e) are various bobbins, hanging at rest, suspended by their weft threads; and (f) is the tapestry as woven and compressed.

commonly known and practised for most if not all woven decoration and ornament. It was certainly as freely used for costumes as for hangings, couch and cushion covers and the like (see Carpet). The frames in which the work was done varied according to size from small and easily handled ones to large and substantially constructed frames. As mentioned in the article Embroidery, ornament of tapestry-weaving occurs in a fragment of Egyptian work 1450 B.C., and Greeks in the 3rd or 4th century B.C. also worked in this method, as is demonstrated by specimens, now in the Hermitage at St Petersburg, which were found in the tomb of the Seven Brothers at Temriouck, formerly a Greek settlement in the province of Kouban on the northeastern shore of the Black Sea.' The simplicity of the process is so obvious that it is found to be widely employed in expressing a variety of primitive textile decoration of which pieces from Borneo, Central Asia, Tibet, the Red Indians of America, and the ancient inhabitants of Peru 2 (see fig. to) are to be seen in museums.