According to mythology Athena, the goddess of wisdom and patroness of  fine arts, created the loom and gave the art of weaving to human kind.  She was the undisputed mistress of weaving and once Arachne, a mortal woman, dare challenge her, she transformed her into a spider.  Athena’s birthplace was Crete so it is no wonder that the island has a rich and long tradition of folk weaving and the embroidery arts.

History

Weaving makes its historic appearance in the Neolithic era with basic textile fibers of wool and flax.  The Minoans made fabric weaving into an art form creating very thin fabrics, arachnoyfanta (spider weavings) as mentioned by Homer, such as those depicted in Minoan frescoes of Crete and Thera.   Bright colors were possible with natural, plant, mineral and animal dyes.  The tradition continued through the centuries, basically unchanged, reaching a peak during the Byzantine and post Byzantine eras.  To the materials were added cotton and, in the 6^th century, silk smuggled from the Orient by two missionary monks.

Cloth and yarn dying was an important and often profitable skill as it required knowledge, patience and precision.  The Minoans were creating a purple dye from the liquid harvested from certain Mediterranean mollusks and used saffron to dye their garments a wonderful orange-yellow hue.  During the centuries, many natural materials were used alone or in combinations to provide a rainbow of colors such as walnut leaves or rust for brown, landanos or pomegranate peels for yellow, almond leaves for green, smoke soot or oak leaves for black and the parasite induced bumps of prinos, a local variety of oak, for the favorite color red.

The loom and weaving

Authentic Cretan weavings are made in traditional looms using the naturally dyed wool, flax, cotton and silk fibers of the past.  Up until recently nearly all the fabric items in a Cretan home were weaved, embroidered, crochet or knitted, including bed coverings, linen and pillowcases, napkins and tablecloths, towels, rugs and floor coverings, decorative furniture coverings, garments, curtains and wall hangings.  Many of these were painstakingly created over the years by family members as a young bride’s dowery (proika).

The loom, argaleios, was a vital piece of equipment, handmade and built to last, it was present in every home.  Every housewife would know its use, a craft passed on from mother to daughter for centuries.  The loom was made by an experienced craftsman using cypress, walnut or mulberry wood. Its ingeniously complex, however the basic design includes the frame of four columns, each pair of columns supporting a cylinder; the front cylinder is for the threads that will be the base of the fabric and the back cylinder for the finished weave.  In between is the comb through which the treads pass, separate and alternately open by a foot petal to accept the yarn through a shuttle that will be weaved into fabric.  After each pass of the shuttle the craftswoman will press the yarn tightly into place via a wooden board, alternate the position of the threads with the foot pedal and repeat the passing of the shuttle from the opposite side.  As the threads change position, they lock the yarn in place and the weave grows.  She will use different color yarn at certain points during the weaving to achieve the desired pattern and motifs.

Woolen rugs, bed coverings (patanies and kilimia), colorful backpacks (vourges), cotton or linen sheets and towels, silk dresses and clothing are some of the most popular products of Cretan textile art. The embroideries of Crete are famous for their colorful representations, with themes from both nature and everyday life as well as motifs borrowed from the Minoan and Byzantine tradition of the island. Embroidery and weaving in many cases are accompanied by knitted lace in wonderful designs and patterns.

Weavings come in many categories according to their designs, make and use;

• The xompliasta, looped, rugged loom weavings.
• The rigota (lined), weavings with thick or thin line patterns.
• The ploumista (fancy), weavings with geometric patterns, images from nature or human activities.

Embroidery and lacework

Embroidery, the process of decorating the fabric with a needle and thread, includes the embellishment of the household items, the ecclesiastical ones and the traditional attire. Its roots are form in the 17^th century so many of the classic embroidery patterns are based on Byzantine designs and motifs.   Since that time the woman of Crete, who from an early age were taught the techniques of embroidery by her elders, learned to repeat the well-known decorative themes according to tradition but also to enrich them based on her creative imagination by attributing facts of everyday life and historical and religious scenes.

 There are many embroidery techniques and types of stitching including;

• Τhe dense Cretan stitch, also called Byzantine stitch, used in free embroidery to fill closed shapes, such as flower petals and leaves. The characteristic of this stitch is the three-dimensional ripples created by the intersection of the threads. The embroidery with Cretan stitch, seems to be iridescent due to the ripples that are created, as the light is reflected in different directions. The color vibrates and gives the impression that two tones of thread have been used (for example red and light red) while in essence only one color has been used.
• The metrita (counted) usually done on canvas by counting the threads of the fabric in order to place the design. 
• The anevato (ascending) uses straight and oblique stitches to give texture.
• The filtire (filter) where threads are removed from a piece of fabric which is then embroidered creating a perforated embellishment.
• The kofto (cut) in which parts of the fabric are removed inside the pattern.
• The azure where threads of fabric are removed and the remaining loosely intertwined with each other forming various decorative patterns.

Embroidery remains a favorite means of decorating household items, traditional garments and costumes as well as ecclesiastical vestments.

Depending on the materials used, the embroideries are classified as

• Colored, embroidered with dyed threads.
• White (asproplumia, asprokenti), embroidered with white silk or cotton threads.
• Lace, usually from cotton yarns, worked with the needle, the crochet hook or the kopanelia
• Gold embroidery, embroidered with metal threads, gold and silver wires and tertiaries.

The first three categories that include common thread embroidery is mainly a women’s domestic handicraft with a strong local character. The gold embroidery was usually a men’s handicraft, mainly used by monks working on religious vestments and other church decorative items.

Decorative themes are embroidered all over the surface or all around the fabric, shaped without naturalism and perspective. Repetition or rotation is also common to the layout of the subjects.  Some decorative themes are immensely popular and common, such as the tree of life in various forms, flowering and fruiting branches, flowers, birds, animals, ethnic and religious symbols and geometric shapes.  Human figures, mermaids and idyllic scenes from village life are also often a subject of modern Greek embroidery.