Linen

 

The word linen is derived from the Latin for the flax plant, which is linum, and the earlier Greek linon

 

The term "linen" refers to yarn and fabric made from Flax fibres; however, today it is often used as a generic term to describe a class of woven bed, bath, table and kitchen textiles because traditionally linen was so widely used for towels, sheets, etc. In the past, the word also referred to lightweight undergarments such as shirts, chemises, waistshirts, lingerie, and detachable shirt collars and cuffs. Linens were manufactured almost exclusively of fibres from the flax plant Linum usitatisimum. But textiles made of cotton, hemp, and other plant fibres have also been referred to as ‘linen’, which can make the exact referent of the term somewhat unclear.

 

Highly absorbent and a good conductor of heat, linen fabric feels cool to the touch. Linen is the strongest of the vegetable fibres with 2 to 3 times the strength of cotton. It is smooth, making the finished fabric lint free, and gets softer the more it is washed. However, constant creasing in the same place in sharp folds will tend to break the linen threads. This wear can show up in collars, hems, and any area that is iron creased during laundering. Linen has poor elasticity and does not spring back readily explaining why it wrinkles so easily.

 

linen textiles may be the oldest in the world. Their history goes back many thousands of years. Fragments of straw, seeds, fibers, yarns and various types of fabrics that date back to about 8000 B.C. have been found in Swiss lake dwellings. Linen was used in the Mediterranean in the pre-Christian age. Linen was sometimes used as currency in ancient Egypt. Egyptian mummies were wrapped in linen because it was seen as a symbol of light and purity, and as a display of wealth. Some of these fabrics, woven from hand spun yarns, were extremely fine and cannot be matched by modern spinning techniques.

 

Today linen is usually an expensive textile and is produced in relatively small quantities. It has a long "staple" (individual fibres length) relative to cotton and other natural fibres.

 

Properties of flax

linen fabrics have a high natural luster and their natural color ranges between shades of ivory, tan, or grey. Pure white linen is created by heavy bleaching. Linen typically has a thick and thin character with a crisp and textured feel to it, but can range from stiff and rough to soft and smooth. When adequately prepared, linen has the ability to absorb and lose water rapidly. It can gain up to 20% moisture without feeling damp.

 

When freed from impurities it is highly absorbent and will quickly remove perspiration from the skin. Linen is a stiff fabric and is less likely to cling to the skin and when it billows away it tends to dry out and become cool so that the skin is being continually touched by a cool surface. It is a very durable, strong fabric and one of the few that are stronger wet than dry. It does not stretch and is resistant to damage from abrasion. However, because it has very low elasticity it can break if it is folded at the same place repeatedly. Mildew, perspiration, and bleach can also damage the fabric, but it is resistant to moths and carpet beetles. Linen is relatively easy to take care of since it resists dirt and stains, has no lint or pilling tendency and can be dry cleaned, machine washed or steamed. It can withstand high temperatures and yields only moderate initial shrinkage. Linen wrinkles very easily and must be ironed often to maintain smoothness. It should not be dried too much by tumble-drying, and is much easier to iron when damp. Nevertheless this tendency to wrinkle is often considered part of the fabric's particular "charm".

 

A characteristic often associated with linen yarn is the presence of "slubs", or small knots that occur randomly along its length. However, these are actually defects associated with low quality. The finest linen has very consistent diameter threads with no slubs.

 

Measure

The standard measure of bulk linen yarn is the Lea. This is a specific length, or indirect grist system, i.e. the number of length units per unit mass. A yarn having a size of 1 lea will give 300 yards per pound. The fine yarns used in handkerchiefs, etc. might be 40 lea, and give 40x300 = 12,000 yards per pound. The symbol is NeL. More commonly used in continental Europe is the Metric system, Nm. This is the number of 1,000 m lengths per kilogram.

 

In China, the English Cotton system unit, NeC, is common. This is the number of 840 yard lengths in a pound.

 

Production method

The quality of the finished linen product is often dependent upon growing conditions and harvesting techniques. To generate the longest possible fibers, flax is either hand-harvested by pulling up the entire plant or stalks are cut very close to the root. After harvesting, the seeds are removed through a mechanized process called “rippling” or by winnowing

 

 

The fibers must then be loosened from the stalk. This is achieved through retting which uses bacteria to decompose the pectin that binds the fibers together. There are natural retting methods that occur in tanks and pools or directly in the fields. There are also chemical retting methods which are faster but are typically more harmful to the environment and to the fibers themselves.

 

At this point, the stalks are ready for “scutching” which takes place between August and December. Scutching removes the woody portion of the stalk by crushing them between two metal rollers so that the parts of the stalk can be separated. The fibers are removed and the other parts such as linseed, shive, and tow are set aside for other uses. The short fibers are separated by “hackling” or combing them away, to leave behind only the long, soft flax fibers.

 

After the fibers have been separated and processed, they are typically spun into yarns and woven or knit into linen textiles. These textiles can then be bleached, dyed, printed on, or finished with a number of treatments or coatings.

 

An alternate production method is known as “cottonizing” which is quicker and requires less equipment. The flax stalks are processed using traditional cotton machinery; however, the finished fibers often lose the characteristic linen look.

 

Producers

Flax is grown in many parts of the world, but top quality flax is primarily grown in Western Europe. In very recent years bulk linen production has moved to Eastern Europe and China, but quality fabrics are still confined to niche producers in Ireland, Italy and Belgium.

 

The Flax Industry Banbridge

 

Uses

Over the past 30 years the end use for linen has changed dramatically. Approximately 70% of linen production in the 1990s was for apparel textiles whereas in the 1970s only about 5% was used for fashion fabrics.

 

Linen uses range from bed and bath fabrics (table cloths, dish towels, bed sheets, etc.), home and commercial furnishing items (wallpaper/wall coverings, upholstery, window treatments, etc.), apparel items (suits, dresses, skirts, shirts, etc.), to industrial products (luggage, canvases, sewing thread, etc.) It was once the preferred yarn for hand sewing the uppers of moccasin-style shoes, loafers, but its use has been replaced by synthetics.

 

A linen handkerchief, pressed and folded to display the corners, was a standard decoration of a well-dressed man's suit during most of the first part of the 20th century.

 

Currently researchers are working on a cotton/flax blend to create new yarns which will improve the feel of denim during hot and humid weather, linen fabric is one of the preferred traditional supports for oil painting. In the United States cotton is popularly used instead as linen is many times more expensive there, restricting its use to professional painters. In Europe however, linen is usually the only fabric support available in art shops. Linen is preferred to cotton for its strength, durability and archival integrity.

 

In the past linen was also used for books (the only surviving example of which is the Liber Linteus. Due to its strength, in the middle ages linen was used for sheilds and gambeson much like how in Classical and Hellenistic Greece linen was used to make multi-plied Hoplite Suirasses. Also because of its strength when wet, Irish linen is the best wrap of pool/billiard cues, due to its absorption of sweat from hands. Paper made of linen can be very strong and crisp, which is why the United States and many other countries print their currency on paper that is made from 25% linen and 75% cotton.

 

linen's history

Linen has been used for table coverings, bed coverings and clothing for centuries. The exclusivity of linen stems from the fact that it is difficult and time consuming to produce (flax in itself requires a great deal of attention in its growth). Flax is difficult to weave because of its lack of elasticity, and therefore is more expensive to manufacture than cotton. The benefits of linen however, are unmatched.

 

Due to the parallel arrangement of its fibers, linen is a stronger, sturdier fabric than cotton. In addition, linen is highly absorbent (perfect for dish towels and napkins). Due to its insulating qualities, linen coverings (such as smocks) provide cooling benefits, ideal for warm kitchens. The subtle combination of firmness and softness of linen make this fabric a favorite.

 

Linen can be machine-washed (and grows softer with time and use) and then ironed while still damp with a hot iron. Linen products tend to outlast cotton, enduring up to 20 years of use.

 

The Living linen Project was set up in 1995 as an Oral Archive of the knowledge of the Irish linen industry still available within a nucleus of people who were formerly working in the industry in Ulster . There is a long history of linen in Ireland.

 

The use of linen for priestly vestments was not confined to the Israelites, but from Plutarch, who lived and wrote one hundred years after the birth of Christ, we know that also the priests of Isis wore linen because of its purity.

 

The Antiquity of linen

In the Belfast Library there is preserved the mummy of "Kaboolie,' the daughter of a priest of Ammon, who died 2,500 years ago. The linen on this mummy is in a like state of perfection. When the tomb of Tutankamen was opened, the linen curtains were found intact.

 

Earliest linen Industry

The Phoenicians, who, with their merchant fleet, opened up new channels of commerce to the peoples of the Mediterranean, besides developing the tin mines of Cornwall, introduced flax growing and the making of linen into Ireland before the birth of Christ, but the internal dissensions, which even in those early days were prevalent in Erin, militated against the establishment of an organized industry, and it is not until the twelfth century that we can find records of a definite attempt to systematize flax production.

 

 

Gathering Flax Banbridge

 

When the Edict of Nantes was revoked, in A.D. 1695, many of the Huguenots who had to flee the country settled in the British Isles, and amongst them was Louis Crommelin, who was born, and brought up as a weaver of fine linen, in the town of Cambrai. He fled to Ulster, and eventually settled down in the small town of Lisburn, about ten miles from Belfast.

 

During the late war Cambrai became well known as one of the centers of the most desperate fighting. The name "cambric" is derived from this town.

 

Although the linen industry was already established in Ulster, Louis Crommelin found scope for improvement in weaving, and his efforts were so successful that he was appointed by the Government to develop the industry over a much wider range .than the small confines of Lisburn and its surroundings. The direct result of his good work was the establishment, under statute, of the Board of Trustees of the linen Manufacturers of Ireland in the year 1711.

 

Flax & Making linen

In the late summer the countryside around Banbridge was permeated by the all pervasive stench of rotted flax being lifted out of flax dams, which were at the bottom of the fields. It was spread out along the banks of the dam then piled high on the stout orange-painted farm carts and taken off to the mills. For a hundred and fifty years the linen industry flourished along the banks of the Bann. At every turn in the river between Banbridge and Portadown, there seemed to be a small factory using water to process some stage of linen manufacturing. In the fields along the Lurgan road huge strips of linen lay stretched across the grass on the bleach greens. The factory whistles or hooters marked the daily routine for hundreds of local people employed in the factories. Long hours were also worked, including Saturday mornings, All these sights and sounds, which the children of fifty years ago accepted as part of the everyday fabric of life in and around Banbridge, have gone, how strange they would appear to our present generation,

R.Wilson.

During the month of August the countryside used to reek with a foul stench as the flax dams were opened and the flax was removed to make linen. Linen is made from fibres found inside the flax plant, Flax was a greedy crop it took a lot of nourishment out of the soil so it was usually grown in a plant succession following potatoes where the ground had had a lot of manure added to it. The type of flax most commonly grown had pretty blue flowers and the ground was carefully prepared. It was ploughed three times to make sure that the soil had a sufficiently fine tilth. Flax seeds are difficult to sow evenly because they are shiny so tend to slip too easily out of the hand and as they are small and light they are easily blown by the breeze. Well prepared ground is usually relatively free from weeds, but the crop was weeded when the plants were about 9cm high. It was ready to be harvested about three months after planting, that is about a month after the first flowers appeared. The flax was harvested by being pulled out by the roots, the plant fibres go from the tip to the roots so cutting the crop would have reduced the length of the threads. Harvesters grasped the plant about halfway up the stem and pulled it upwards and slightly to one side, it was hard work.

 

Four handfuls of flax were tied into a beet or sheaf, then the immature seeds were removed by a process called ripling by being pulled through a structure called a rippling comb. The seedless beets were put into flax dams, also called lint holes. A typical flax dam was about 26 m by 2.5 m , it was narrow so that workers could throw beets into the water from both sides of the structure. The beets were weighted down by large stones. The outer parts of the flax plant decayed in the water so that the linen threads could be removed, the length of time the flax was kept in the dam depended on the temperature, the quality of the water and the type of flax. At last the flax was deemed to be ready and the dam was opened, removing the flax from the dam was a most unpleasant task. The men had to get into the water and they became very smelly. The smell was so persistent it could be detected on the skin two weeks later so only young boys and old men would get into the water, that is males who were not interested in chasing woman!.

Once the flax was taken out of the dam it had to be dried, then it was taken to a scutch mill so that the unwanted parts of the plant could be knocked off linen threads which were then spun and woven into linen. The linen was a dull brown when it was first woven so it was spread out on fields called bleaching greens. The linen was valuable so people were hired to watch it and prevent it from being stolen or destroyed by stray animals. One of the old watch towers which used to be found at Tullylish and which used to house a linen watcher has been reconstructed in the Ulster Folk and Transport Museum.

© Bann Valley CIC