A PRIMITIVE WEAVING FRAME. 501 



at the end of a pioco of oak wood and hold fast by wooden pegs. 

 Finally, the oak piece is tirmly set in and mortised into a heavy block 

 of wood which acts as a foot to the apparatus. 



This specimen belongs to the class of stationary heddle frames as in 

 the example from Siena, Italy, and from Lancaster, Pennsylvania. 

 The specimens from Maine and Connecticut, held between the knees 

 of the operator, really belong to the same type. 



Mrs. F. R. Post, of Hebron, Connecticut, has one of these heddle 

 frames cut out of a single piece of wood, on which her grandmother 

 when 3"oung used to weave garters, etc., for her mother and her sisters, 

 and her mother has also used it. 



The warp was laid off in proper lengths b}^ being w^ound around 

 chairs, run through the holes in the healds and between slats; the outer 

 ends were tied together and fastened to some object and the inner ends 

 wer(> \w\d in the hand of the weaver. The weaver held the heddle 

 between her knees by means of the projecting lower part or handle, 

 and taking the inner ends of the warp in one hand, she raised and 

 lowered it alternately. The slats allowed the warp to spring the same 

 as the harness in a loom. The filling was put in with her other hand 

 bv lueans of a simple shuttle, and beat up with one finger. (Compare 

 fig. W.) 



Mrs. Louise G. Strong, of Colchester, Connecticut, also sent to the 

 U. S. National Museum models, in cardboard, of these primitive hand 

 looms, and with them two specimens of work done thereon. The first 

 specimen is tough white linen tape one-fourth of an inch wide, used 

 in old country houses for making loops on towels and other fabrics to 

 hang them up. The other example is in worsted; the warp is a series 

 of black, green, red, olive, and blue worsted thread; the woof is a salmon- 

 colored worsted thread, l)ut it is invisible on the surface of the fal)ric, 

 the warp having been driven hard home, so as to give a twilled eflect. 



Mrs. Strong says that the loom on which these were woven was used 

 in her family eighty years ago for making substantial fabrics, but 

 more especially as a pastime for 3'oimg women. 



Mrs. O. D. Nott, of New York, writes that her grandmother, living 

 in the little village of Milton, Litchfield County, over sixty years ago, 

 used a loom to make tape for apron strings. It was a very simple 

 affair, operated as follows: One end of the warp threads was fastened 

 to some stable object to hold them firm; the other ends were held in 

 the left hand, and by raising and lowering them the "shed" was formed, 

 through which the filling or weft was inserted. In a cardboard model 

 giv^en to the U. S. National Museum are five healds and six spaces. 

 The woof in this example is not even wound on a shuttle. The fabric 

 being very narrow, a small reel or bobbin was sufficient for the work, 

 the lay being beaten home with the forefinger. 



Specimen 175640 in the U. S. National Museum is a heddle frame 



