Chinese Textiles

 

Silk production, a feature of China's earliest civilization, has been a steadfast feature of Chinese tradition and a distinguishing feature of China's interaction with other cultures. Hemp and ramie were cultivated and woven into textiles for clothing and other uses in China since the Neolithic era. Wool textiles played a minor role, being associated with northern and western border peoples. Cotton cultivation dates back to at least the eighth century. It had grown to rival silk production by the Ming dynasty (1368-1644). Although silk remained a luxury fabric and a symbol of Chinese culture, cotton cloth eventually became a common material and an economic staple. 

Silk production was a major state-controlled industry from the Han dynasty (206 B.C.E.-220 C.E.). Silk was a major commodity and, at times, a standard medium of exchange for thousands of years along land routes through Central Asia and sea routes along the coasts of East and Southeast Asia. Silk played a stabilizing role in Chinese diplomacy, bringing large areas of Inner Asia under Chinese control. Silk production was regarded as both a moral and a practical necessity at home. The Confucian adage "men till, women weave" expresses the importance of women in the preparation of silk yarn and cloth in a household. Later, as industrial specialization increased, women's efforts shifted from weaving to needlework, but the spirit of the phrase was preserved. As late as the seventeenth century, the state collected taxes in both silk and grain, demonstrating the importance of this human endeavor. Silk's uses eventually expanded to include textiles made for art appreciation as well as clothing and furnishings.

Elaborate techniques for producing complex designs were developed, both in the woven cloth itself and in embellishments worked onto the surface. Brocades, weaves with supplementary weft yarns that create complex patterns, were used in a variety of variations, including the complex lampas weave with its additional binding warps. Kesi, a tapestry weave that may have originated with Central Asians using wool yarn, became highly refined in the works of Chinese weavers of the Song dynasty (960-1279) and later. Embroidery, a technique for embellishing woven fabrics with stitches made with a threaded needle, flourished in China throughout the history of silk textiles.

Silk and Diplomacy

Silks' value as diplomatic gifts was recognized early on. The practice is mentioned in Confucian texts from the third century BCE. 200,000 bolts of silk were among the diplomatic gifts given to border peoples during the Song dynasty (960-1279).

Pliny the Elder wrote in his Natural History (Book XII, translation by H. Rackham, 1952, p.3) in the first century C.E.: "This motivates us to achieve even more... From these humble beginnings, man has progressed to quarry the mountains for marbles, travel as far as China for raiment, and explore the depths of the Red Sea for the pear."

Sir Aurel Stein (1862-1943) described textiles discovered in Dunhuang's "walled up temple library" in 1912, including a large embroidery of a Buddha with bodhisattvas, an embroidered cushion cover with scrolling floral motifs, "a number of triangular head-pieces... detached from their painted banners... composed either in their body or in their broad borders of pieces of fine silk damask," and "a silk cover... intended for a manuscript roll." (Stein, pp. 207-210). Stein's collection is now housed in the British Museum and the Museum of Central Asian Antiquities in New Delhi, India. The French archaeologist Paul Pelliot (1878-1945) also collected textiles at Dunhuang, which are now housed in the Musée Guimet and the Bibliothèque Nationale in Paris. Another group of Dunhuang materials can be found in St. Petersburg, and more recent discoveries can be found in Chinese collections.

The Manila Galleon

Stein's collection is now housed in the British Museum and the Museum of Central Asian Antiquities in New Delhi, India. The French archaeologist Paul Pelliot (1878-1945) also collected textiles at Dunhuang, which are now housed in the Musée Guimet and the Bibliothèque Nationale in Paris. Another group of Dunhuang materials can be found in St. Petersburg, and more recent discoveries can be found in Chinese collections.

"raw silk in bundles, … fine untwisted silk, white and of all colors, … quantities of velvets … others with body of gold and embroidered with gold; woven stuffs and brocades, of gold and silver upon silk … gold and silver thread … damasks, satins, taffetas, … linen … cotton. (Schurz, p. 73) "

Historical and Archaeological Evidence

Needles have been discovered in some of China's earliest settlements. Fabrics made from hemp and ramie have been found in abundance at sites dating back to the fifth millennium B.C.E. Stone or pottery spindle whorls discovered in these sites confirm the spinning of hemp or ramie fibers into threads for weaving and sewing. Components of a possible backstrap loom have also been discovered. Impressions of woven materials on the bases of pottery vessels, such as those discovered in Banpo, Shaanxi province, suggest the various applications of coarse cloth or matting, in this case to create a simple turntable for pottery making. Remains from the Lower Yangtze River region's Liangzhu culture confirm the start of sericulture in the third millennium B.C.E. The earliest confirmed evidence of the development of the complex process of raising silkworms (Bombyx mori), harvesting the filaments from their cocoons, reeling the silk, and weaving it into cloth can be found here.

Shang (C. 1550 B.C.E.-1045 B.C.E.) and Zhou (C. 1045 B.C.E. -221 B.C.E.) Dynasties

Silk, like bronze and jade, was a luxury commodity in China during the Bronze Age, as evidenced by tombs. The royal tombs in Anyang, Henan province, show ritual bronze objects and ritual jades wrapped in silk before being buried as grave goods. More than fifty ritual bronzes are known to have been wrapped in silk cloth in the tomb of Lady Fu Hao (twelfth century B.C.E.). Anyang silks came in a variety of weaves, including damasks and plain (tabby) weaves, and some were embroidered with patterns in chain stitch.

Spectacular finds of Zhou dynasty silks from the Warring States period (453-221 B.C.E.) have been linked to China's distinctive Zhou culture, which is centered in the middle Yangtze River valley. A tomb in Mashan, Hubei province, yielded the following silks: a coffin cover, a silk painting, bags of utensils, costumes on wooden tomb figures, and nineteen layers of clothing and quilts around the corpse itself (dating from the fourth century B.C.E.). Plain silks, brocades, plain and patterned gauzes, and embroidery in cross-stitch and counted stitch were all included. Scholars believe that an early form of the drawloom must have been used to produce the complex and densely woven Mashan silks.

Other well-known Zhou culture finds confirm the early use of silk as a painting ground, most notably two third-century B.C.E. pictorial banners used in funerary rituals and then buried with the deceased. The "Zhou Silk Manuscript," which dates from around 300 B.C.E., documents the tradition of early Chinese texts being written on silk cloth and bamboo, as well as cast in bronze or carved on stone. Shop marks have been discovered on silks from this time period, including a brocade with an impressed seal, indicating a growing appreciation for distinctive workshop products and the commercial value of textiles.

Archaeological discoveries outside of China's traditional borders corroborate the scattered early references to China's silk export to neighboring lands. Silks dating from 500-400 B.C.E. were discovered alongside textiles of Near Eastern origin in the Scythian tombs at Pazyryk in the Altai mountains of Siberia (excavated in 1929 and 1947-1949). This evidence supports the theory that the Greeks imported Chinese silk by the fifth or fourth century B.C.E.

Qin (221-206 B.C.E.) and Han (206 B.C.E. -220 C.E.) Dynasties

Qin Shi Huangdi (best known in the early 2000s for the 1974 discovery of his "terra-cotta army") built a great palace after establishing China's first empire. Silks such as brocade, damask, plain silk, and embroidered silk have been discovered among its ruins. Silk production became a primary industry following the reconsolidation of the empire under Han imperial rule, with state-supervised factories employing thousands of workers to produce silks and imperial costumes. Officials were occasionally compensated or rewarded with silk textiles. As the period progressed, textiles and grain supplanted coinage as a recognized medium of exchange.

The legacy of the former state of Zhou flourished, as evidenced by the rich treasures discovered at the noble tombs at Mawangdui, Hunan province (second century B.C.E.). Silk clothing was preserved in fully intact robes. There were also manuscripts, maps, and silk paintings, as well as elaborate funerary banners depicting a portrait of the deceased entering an afterworld of cosmic symbols and signs of immortality. Embroidered silks use chain stitch in cloud-scroll patterns to replicate patterns seen in earlier Mashan silks. Printed silks discovered at Mawangdui correspond to a relief stamp discovered in the tomb of the Second King of Nan Yue (in Guangzhou, dated before 122 B.C.E. ), confirming that techniques and styles had spread throughout the empire.

Silks from the Han tombs include plain weave, gauze weave, both plain and patterned, and pile-loop brocade similar to velvet. There are over twenty dyed colors identified. New embroidery techniques incorporating gold or feathers, as well as block-printing, stenciling, and painting on silk, were used to embellish woven fabrics. Later Han silks feature an eye-catching array of woven patterns with texts, typically containing several characters with auspicious meanings. Scholars have deduced from pictorial representations that Han weavers used treadle looms.

Discoveries in remote areas have added to our understanding of silk textile production and commerce. Sir Aurel Stein discovered a strip of undyed silk in Western China inscribed by hand with the origin, dimensions, weight, and price. A seal impression indicates the province of Shandong in Northeast China. Other discoveries established the standard selvage-to-selvage width of Han silk, which ranged between 1712 and 1912 inches (from 45 to 50 centimeters). Stein (1906-1908 and 1913-1914) discovered Han figured silk textile fragments (dating to the third century C.E. or earlier) alongside an early example of slit tapestry woven in wool at Loulan, in the Tarim Basin in modern China's far Northwest (Xinjiang province). The latter could be a forerunner of the later silk kesi slit tapestry. Finds from the second century C.E. at Noin-Ula in northern Mongolia provide more evidence of the widespread exchange of silks throughout Asia. Although the trade's specifics are unknown, comments by early writers demonstrate the Roman world's fondness for Chinese silks.

Six Dynasties Period (220-589) and the Tang Dynasty (618-907)

Political unrest from the third to sixth centuries brought close interaction with Central Asia, resulting in new textile styles and techniques. Tang silks are a reflection of the previous centuries' closer contacts. The Tang maintained an open capital with foreign merchants and a diverse ethnic and religious population. Tang silk is distinguished from Han silk by a general shift in weaving techniques. While Han weavings were warp-patterned, Tang weavings became weft-patterned.

Some of the best Tang textiles can still be found in Japanese temples, where Chinese fabrics have been carefully preserved in Buddhist temples since before the eighth century. The Shsin (a storehouse dedicated at Tdai-ji, Nara, in 756, for Emperor Shmu's donated collection), which contains various garments and other textiles believed to have been brought back to Japan by Buddhist monks returning from China, is the most important of these holdings.

The discovery of well-preserved ancient textiles in Central Asian sites, such as Sir Aurel Stein's expeditions in northwest China and inner Asia, sparked interest in Chinese textiles (in 1900, 1906-1908, 1913-1916 and 1930). Discoveries at Dunhuang's Buddhist cave temples provided a new range of textiles for study, as well as an early understanding of the importance of textiles in Buddhist ritual. These textiles were most likely pious offerings made by Buddhists from Central Asia, particularly Sogdiana, as well as China. Many of the silks were used to make banners or other decorations for Buddhist chapels, as well as wrappers for sacred texts. A mantle (kashaya) for a Buddhist priest was also discovered, its patchwork representing the vow of poverty. Many of the silk textiles have vibrant woven or embroidered patterns, while others were embellished after weaving by painting, printing, stenciling, or dyeing with resist techniques such as clamp-resist, wax-resist, and tie-dyeing. These finds include silk tapestry (kesi), gauze, and damasks, as well as compound weft-faced and warp-faced weaves that were most likely woven on a drawloom. These discoveries confirm that Buddhist patronage encouraged the creation of pictorial textiles, either woven in the kesi technique or embroidered with highly refined use of stitches (often satin stitch) to create representational effects.

Famous Tang silks have been discovered at Famen Temple in Shaanxi province. A C.E. 874 ritual offering included approximately 700 textiles, including brocades (many with metallic threads), twill, gauze, pongee, embroidery, and printed silk. Among them was a set of miniature Buddhist vestments, which included a model of a kashaya, an apron (or altar frontal), and clothing, all couched in lotus blossom and cloud patterns on silk gauze.

Song Dynasty (960-1279)

Song weavers refined textile technology, particularly the weaving of satin and kesi tapestries. In general, the use of gold and silver in embroidery and woven brocades increased. Needle-loop embroidery, a detached looping stitch sometimes combined with gilt paper appliqué, became popular. Embroidery and tapestry were used for devotional Buddhist images in Song and Tang times, but now the techniques were used to create items for aesthetic appreciation, such as paintings, in the form of scrolls or album leaves.

Jin (1115-1234) and Yuan (1279-1368) Dynasties

Silk was important in trade, diplomacy, and court life during the Jin dynasty, which was founded by the Jurchen, a Tatar people, and the Yuan dynasty, which was founded by the Mongols, both of which were non-Chinese ruling houses. Recent exhibitions have focused on Jin and Yuan brocades, which are notable for their rich patterning with gilt wefts of leather or paper substrate. These silks spread widely as a result of the open trade connections encouraged by the Mongol conquests. Trade and diplomatic gifts brought examples to the Pope. Thus, the gold cloth favored by Mongol leaders had a fourteenth-century European counterpart in panno tartarico.

Ming Dynasty (1368-1644)

Weavers in Ming times used elaborate drawlooms with up to forty different colored wefts and flat gold (gilt paper) strips, gold-wrapped threads, and iridescent peacock feathers to create their brocades. During the Yongle reign (1403-1424), enormous resources were dedicated to the production of diplomatic gifts, including textiles for Buddhist purposes, a practice that continued into the Xuande reign period (1426-1435). Excavations at the tomb of Ming emperor Wanli (reigned 1572-1620) turned up two complete sets of uncut woven silk for dragon robes, as well as silk brocades and patterned gauzes labeled as products of the imperial workshops in Nanjing and Suzhou.

Cotton cultivation, which had been encouraged under the Yuan dynasty and expanded further under the Ming, had become a major part of the Chinese economy by the late sixteenth century. Cotton has been used to make clothing for the lower classes since at least the Tang dynasty (Cahill [p. 113] observes that "cotton-clad" meant a commoner in medieval Chinese poetry). Cotton cloth was associated with the virtues of humility in subsequent centuries. Ginned cotton was shipped south from Henan and Shandong provinces or north from Fujian and Guangdong provinces to the Jiangnan region, where it was spun into thread and woven into cloth. Cotton thread is mentioned among Chinese exports to Japan, and white cotton cloth as well as blue or white cotton garments are mentioned among the items exported on the Manila galleon.

Domestically, cotton was widely used in undergarments and silk linings (such as in ceremonial silk garments), and it was also dyed in bright colors and calendered to an attractively polished surface. The most distinct artistic developments in Chinese cotton textiles are those found primarily in rural traditions and folk art associated with minority groups, such as the Miao of Guizhou and Yunnan provinces. The primary techniques, resist dyeing (using stencils to apply a paste that would retain white undyed areas) and batik (using wax to reserve undyed areas), had been known in China since the Han dynasty, and are found in silk examples preserved from the Tang period, along with block printing, tie-dyeing, and clamp-resist. The distinctive blue from indigo, which is characteristic of dyed cotton, also reflects an ancient tradition, which is detailed in Ming dynasty texts.

In the seventeenth century, anthropologists and historians observed a shift in importance among Chinese women from weaving to embroidery. As specialization increased, finished yarn and finished cloth could be purchased on a regular basis. This sparked a surge in gentry interest in embroidery, as well as a rise in embroidery's status to rival that of the fine arts of painting and calligraphy. Shanghai's Gu family, for example, rose to prominence for their distinct pictorial embroidery style. A woodblock-printed manual of embroidery designs compiled by scholar-calligrapher Shen Linqi (1602-1664) set out themes and patterns that inspired embroiderers for centuries.

Qing Dynasty (1644-1911)

The study of Qing textiles has centered on the court collections, which are now housed in Beijing's Palace Museum and Taipei's National Palace Museum, and include wall decorations, curtains, desk frontals and upholstery fabrics, ceremonial and informal costumes, and works of art. When the Qianlong emperor commissioned scholar-officials to catalog his art collections (producing the Bidian Zhulin and the Shiqu Baoji, published in 1744-1745, 1793, and 1816), he was inspired by late Ming scholar-collectors as well as the precedent of the Song Emperor Huizong (reigned 1101-1125). These catalogs included examples of kesi and embroidery alongside painting and calligraphy. Qianlong himself may have chosen works to be "reproduced" in kesi, including his own painting and poetry, as well as works from his painting and calligraphy collection.

The Qing emperors were Manchus from the far Northeast, outside of China's traditional borders. When they conquered China, they quickly adopted the Chinese practice of using silk gifts, particularly cloth for dragon robes, to entice powerful leaders of vassal states to join their military bureaucracy. During the late Ming period, the Qing forefathers were victims of this practice. Silk had long been used to appease border peoples; Song examples abound, but the practice predates the Han dynasty. The lavish silk brocades bestowed on Tibetan nobles and preserved in Tibet's dry climate until recent years are most visible among textiles surviving to the twenty-first century.

Collecting and Study of Textile

Until recently, the study of Chinese textiles was centered on Beijing's imperial palaces, which served as a focal point for interest in Chinese culture following the end of the Qing dynasty in 1911. Many court costumes and other textiles were dispersed into collections around the world in the years preceding the formal establishment of the Palace Museum within the former Forbidden City in 1925. Western scholars became interested in Chinese textiles after becoming acquainted with them through court robes and interior furnishings. In recent years, studies at the Association pour l'Étude et la Documentation des Textiles d'Asie (AEDTA), Paris; the Royal Ontario Museum, Toronto; the Hong Kong Museum of Art; the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; the Cleveland Museum of Art; the Los Angeles County Museum of Art; the Phoenix Art Museum; the Chicago Art Institute; and the Minneapolis Institute of Arts have been carried out.