Hagen nodded towards the corner of the room where a man sat swaddled in an enormous stack of furs ‘whats going on here then Jolion? You let wild men into the wing now?’
Jolion hushed him with a quick hiss ‘Quite Hagen you fool, that’s Eofor’
‘What on earth is he wearing?’ asked Hagen in surprise, the roaming horseman was no stranger here but was better known for his finery.
‘Says it’s a troll skin cloak’ said Jolion flatly ‘Had some folk up north make it special for him’
Hagan gaped openly at the brown mass of fur
‘Says it gives him the strength of a troll and that they can’t smell him coming’
Hagans mouth hit the floor
‘So just mind what you say around my guests now you hear?’
I wanted to pop in and share something new and exciting with you all. Several months ago I made a commission for a unique textile - An Icelandic vararfeldir, a type of pile woven cloak made in Iceland during the viking age, that has tufts of fleece woven throughout the garment.
Experiments on samples of the garment by Julia Hopkin in edition 63 of the Archaeological textiles review had shown that the fabric had some above average properties for those trekking in the wilds and I couldn't overcome my curiosity about how a full size cloak would perform compared to what I have been using.
I found a very talented weaver from Germany who wove the cloak to the specifications laid out in the Grágás, the earliest written Icelandic legal code which dates back to the 10th century and waited until they had completed the laborious task of not just the weaving but the carding and seperating of the top fleece of the wool used (the Grágás state that only the top coat of the Icelandic sheep could be used)
In a middle earth context I could see such a garment being worn by a shepherd in the misty mountains foothills or in the white mountains, perched upon a rock with his sling and stave watching over his herd through all weathers.
Anyway here it is, I didn't want to make the original post too heavy but if you have any questions I'm happy to talk about this thing all day.