Making fiber into string, cloth, and clothing took enormous labor, and right up to the Industrial Revolution it was a huge economic force. Because women mainly did this work, they controlled an industry of their own and held real economic power.
Twisting fibers into string reaches back some twenty thousand years and came before settled civilization. It made that civilization possible, because so much else depends on being able to tie, carry, net, and clothe.
Textiles became women's work for a practical reason, not by accident. The tasks suited the demands of daily life that women carried in early societies. As cloth-making moved from courtyard households to city workshops and outwork for the elite, women's social standing shifted along with it.
Cloth and clothing do more than keep people warm. Their patterns, colors, and forms carry coded social messages about who the wearer is. Recovering what these signs meant opens a window onto lives that written records never describe.