civilization was lost through poor excavation methods.
Egypt was thought to be the only ancient land
to have preserved organic material such as cloth.
Modern excavation techniques on new sites
have revolutionized knowledge of textile production in the ancient Near and Middle East. FIBRES Flax was the commonest ancient plant fibre, though hemp, palm and papyrus were also used.
Seeds of domesticated flax found with
spindle whorls are indicative of textile activity in west Asia. They have been found in north Syria,c.6000 BC, in Samarra villages in north Iraq, c.5000 BC.
In Upper Egypt, c.5500 BC, flax seeds,
whorls, bone needles, cloth and matting were found.
Spindles of wood and looms have not
survived from these early times. The domestication of sheep, goats and dogs started in the uplands of north Iraq, c.9000 BC and in Iran, Palestine and Turkey from seventh to sixth millennia BC.
Sheep rearing became a major industry in
Samaria, c.3500 BC to 3000 BC by which time both hairy and woolly sheep were known.
Wool became Urs principal export, often
simultaneously with flax cultivation in mixed farming economies. Cotton, native to India, with a variety growing in Sudan is first documented, c.700 BC, where it is described as tree bearing wool.
Silk , was originally exclusive to
China, but the recent discovery of Bombyxmori silk thread in a German tribal chiefs grave dating from 6th century BC, puts back the silk trade by 4 centuries. DYES Although the ancient Egyptians, and later, the Jews preferred garments of white linen and wool, often for religious purposes, there is plentiful evidence that others did not.
They included those whom the
Egyptians described as Barbarians, Nubians and Libyans. In ancient Egypt, dyed textiles are rare, but Egyptians tiles and wall paintings depicting these foreigners survive.
Most famous is the painting of family
group of tribal Aamu at Beni Hassan tomb of the 12th dynasty who is wearing brightly striped garments , of wool.
Three of thirty-seven visiting Semitic
traders/artisans depicted full scale in the 19th century BCE tomb of an Egyptian baron, at Beni Hassan on the middle Nile. The clothes of the men, women and children in the group are woven on an upright loom and dyed in many colours.
Both the loom and the dyes were
unknown in Egypt at the time; the technologies were first introduced into Egypt by Semites four centuries later.
The principal dye plants and mordents
such as alum must have been known from early times. Leonard Woolley found traces of red garments at Ur from 2100 to 2000 BC, as the most celebrated dye.
The royal purple together with other
cheaper dyes, and dyed wool became the major trade goods of the Phoenicians.
Recent excavations on the Syrian and
Palestine coasts have exposed crushed murex shells, c.1450-1365 BC. THE EARLIEST TEXTILES The title of earliest textile has recently shifted from Egypt to Anatolia, with Egypt and Palestine as close contenders.
James Mallart's dig at the Neolithic
village in Southern Turkey, dating from the sixth millennium BC, exposed fine spun and plied thread, plain weave tabby cloths and garments. Some of them were showing darns, while others had been dyed with local dye plants.
Remains of sheep but none of flax led at
first to identification of fibres as wool or mohair, but this has been challenged by fibre tests also revealing flax.
A burial coach found at Gordion, in
ancient Phrygia, dated back to the late 8th century BC. It was covered by some twenty layers of linen and wool cloth, together with traces of tyrian purple cloth and fragments of hemp and mohair.
Widespread Israeli excavation has revealed
that this countrys deserts provide ideal conditions for the preservation of fibre.
Finds from Neolithic Hemal Cave dating
from, c.7160 to 6150 BC, include rope, netting, matting, spun and plied thread, chiefly flax, and tabby woven cloth, including blue dyed textile with shell and bead decoration. Arad, a town site of, c. 3500-2650 BC, yielded whorls, linen thread wrapped around tool handles, and pottery impressions of fine plain weave.
At the copper mine of Timna,
established by the Egyptians using local labour, c.1300 BC, rare fragments of a large tent shrine of thick red and yellow wool tabby were found. EARLY TRADE Archaeological evidence shows that trade was established as early as the Neolithic period in the seventh millennium BC.
Wool and cloth were important trade
goods in the East-West trade; Urs textile goods were exchanged for raw materials.
Ur also traded up-river to Babylon and
Mari in north Syria. War and territorial conquests were largely motivated by trade; the lucrative Phoenician trade in dyed wool relied on the wool of its hinterland, the profits from which were later shared by the Jewish kings.
Sheep and goats from Arabia, white wool
from Hebron and Egyptian linen were all marketed in Damascus.
These trade links were the foundation of
later Hellenistic and Roman trade around the Mediterranean. TERMINOLOGY EXTRACTION Organic - derived from, like, of the nature of. Near East - now generally describes the countries ofWestern Asiabetween theMediterranean SeaandIran. Middle East - is aregionthat encompasses southwesternAsiaandEgypt. Papyrus - is a thickpaper-likematerial produced from thepithof the papyrus plant,a wetlandsedgethat was once abundant in theNile DeltaofEgypt. Samarra a city in Iraq. Dead sea - is asalt lakeborderingJordan to the east, andIsraeland theWest Bankto the west. Bombyxmori - thesilkwormis thelarvaorcaterpillarof thedomesticated silk moth, Bombyxmori. TheNubians - are an ethnic group originally from northernSudan, and southern Egypt. Phoenicians - was an ancient civilization centered in the north of ancientCanaan, along the coastal regions of modern dayLebanon,Syria andIsrael. Murex sea snails. Neolithic new stone age. Arad city in ancient Israel. Timna an ancient city in Yemen. Babylon ancient Mesopotamia, now Iraq.