4 Medieval Islamic Textile Tools, Spindle Whorls and Bead

Near East, Islamic Medieval era. A group of three spindle whorls, and a pottery bead. Two of pale limestone, domed above and flat below, the flat faces incised with petaloid motifs and stylized birds, the sides cut with looping arcs. A third, carved from bone, low and domed with a ring of compass-drawn ring-and-dot motifs around the perforation. The bead, in coarse buff earthenware, is near spherical with faint incised ribs and circular motifs. Spinning was the most widely distributed manufacturing activity in the medieval Islamic world, and the whorl is its most durable survivor. Textile production drove the economies of Fustat, Nishapur, and Rayy, and excavation at each has yielded whorls by the hundreds, in limestone, steatite, bone, glass, and reused potsherds. Weight, not material, was the functional variable: a heavier whorl produced a thicker, more tightly plied yarn, a lighter one the fine thread required for muslin and gauze. Because whorls were personal, and made at home as often as in a workshop, their decoration is unusually free, and the incised arcs and ring-and-dot roundels seen here belong to a repertoire that changed remarkably little between Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages. Item # 204588

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