It's the middle of a week! And a shorter one at that - time for some links!

Jane Austen's novel "Emma" has its 200 year anniversary this year, and there's an exhibition about it at Chawton House Library, Hampshire, UK. The exhibition will run until September 25, 2016, so if you want to see it, there's still plenty of time left to plan a trip. If you like textiles (which you probably do, since you are reading this blog), it gets even better: part of the exhibition features contemporary embroideries, inspired by patterns from Austen's time. This part is called Stitch-Off, and you can read more about it here. If you're curious about the patterns used, you can find them here, and if your fingers are itching, it's still possible to join in on the project.

Totally unrelated, but rather funny: the UK is building a new polar research ship and they have invited the public to suggest names for their vessel - with interesting results. The leading suggestion is Boaty McBoatface. (The Council responsible was smart, though, as they are only inviting suggestions - they'll be free to pick whatever name they like best in the end.)

 

Textile terminology, as many of you will probably know, can be a never-ending headache. Especially when you are looking at texts in a foreign language. Consequently, there have been a few attempts at making glossaries or catalogues; sometimes, there is a small multi-language glossary or dictionary in the appendix to a book or article. Burnham's "Warp and Weft" also states the terms for different weaves in several languages.

However, there's a whole book with textile terminology that I had never heard about before: “Nordisk textilteknisk terminologi- Förindustriell vävnadsproduktion”, written by  Elisabeth Strömberg, Agnes Geijer, Margrethe Hald and Martha Hoffman and published in 1967. The title of the book translates to “Nordic textile technical terminology - pre-industrial fabric  production”. The book consists of Swedish term definitions, with synonyms in Danish, Icelandic, Norwegian, Finnish, English, French and German. The edition was revised by Geijer and Hoffmann in 1979. The Icelandic and Finnish terms were compiled by Elsa E. Guðjónsson.

So there's a whole book out there - and it gets even better. Amica and Maria from historicaltextiles.org have brought together KulturNav, a website where museums and other organisations can have shared lists of things hosted; the Textile Museum in Borås, who agreed to manage the dataset from the book, and friendly help from fellow nerds to convert the whole book into a database.

And now it's done - the Terminology is online and available, for free, via KulturNav. You can find the whole back story, and some instructions on how to use the database, on the Historical Textiles blog, including instructions on how to contribute should you find something is missing, or would like to suggest a change.

This is a wonderful thing - and my thanks to everybody involved who made this possible!

Gillian, my partner-in-Beastly-crime, has a new book coming up. It's her latest academic work, published by Peter Lang, titled "History and Fiction. Writers, their Research, Worlds and Stories".

The book looks at how writers understand and use history in their fiction, including world building. It focusses on genre fiction, so if you've always been wondering how history might influence science fiction novels... here's a book for you.

I'm all excited for her, and I especially like how the cover turned out...



...because I had a hand in it. As in I made the photo. And the Most Patient Husband of Them All also had a hand in it, even more literally, as it is his hand you can see doing the colouring. Which means he got to be a cover model, though he never planned on it!

It's Friday again, the sun is shining, and I am in dire need of some coffee (which I will make as soon as this blogpost is done). So - Friday links for you!

First of all, there's a nice post by Juliet McKenna about embroidery, and what the "richly embroidered wall-hangings" in a fantasy novel (or in a medieval source, of course) actually mean in terms of time spent (and thus in terms of wealth).

Twitter has changed its display style from chronological to an algorithm a bit similar to the Facebook one - you are now getting tweets first in line that the algo thinks you'd be more interested in. Here's a longer post about it - but if you just want to go back to how Twitter was before, go into the "settings" menu and uncheck the appropriate box.

Internet memes change our language - for instance, turning nouns into verbs (let me google that for you) has become quite common. JSTOR Daily has an article about this phenomenon here.

The British Library has an Anglo-Saxon manuscript digitisation project running, and the latest addition is the 11th-12th century MS Cotton Vespasian A XIV, which contains the letter book of Archbishop Wulfstan.

Medieval Histories has a short article about 13th-century knitted mittens from Estonia (where else?).

And that's it for this week. Have a sunny weekend!

As an archaeologist, I get itchy when I see any original finds on sale anywhere. Itchy, and sometimes also a little bit angry, and always a good bit sad. Removing finds, taking them out of the soil, destroys irrevocally some knowledge that we could have gained about an area, a find spot, a development. This can be true even if they were stray finds that turn up on top of a field that had been ploughed.

Selling original artefacts supports the market for original artefacts. It does not matter where they come from, and it does not matter whether they are expensive or cheap, stray finds or not - everyone that buys or sells artefacts strengthens the market, and the stronger the market is, the more attention it gets, the more treasure hunters will go and try to find (and sell) stuff.

This destroys archaeological sites. It can even destroy more - such as this Roman bridge in Bulgaria that collapsed due to treasure hunters trying to find a gold treasure supposedly buried at or near the bridge.

I am out of words about this. Our world is one Roman bridge poorer because some people know no boundaries in their greed for treasure. Sometimes, I have a hard time to believe in humanity.

A while ago (a good while!), I posted a link to the petition against the closure of the Musee des Tissus in Lyon, France. (If you haven't signed yet, you can still do so!)

It looked rather bleak for a while, but as far as my French is reliable, it now finally looks as if there is a bit of hope for the museum to stay open. (Link to the French news about the petition by Daniel Fruman.)

Let me try to give you the gist of the text linked above: There was a meeting on March 8, and it was clear that without financial engagement of the Lyon, the museum would have to close. Fourty-eight hours later, a temporary solution has been found that will keep the museum open to the end of this year - so there's at least some more time to find a permanent solution, and permanent financing.

A second positive thing: More than 100 000 people have signed the petition until now, showing very, very clearly that there is great interest in the museum, and that many people want it to stay open. Some of those who signed are rather well-known, such as Placido Domingo, who also sent a letter to the ministry in support of the museum.

The long-term fate of the museum, however, is still unclear. Closure is still very much possible, and to avoid that, the parties concerned - the state, the region, the village - have to find an agreement within the next nine months.

There is some hope that the museum will stay open. If you haven't signed the petition yet, you can help by signing - and, as always, sharing.

Well, it's not exactly monsters that are munching all the time... but there are a few things afoot right now that do. One of them, due this morning: another update of the webshop, followed by a few necessary tweaks. There's some more coming up, as I will finally get the fix (it's on its way) for an issue-free login possibility with email address instead of the username (that nobody remembers anyway).

There's some other stuff going on behind the scenes - more prep work for events later in the year. Taking care of some insurance stuff for my one-woman company. Organising things to prepare for the Great Tax Filing of 2016 (as every year). Plus, we're having my parents over for a few days at the moment, so some family time tends to creep in - no wonder the time wooshes by faster than I can say "wow, it's afternoon already".

Also? It has snowed again today. Huge big flakes. Just when I thought we're finally going for spring... oh well.