The Valkyries’ Loom
The Archaeology of Cloth Production and Female Power in the North Atlantic, by Michele Hayeur Smith
Cathy Koos
Thoroughly researched and well-written in the style of Elizabeth Wayland Barber of Women’s Work, Michele Hayeur Smith carefully examines early Viking textiles. Women’s occupations tend to be briefly documented, if at all. Smith studies textile material culture to better inform the reader of women’s vital contributions to the medieval and early modern North Atlantic world.
Smith’s analysis ranges all over the North Atlantic from Norway, the Faroe Islands, the Northern Isles over to Iceland and Greenland and into the L’Anse aux Meadows of North America in a time span from ca 800 CE to 1000 CE.
Cloth did not just provide clothing but also sails and was even used as currency. Cloth exporting further contributed to its value as a commodity. The Danish trade monopoly further elevated women’s roles.
While Smith focuses primarily on everyday homespun wool cloth, she also surveys the primary tools employed, including the warp-weighted loom for weaving and drop spindles for spinning. We learn that the drop spindle was later replaced by the high-top whorl.
Smith is an archaeologist and research associate at the Haffenreffer Museum of Anthropology at Brown University. The Valkyries’ Loom is published by the University of Florida Press and is available online at http://upress.ufl.edu or through Amazon, ISBN 987-0-8130-8011-6, $26.95