The eighth week of the quarter continued to be filled with more spinning. I figured out this week that I could connect my headphones to my phone and therefore free my hands during phone calls. I wrote previously that I felt somewhat lonely while spinning, and remembering that headphones exist has helped to assuage that loneliness. I also realized that I can easily spin and participate in roleplaying sessions with my Dungeons and Dragons group at the same time. It’s not quite the same as the old days when groups of women gathered to spin together, but it’s close enough.
It felt like it was taking forever to fill up the bobbin on my spinning wheel. I could see the progression, the yarn slowly winding up on itself layer by layer, but hours and hours of spinning have passed and the bobbin still had room on it. I’m used to the spindles I work with, which usually max out at around two or so ounces of wool, while the bobbins that my wheel uses hold a little more than four ounces.
I continued to read Ariadne‘s Threads, though I do think it is, again, another book that the most useful part for me is the bibliography. The clothing it focuses on doesn’t include the chiton nor do Minoan garments seem to be predecessors to Archaic and Classical Greek clothing; throughout the book, the author provides a strong argument that Minoan clothing was actually cut and sewn, even if it was a minimal amount. Ancient Greek clothing was not made up of cut and sewn garments, but usually composed of rectangular pieces of fabric nearly straight off the loom, arranged on the body and held together with belts, girdles, pins, etc.
I also started reading more in depth Body, Dress, and Identity in Ancient Greece by Mireille M. Lee. I’ve actually had this book checked out from the library for a while, even before the quarter started. I was interested in the subject in general, but I had only skimmed through the book until now. I jumped to the “Garments” chapter and the author made a very good point I hadn’t considered before: when studying the dress of a culture, it’s limiting to only look at garments. We disregard the overall appearance – what about accessories, cosmetics, how is the garment worn, who is wearing it, etc – and therefore we don’t take into account the relationship between the body and dress. Also, the study of dress becomes difficult when no garments survive, as is the case with ancient Greece. Researchers are left with vase paintings and sculptures, which can be problematic in that we do not know how representative of lived reality they are depicting .