COMBING THE DATA: ASSESSING THE UTILITY OF ‘WEAVING’ COMBS IN THE TEXTILE PRODUCTION SEQUENCE

During the Glastonbury excavations in the early 20th century, Bulleid and Gray associated long-handled combs with weaving. Since then, the long-handled comb has been generally included as part of the weaving chaîne opératoire. The first attempt to understand the wear patterns on these combs occurred in 1871, however, it was not until the 1970s and 1980s that wear patterns were reassessed. Building on the collections of others, Tuohy’s (1999) published PhD thesis further examined wear patterns and proposed that they were primarily used for band weaving. The frequent association of weaving combs with other known textile production tools has embedded their place in the prehistoric textile toolkit for Britain. Although this association is generally agreed upon, their utility within the textile production sequenceillustrates a vague understanding in context. Typically, they are depicted most often in association with the warp-weighted loom, despite Tuohy’s proposition to the contrary. On the grounds of ethnographic analysis in conjunction with Tuohy’s wear analysis, this paper proposes an alternate way of viewing these combs. Tuohy, T. (1999) Prehistoric combs of antler and bone. British Archaeological Reports. Vol. 285.
Author(s): Beamer, Jennifer (University of Leicester)

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