Spokespersons:

Annette Paetz gen. Schieck annette.schieck@cez-archaeometrie.de

Sylvia Mitschke sylvia.mitschke@mannheim.de

Investigations of this group focus on aspects of quality in Roman textile production. Therein, for example, series of systematic analyses of the fibres used in the Roman Empire will be carried out. Fibre analyses reveal typical traits of fibre degradation caused by different preservation conditions. They also detect, for instance, the effects of animal domestication from antiquity to presence, the range of quality due to summer and winter coat, and their dependency on the animal’s topography.
In order to trace these characteristic traits, three types of microscopes are applied: Observations are carried out with the two conventional methods of observation as the transmitted light and reflected light microscopy. Additionally, an atmospheric scanning electron microscope is employed which allows a non-destructive investigation of the objects and enables to picture detailed surface-structures of the fibres.
In close relation to the “Curt-Engelhorn-Zentrum für Archäometrie”, fibre research will basically be carried out at the Reiss-Engelhorn-Museums, Mannheim. Extended examinations, like fourier transform infrared spectroscopy or amino acid analysis, will be accomplished by partner institutes, as for example the Royal Institute for the Study and Conservation of Belgium’s artistic heritage in Brussels.
The material to be investigated derives from archaeological remains and modern fibres as well, while the modern material serves as reference material. All the results will be presented in a database in Mannheim open to the public and available for future research. Finally, the observations are correlated with archaeological evidence of tools and the archaeobotanical and archaeozoological studies as well as to that information drawn from written sources and iconographical analyses.

The investigations of study group 3 in the field of fibre research will help to determine local and imported textiles and will indicate standards of Roman and Barbarian textile production. For the first time the results will enable scholars to distinguish between Roman commercial textile quality and luxury that is so often mentioned in the literary sources.  In order to gain information on original textiles and their traces, study group 3 launched a circular addressing all German archaeological museums requesting for textile remains, textile remains corroded to metall objects, and textile imprints on ceramics. The request for imprints was again posted at the German "Keramiktag" at Heidelberg, on December 6, 2008.