From Paleolithic flax to 3D knitting, explore the global history of textiles and the world they weave together in this enthralling and educational guide. The story of humanity is the story of textiles -- as old as civilization itself. Since the first thread was spun, the need for textiles has driven technology, business, politics, and culture. In The Fabric of Civilization, Virginia Postrel synthesizes groundbreaking research from archaeology, economics, and science to reveal a surprising history. From Minoans exporting wool colored with precious purple dye to Egypt, to Romans arrayed in costly Chinese silk, the cloth trade paved the crossroads of the ancient world. Textiles funded the Renaissance and the Mughal Empire; they gave us banks and bookkeeping, Michelangelo's David and the Taj Mahal. The cloth business spread the alphabet and arithmetic, propelled chemical research, and taught people to think in binary code. Assiduously researched and deftly narrated, The Fabric of Civilization tells the story of the world's most influential commodity.

A magnificent work of original research that unravels history through textiles and cloth—how we make it, use it, and what it means to us. How is a handmade fabric helping save an ancient forest? Why is a famous fabric pattern from India best known by the name of a Scottish town? How is a Chinese dragon robe a diagram of the whole universe? What is the difference between how the Greek Fates and the Viking Norns used threads to tell our destiny? In Fabric, bestselling author Victoria Finlay spins us round the globe, weaving stories of our relationship with cloth and asking how and why people through the ages have made it, worn it, invented it, and made symbols out of it. And sometimes why they have fought for it. She beats the inner bark of trees into cloth in Papua New Guinea, fails to handspin cotton in Guatemala, visits tweed weavers at their homes in Harris, and has lessons in patchwork-making in Gee's Bend, Alabama - where in the 1930s, deprived of almost everything they owned, a community of women turned quilting into an art form. She began her research just after the deaths of both her parents —and entwined in the threads she found her personal story too. Fabric is not just a material history of our world, but Finlay's own journey through grief and recovery.

The colour and shade of dyed textiles were once as much an indicator of social class or position as the fabric itself and for centuries the recipes used by dyers were closely guarded secrets. The arrival of synthetic dyestuffs in the middle of the nineteenth century opened up a whole rainbow of options and within 50 years modern dyes had completely overturned the dyeing industry. From pre-history to the current day, the story of dyed textiles in Western Europe brings together the worlds of politics, money, the church, law, taxation, international trade and exploration, fashion, serendipity and science. This book is an introduction to a broad, diverse and fascinating subject of how and why people coloured textiles. A fresh review of this topic, this book brings previous scholars' work to light, alongside new discoveries and research.

Excerpt from The Story of Textiles: A Bird's-Eye View of the History, of the Beginning and the Growth of the Industry, by Which Mankind Is Clothed As clothing has from time immemorial been one of man's necessities and almost as essential to his welfare as food, it is not surprising that the textile industry has long in value of output been second only to the production of foodstuffs. Important, however, as the industry is, its history, so far as the writer knows, has never, at least in America, been published. Aside from its importance the industry possesses much of interest not only for the student, but also for the man of affairs. Different branches of the industry, such as wool, silk, cotton, and linen, have been treated separately, but nothing has been written about the origin and growth of the industry as a whole. This book, of which some explanation is necessary, is an effort to fill this gap. Although a complete history of the industry has not been the aim of the writer nor the desire of the publisher, the purpose has been to present to those interested in the textile industry a bird's-eye view of the leading facts which have marked the progress of the industry up to the firm establishment of the manufacture of textiles on American soil, together with such intervening facts as are necessary to give one a comprehensive view of the subject. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

Excerpt from The Story of Textiles: A Bird's-Eye View of the History, of the Beginning and the Growth of the Industry, by Which Mankind Is Clothed As clothing has from time immemorial been one of man's necessities and almost as essential to his Welfare as food, it is not surprising that the textile industry has long in value of output been second only to the production of food stuffs. Important, however, as the industry is, its history, so far as the writer knows, has never, at least in America, been published. Aside from its importance the industry possesses much of interest not only for the student, but also for the man of affairs. Different branches of the industry, such as wool, silk, cotton, and linen, have been treated separately, but nothing has been written about the origin and growth of the industry as a Whole. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

This collection of essays examines the history of cotton textiles at a global level over the period 1200-1850. It provides new answers to two questions: what is it about cotton that made it the paradigmatic first global commodity? And second, why did cotton industries in different parts of the world follow different paths of development?