Textile Production in Pre-Roman Italy

Older than both ceramics and metallurgy, textile technology reveals much about prehistoric social and economic development. Textile production has always been a fundamental part of economy and exchange and was practiced on all levels of society. This work examines evidence for textile production in Italy, focusing primarily on the period from the transition between the Bronze Age and Early Iron Age until the Roman expansion (1000–400 BCE). The period from the 10th to the 6th century BCE is deemed particularly important as it witnesses the shift from small villages of mostly egalitarian type to large urban centred with social stratification, specialised crafts, more intensified and organised production and commercial exchange throughout and beyond the Italic sphere. Based largely on the surviving textiles and tools associated with textile production, this volume sets the stage for future studies of textile production in ancient Italy and Mediterranean. It will be of great interest, not only to textile specialists and archaeologists working on pre-Roman sites in Italy, but also to excavators of this frequently overlooked class of archaeological evidence, and lead towards a better understanding of ancient textile technology and broader issues associated with it.