Category: Seo nydþearf feala læreð (Necessity teaches many things)
Entrant: Trudy of Essex
Title: The apron dress from Køstrup (Grave ACQ)
I needed to make this dress in order to display my tablet-woven band.
The grave in Køstrup Fyn in Denmark was excavated in 1980-81. Grave ACQ had preserved fragments of textile, a small casket with ironwork and a lock, two tortoise brooches, six glass beads, two quartz beads, an iron knife with sheath and an iron key.
The brooches style indicated a date between 850-1000. The black bead dated by Indblom (1993) to 960-990, placing the grave in the 10th century. It was later reclassified as 850-860 (Delvaux).
The woolen tabby-woven material fragments in the grave had 26/10 (warp/weft) threads per cm and had been dyed blue. There was a section of smokkr pleated with tiny pleats 2-3mm deep and 3mm wide. It’s uncertain how far down it goes, so I just did the front section.
The straps had loops that were made of woolen fabric and a piece of waste linen. The front and back loops were held together by brooches at the front.
Decoration. A tablet woven band was made using two-hole tablet technique (LINK TO OTHER ENTRY HERE).
Beads. Eight beads were found. Six glass and two quartz. I had the glass beads made by Amokura Glass, Rotorua.
Unusually, the woven band was not connected to the smokkr, but wrapped around the loops above the smokkr, and the beads were on a thread, perhaps above the weaving. Placement was determined by remnants of fabric on the brooches.
I based my reconstruction of the underdress on a pattern from Alicja Mega (Hrafna Norse Crafts).
