© Michael C. Carlos Museum, Emory University

ClassificationsAncient Near Eastern Art

Spindle Whorl

Place ExcavatedJericho, Palestine, Asia

PeriodIntermediate Early Bronze Age - Middle Bronze Age

Date2300-2000 BCE

MediumStone

Credit LineJericho Excavations, 1952-1958

Dimensions3/8 x 1 7/16 in. (0.9 x 3.7 cm)

Object number1958.018

Label TextEvidence for the textile industry in ancient Jericho is recorded by badly preserved textile fragments and various tools and accessories which have survived. It is presumed that, at various times, the people of Jericho used plant fibers from palm trees, flax, and possibly animal hair fibers to weave and sew clothing. Draped robes and kilts made of a plain weave were attached by toggle pins and worn along with rarer tunics that were cut and sewn into shape.

Analogies with the textile industry in Egypt suggest that the process of making textiles at Jericho probably consisted of three steps. Fibers were prepared by being soaked, beaten, and combed out or hackled. The fibers were then ready for spinning where they were then drawn on a spindle and twisted to produce yarn. As early as the Pottery Neolithic Period at Jericho (ca. 5500-4000 B.C.), wooden spindles weighted with a whorl made of wood or stone were commonly used. After spinning, the yarn was warped on the loom. Because very few loom weights have been found in the Bronze Age levels (1800-1550 B.C.), it is possible that a horizontal loom was used.

Little is known about the tools involved in the weaving process at Jericho except that they were used in other industries. Awls, for example, were likely to have been used to press down the weft in the course of the weaving when no comb was available, or to pick up threads of the weft to make designs.
Exhibition HistoryMCCM Permanent Collection Galleries, May 11, 1993 - Spring 2001
Published ReferencesKathleen Kenyon, Excavations at Jericho II (London: British School of Archaeology in Jerusalem, 1965), 107, figure 38.7.

ProvenanceExcavated by Kathleen Kenyon (1906-1978), Jericho, Palestine.

Status

Not on view

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