Reading a loom weight. Preliminary observations on notation practices on textile tools from Bronze Age Greece and their potential meanings, paper at 'The Wor(l)ds of Linear A: An integrated approach to Linear A documents and script' online conference, University of Cambridge, 24-26 May 2022

Textile tools, especially clay spindle-whorls and loom weights are the most frequently preserved material remnants of textile production in Bronze Age Greece. Their functional parameters are informative of general qualities of products made using them, while typology and geochronological distribution of the distinguished types reflects specific craft traditions. Additionally to the technological characteristics of tool types, a limited number of textile tools, specifically loom weights, was subjected to marking. This practice, although always rare and apparently context-specific, has, nevertheless, been observed throughout the entire Bronze Age. All the attested notation practices were executed when the clay was still moist and they comprised marking with impressed seals and, occasionally, other objects, incising signs and even one, so far, inscription in Lin A on a discoidal loom weight from Akrotiri. In this paper, I present a brief overview of the notation practices that were documented within the research project ‘Textiles and Seals. Relations between Textile Production and Seal and Sealing Practices in Bronze Age Greece’ (ref. no. 2017/26/D/HS3/00145). A special focus is put on the incised tools and visual forms of the signs. While a range of potential meanings of the marked textile tools will be argued both in relation to the Aegean evidence and similar practices observed in Europe and the Mediterranean, I would like to open a discussion on potential relationships of the attested markings to script signs, especially Lin A, as well as potters’ and masons’ marks of the time.