Lemurian City of Ladies

from Wikipedia
Silk fabric was first developed in ancient China, possibly as early as 6000 BC and definitely by 3000 BC. Legend gives credit to a Chinese Empress Xi Ling-Shi. Though first reserved for the Emperors of China, its use spread gradually through Chinese culture both geographically and socially. From there, silken garments began to reach regions throughout Asia. Silk rapidly became a popular luxury fabric in the many areas accessible to Chinese merchants, because of its texture and lustre. Because of the high demand for the fabric, silk was one of the staples of international trade prior to industrialization.

Secret

The Emperors of China strove to keep the knowledge of sericulture secret from other nations, in order to maintain the Chinese monopoly on its production. This effort had mixed success. Sericulture reached Korea around 200 BC with Chinese settlers, about the first half of the 1st century AD in Khotan, and by 300 AD the practice had been established in India. Although the Roman Empire knew of and traded in silk, the secret was only to reach Europe around AD 550, via the Byzantine Empire. Legend has it that the monks working for the emperor Justinian were the first to bring silkworm eggs to Constantinople in hollow canes. The Byzantines were equally secretive, and for many centuries the weaving and trading of silk fabric was a strict imperial monopoly; all top-quality looms and weavers were located inside the Palace complex in Constantinople and the cloth produced was used in imperial robes or in diplomacy, as gifts to foreign dignitaries. The remainder was sold at exorbitant prices.

Silk trade

Perhaps the first evidence of the silk trade is that of an Egyptian mummy of 1070 BC. In subsequent centuries, the silk trade reached as far as the Indian subcontinent, the Middle East, Europe, and North Africa. This trade was so extensive that the major set of trade routes between Europe and Asia has become known as the Silk Road.

Wild silks

“Wild silks” are produced by a number of undomesticated silkworms. Aside from differences in colours and textures, they all differ in one major respect from the domesticated varieties. The cocoons, which are gathered in the wild, have usually already been chewed through by the pupa or caterpillar (”silkworm”) before the cocoons are gathered and thus the single thread which makes up the cocoon has been cut into shorter lengths.

A variety of wild silks have been known and used in China, India and Europe from early times, although the scale of production has always been far smaller than that of cultivated silks.

Wild silks are produced by caterpillars other than the mulberry silkworm (Bombyx mori). The term “wild” implies that these silkworms are not capable of being domesticated and artificially cultivated like the mulberry worms.

Commercially reared silkworms are killed before the pupae emerge by dipping them in boiling water or with a needle, thus allowing the whole cocoon to be unravelled as one continuous thread. This allows a much stronger cloth to be woven from the silk. Wild silks also tend to be more difficult to dye than silk from the cultivated silkworm.

There is ample evidence that small quantities of wild silk were already being produced in the Mediterranean and Middle East by the time the superior, and stronger, cultivated silk from China began to be imported.

Venetian merchants traded extensively in silk and encouraged silk growers to settle in Italy. By the 13th century Italian silk was a significant source of trade. Italian silk was so popular in Europe that Francis I of France invited Italian silkmakers to France to create a French silk industry, especially in Lyon. The French Revolution interrupted production before Napoleon took power.

James I of England introduced silk growing to the American colonies around 1619, ostensibly to discourage tobacco planting. Only the Shakers in Kentucky adopted the practice. In the 1800s a new attempt at a silk industry began with European-born workers in Paterson, New Jersey, and the city became a US silk centre, although Japanese imports were still more important.

World War II interrupted the silk trade from Japan. Silk prices increased dramatically and US industry begun to look for substitutes, which led to the use of synthetics like nylon. Synthetic silks have also been made from lyocell, a type of cellulose fiber, and are often difficult to distinguish from real silk.