[Sca-cooks] flax processing
Stefan li Rous
StefanliRous at austin.rr.com
Wed Nov 21 23:03:39 PST 2007
Selene replied to Bear, who was replying to my inquiry:
<<<
Terry Decker wrote:
> The first laurel in Calontir (I can't remember his name, but Margaret
> probably does) grew, retted, cleaned, and spun the flax, wove it
> into linen,
> then tailored it into garb, making his own scissors and needles in
the
> process. One of his neighbors turned him into the cops for
> manufacturing
> drugs, IIRC, during the rather smelly retting of the flax. I
> believe he
> documented the project.
>
> Bear
Aye, well if he didn't, surely the police did. <grin> The problem is,
unlike wool, which comes off the sheep in more-or-less usable form, flax
takes weeks to "rett" or ferment in a pool so everything that's not
usable fiber drops away. It can't really be done as a one-day project.
Maybe starting with pre-retted, dried tows.
Selene >>>
Well, my original inquiry was to find someone who might have made
some flax themselves, so that I might be able to get a first-hand
article on doing such a thing for the Florilegium. Whether they did
or did not do all the other steps from flax to finished cloth isn't
the point, although they might make good stories/articles themselves.
Unfortunately, I still haven't found anyone to write an article on
turning flax into fibers based on their own experiences.
However, if the police did get interested in such a project, I'd
still be interested in hearing the details, hopefully first-hand,
because that sounds like it would make an interesting story for my
SCA-STORIES section.
Stefan
--------
THLord Stefan li Rous Barony of Bryn Gwlad Kingdom of Ansteorra
Mark S. Harris Austin, Texas
StefanliRous at austin.rr.com
**** See Stefan's Florilegium files at: http://www.florilegium.org ****
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