"Dogs and Flowers" Cingulum

Warp: Red silk
Weft: DMC Cotton
Brocade: Spun gold
Pattern: "Dogs and flowers", 13th/14th century cingulum, Halberstadt
Cards: 46
Width:2.5cm
Length: Approx. 1.4 metres
What's new: higher number of cards. Intermittent brocade.The warp runs left to right in the pattern above. Also, I have stretched it out so it appears about in proportion to the real thing. This pattern is on page 138 of EPAC. I modified it slightly. I removed 4 picks from the flower, so that it turned out circular when I wove it (as usual I can't get my weft density up as high as the original band). The original had the dog's collar in a contrasting thread, which I couldn't be bothered with, so I also altered it to be gold brocade right through.

I used gold Kreinik jap #7 for the brocade. For the brocaded regions I used polyester thread for the ground weft so I could make the brocade as dense as possible. Between each dog/flower is a region of 20 picks with no brocade. For these regions I used the same silk as the warp for the ground weft. I thought using a thicker thread might make the transitions between the brocaded and non-brocaded regions a bit less jarring. It didn't really work very well. The band was still much thicker (not wider- well, actually the width was a bit all over the place) in the brocaded regions.

Now I'm done I've realised I don't know how to finish a double-wrapped belt so this piece is in limbo until I work that out :(

Update: you can see the finished clingulum here.

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