Damask (; ) is a woven, reversible patterned

fabric Textile is an umbrella term that includes various fiber-based materials, including fibers, yarns, filaments, threads, and different types of fabric. At first, the word "textiles" only referred to woven fabrics. However, weaving is no ...

. Damasks are woven by periodically reversing the action of the warp and weft threads. The pattern is most commonly created with a warp-faced

satin A satin weave is a type of Textile, fabric weave that produces a characteristically glossy, smooth or lustrous material, typically with a glossy top surface and a dull back; it is not durable, as it tends to snag. It is one of three fundamen ...

weave and the ground with a weft-faced or sateen weave. Yarns used to create damasks include

silk Silk is a natural fiber, natural protein fiber, some forms of which can be weaving, woven into textiles. The protein fiber of silk is composed mainly of fibroin and is most commonly produced by certain insect larvae to form cocoon (silk), c ...

wool Wool is the textile fiber obtained from sheep and other mammals, especially goats, rabbits, and camelids. The term may also refer to inorganic materials, such as mineral wool and glass wool, that have some properties similar to animal w ...

linen Linen () is a textile made from the fibers of the flax plant. Linen is very strong and absorbent, and it dries faster than cotton. Because of these properties, linen is comfortable to wear in hot weather and is valued for use in garments. Lin ...

cotton Cotton (), first recorded in ancient India, is a soft, fluffy staple fiber that grows in a boll, or protective case, around the seeds of the cotton plants of the genus '' Gossypium'' in the mallow family Malvaceae. The fiber is almost pure ...

, and

synthetic fiber Synthetic fibers or synthetic fibres (in British English; see spelling differences) are fibers made by humans through chemical synthesis, as opposed to natural fibers that are directly derived from living organisms, such as plants like cott ...

s, but damask is best shown in cotton and linen. Over time, damask has become a broader term for woven fabrics with a reversible pattern, not just silks. There are a few types of damask: true, single, compound, and twill. True damask is made entirely of silk. Single damask has only one set of warps and wefts and thus is made of up to two colors. Compound damask has more than one set of warps and wefts and can include more than two colors. Twill damasks include a

twill Twill is a type of textile Textile is an Hyponymy and hypernymy, umbrella term that includes various Fiber, fiber-based materials, including fibers, yarns, Staple (textiles)#Filament fiber, filaments, Thread (yarn), threads, and d ...

-woven ground or pattern.

History

A damask weave is one of the five basic weaving techniques—the others being tabby,

Lampas Lampas is a type of luxury Textile, fabric created on a draw loom with a background weft (a "ground weave") typically in taffeta with supplementary wefts (the "pattern wefts") laid on top and forming a design, sometimes also with a "Brocade, broca ...

, and

tapestry Tapestry is a form of Textile arts, textile art which was traditionally Weaving, woven by hand on a loom. Normally it is used to create images rather than patterns. Tapestry is relatively fragile, and difficult to make, so most historical piece ...

—of the

early Middle Ages The Early Middle Ages (or early medieval period), sometimes controversially referred to as the Dark Ages (historiography), Dark Ages, is typically regarded by historians as lasting from the late 5th to the 10th century. They marked the start o ...

Byzantine The Byzantine Empire, also known as the Eastern Roman Empire, was the continuation of the Roman Empire centred on Constantinople during late antiquity and the Middle Ages. Having survived the events that caused the fall of the Western Roman E ...

and

Middle East The Middle East (term originally coined in English language) is a geopolitical region encompassing the Arabian Peninsula, the Levant, Turkey, Egypt, Iran, and Iraq. The term came into widespread usage by the United Kingdom and western Eur ...

ern weaving centers. Damask was named after the city Damascus, Syria, a large trading center on the

Silk Road The Silk Road was a network of Asian trade routes active from the second century BCE until the mid-15th century. Spanning over , it played a central role in facilitating economic, cultural, political, and religious interactions between the ...

.Jenkins, David T., ed.
''The Cambridge History of Western Textiles''
Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2003, , p. 343.

Damask in China

In China, draw looms with a large number of

heddle A heddle or heald is an integral part of a loom. Each thread in the warp passes through a heddle,"Weaving." ''The Encyclopædia Britannica''. 11th ed. 1911. which is used to separate the warp threads for the passage of the weft."Heddle." '' ...

s were developed to weave damasks with complicated patterns. The Chinese may have produced damasks as early as the

Tang dynasty The Tang dynasty (, ; zh, c=唐朝), or the Tang Empire, was an Dynasties of China, imperial dynasty of China that ruled from 618 to 907, with an Wu Zhou, interregnum between 690 and 705. It was preceded by the Sui dynasty and followed ...

(618–907). Damasks became scarce after the 9th century outside Islamic Spain, but were revived in some places in the 13th century. Trade logs between The British East India Company and China often demonstrate an ongoing trade of Chinese silks, especially damask. Damask is documented as being the heaviest Chinese silk.

Damask in Europe

The word ''damask'' first appeared in a Western European language in mid-14th century French records."Damas"
etymology (in French). ''www.cnrtl.fr'' accessed 2 March 2021 Shortly after its appearance in French language, damasks were being woven on draw looms in Italy. From the 14th to 16th century, most damasks were woven in one colour with a glossy warp-faced satin pattern against a duller ground. Two-colour damasks had contrasting colour warps and wefts, and polychrome damasks added gold and other metallic threads or additional colours as supplemental brocading wefts. Medieval damasks were usually woven in silk, but weavers also produced

and linen damasks.Monnas, Lisa. ''Merchants, Princes and Painters: Silk Fabrics in Italian and Northern Paintings 1300–1550''. New Haven, Yale University Press, 2008, pp. 295–299

Damask and Nomads

In daily nomadic life this form of weaving was generally employed by women, specifically in occupations such as carpet-making. Women collected raw material from pasture animals and dyes from local flora, such as berries, insects, or grasses, to use in production. Each woman would create a specialized pattern sequence and color scheme that aligned with her personal identity and ethnic group. These techniques were passed down generationally from mother to daughter.

Modern usage

In the 19th century, the invention of the

Jacquard loom The Jacquard machine () is a device fitted to a loom that simplifies the process of manufacturing textiles with such complex patterns as brocade, damask and matelassé. The resulting ensemble of the loom and Jacquard machine is then called a Jac ...

which was automated with a system of punched cards, made weaving damask faster and cheaper. Jacquard-Webstuhl Museum Tuch und Technik

Modern damasks are woven on computerized Jacquard looms.Kadolph, Sara J., ed.: ''Textiles'', 10th edition, Pearson/Prentice-Hall, 2007, , p. 251 Damask weaves are commonly produced in monochromatic (single-colour) weaves in silk, linen or synthetic fibres such as

rayon Rayon, also called viscose and commercialised in some countries as sabra silk or cactus silk, is a semi-synthetic fiber made from natural sources of regenerated cellulose fiber, cellulose, such as wood and related agricultural products. It has t ...

and feature patterns of flowers, fruit and other designs. The long floats of satin-woven warp and weft threads cause soft highlights on the fabric which reflect light differently according to the position of the observer. Damask weaves appear most commonly in table linens and furnishing fabrics, but they are also used for clothing. The damask weave is prevalent in the fashion industry due to its versatility and high-quality finish. Damask is often used for mid-to-high-quality garments—associating itself with higher quality brands/labels.

References