Etruscan textiles: Methods, Approaches, Results and Future Perspectives

Textiles are rarely preserved in archaeological contexts, often leading to an incomplete and even biased picture of their role in Etruscan culture. When textiles do survive, however, a wide range of interdisciplinary methods and approaches can be applied to study them, contributing important information regarding their production techniques, raw materials, date, and provenance. Indirect evidence consisting of archaeological textile tools, written sources, and iconography, as well as textile production, consumption, and economy. The empirical data obtained from scientific analyses of the extant archaeological textile finds and related sources are beginning to inform broader aspects of Etruscan society, such as its textile culture, the role of gender in cloth manufacture, long-distance trade in textiles, and the use of textiles in signaling identities. This chapter provides an overview of the latest methods and approaches in Etruscan textile archaeology and the latest results, and it sets out directions for future research.