Procedure in the production of Kashmir shawls

Kashmir Shawls

Baden Henry Baden-Powell

Punjab Printing Company

1872

Manufactures & Arts of the Punjab: With a Combined Glossary & Index of Vernacular Trades & Technical Terms ... Forming Vol. Ii to the "Hand-book of the Economic Products of the Punjab" Prepared Under the Orders of Government, page 36-39

Edited by Amelia Pare

Book

The first task of the spinner is to separate the different materials of which the fleece
consists, usually in about the following proportions i — Coarse hair, ... ... li seen. Seconds, or
Phiri, ... ... Dust and foreign substances, 2£ „ Fine wool, ... ... ... 2 „ 6 seers, or 1 tark. Much
attention is required to free the wool from the hair, and the process is a tedious one.
The next step is cleaning and separating the wool. A quantity of husked rice is steeped in
clean cold water, for a day and a night, or longer, until it becomes soft, when it is ground or
bruised upon a stone slab to fine flour. Thin layers of this and of the picked wool are laid
alternately, and squeezed with the hand until they are completely intermixed. A little water may
bo occasionally sprinkled over the heap, if the weather is hot and dry, else it is not necessary.
Soap is never used, as it makes the wool harsh; and its employment in Hindustan being
communicated to the Kashmirians, induced them to boast that in this matter at least they were
more knowing than Europeans.
After being thus treated for about an hour, the flour is shaken out, the wool opened and
torn to pieces, chiefly by the nails, and made into somewhat Bquaro, thin, elastic pads, called
Tumbu In this process the Phiri, or second school, is extricated. Though too coarse for fine
shawls, it is used in the manufacture of those of inferior quality, and of a strong shawl cloth
called pnttu.
The tumbu is then worked out into a thin flat roving, about half a yard long, which is
called a mala. The mala is folded up to the size of the tumbu, and deposited in a deep pot of red
earthenware, called a taskas, to be out of the way of dust or accident till required for the spinning
wheel.
The wheel is constructed on the same principle as that used in Hindustau, but varying in
neatness of form and finish, according to its price; the rudest, the Takhtidar, or Pachindar, costs a
half rupee; the Katzker, which is the most serviceable, three or four rupees; and the Pakchedar,
which is used by those who spin for amusement only, costs from six to sixteen rupees. The iron
spindle is enclosed in a cylindrical tube of straw or reed grass, and instead of one line of radii or
spokes, supporting a continued circular wooden rim, there are two circular and parallel walls of
flat spokes in contact at their edges, leaving between them at their outer circumference an empty
space. A hair cord fastened to the loose end of the one spoke, is carried across the space or
trough, to the end of the next spoke but one on the opposite side, and having been passed round,
it returns to a spoke on the side from which it began. By a continuation of this process a rim is
formed of a surface of hair cord, over which runs a small band, that is said seldom to be cut by
the friction to which it is exposed. The principle kept in view by this arrangement of spindle and
of rim, is to produce a continuance of soft elastic movements without jerk or stiffness, to prevent
the yarn breaking on the occurrence of any slight interruption in drawing it out.
Women begin to work at daybreak, continue with little interruption the whole day, if not
taken off by other domestic affairs, and extend their labor until very late in the night, spinning by
moonlight when available, and when they cannot afford to purchase oil for a lamp. The fine wool
is spun commonly into about seven hundred gaz, each gaz consisting of sixteen girahs, about
equal to two nails.
This yarn is doubled and formed into twist, which is cut into two hundred lengths, each
length of three gaz and a half: this measure being suited to the length of the warp for a shawl.
From the Phiri, or seconds wool, about one hundred gaz of yarn are also produced.
The yarn of the fine wool is sold sometimes by measure and sometimes by weight. A
hundred lengths of yarn of fine wool doubled, and each three gaz and a half, bring ordinarily
seven tangas, or about seven-ponce. But if the same kind of yarn be sold without being doubled
and twisted, the price is regulated by weight, a " pal " bringing from twelve annas to one rupee
four annas, according to the demands of the market. The yarn from Phiri, or seconds wool, is
sold only by measure, but the gaz employed consists of no more than twelve girahs, or nails, that
is, of four girahs less than the gaz in ordinary uso. A hundred yards of Phiri twist, and each of
two short gaz, or of twenty four girahs, sell for one ami a half tanga, three pice, or about three
half-pence. Although calculations upon this matter can be little more than approximations, yet
three pence or three pence-half penny a day, or from three rupees to three rupees eight annas, or
from six to seven shillings a month, may be taken as the general earnings of an industrious and
expert spinner in Kashmir, out of which, however, must be subtracted the price of the wool,*
leaving only one rupee eight annas for her labor. If shawl-wool be furnished to a spinner to clean
and to spin, eight annas arc paid for spinning one pal, or three and one third rupees weight of
yarn of * Thirty two Tanga or annas, equal two rupees.
Class VI. Division TT. 37 the requisite quality for shawls. Sheep's wool, spun by
contract, is paid for by the pao, or quarter of a seer, at the rate of from two tan gas. of four pice,
to twelve annas per pao, according to the fineness of the yarn; and the spinning- of this quantity
into yarn suited for shawls will occupy a woman for eight days. There are several varieties of
thread, distinguished by different degrees of fineness. From one pao of clean fine shawl wool a
spinner will draw from a hundred to a thousand threads of three and a half gaz each. There is not
such a difference between the price of coarse and of fine yarn as might be expected, owing to the
greater expenditure on the former of a material that is dear, and on the latter of labor that is
cheap. Shawl wool is sometimes spun by men, with a loose spindle like that used in Ladakh.
These men are called Trakhans, and the yarn thus spun is finest, but very little of it is now made.
Girls begin to spin at the ago of ten, and a hundred thousand females are employed in
this occupation in Kashmir. About one-tenth of this number are supposed to Spin for the purpose
of obtaining shawls for themselves, or for other members of their families, and nine tenths to
earn their livelihood.
The Puimangu keeps a shop for the purchase of yarn, but also sends people to collect it
from the houses of the spinners, who give notice of their approach by ringing a bell. The yarn is
sold to the weavers at a profit of from one piece to a tanga in the rupee. As a large stamp duty is
levied on shawl-goods when finished, the exportation of the yarn is forbidden, and prohibition is
enforced by heavy fine and imprisonment. Much of it is, nevertheless, exported to those places in
the Punjab where the expatriate weavers have settled. Having ascertained the kind of pattern
most likely to suit the market, the weaver applies to persons whose business it is to apportion the
yarn according to the colors required; and when this is settled, ho takes it to another, whose
function it is to divido the yarn into skeins accordingly, and each skein is delivered to the
Rangroz, or dyer.
When the body of the cloth is to be left plain, the Phiri, or seconds yarn, is alone given to
be dyed. This is generally about the thickness of common cotton sewing thread, is loosely
twisted, of a coarser quality than the yarn used for the cloth, and is preferred for employment in
flowers, or other ornaments, from its standing higher, and being, as it were, embossed upon the
ground. The dyer prepares the yarn by steeping in clean cold water. He professes to be able to
give it sixty- four tints, most of which are permanent. Each has a separate denomination, as for
instance: the crimson is termed Gulanar (pomegranate flower); the best kind is derived from
cobineal, imported from Hindus tan; inferior tints are from Lac and Kirmis (Cher- men),
distinguished as Kirmisi. Kirmdana, and Kir- misi lac, or cochineal and lac chermes: log wood is
used for other red dyes; blues and greens are dyed with indigo, or colouring matter extra* ted by
boiling from European broadcloth. Logwood is imported from Multan and Indigo from India.
Carthamns and Saffron, growing in the province, furnish means of various tints of orange,
yellow. &c. The occupation of a dyer is invariably hereditary. The whiter and finer the fibre of
the wool, and the finer the yarn into which it is made, the more capable it is said to be of
receiving a brilliant dye; and this is one reason why the fine white wool of the goat is preferred
to that of the sheep.
The Nakatu adjusts the yarn for the warp and for the weft. That intended for the former
is double, and is cut into lengths of three gaz and a half, anything short of that measure being
considered fraudulent. The number of these lengths varies from two thousand to three thousand,
according to the closeness or openness of texture proposed, and the fineness or coarseness of the
yarn. The weft is made of yarn which is single, but a little thicker than the double yarn or twist of
the warp. The weight of the weft is estimated at a half more than that of the warp.
The Nakatu receives the yarn in hanks, but returns it in balls: he can prepare in one day
the warp and weft for two shawls. the Pennakamgnrn, or warp dresser, takes trom the weaver the
yarn which has been cut and reeled, and stretching the lengths by means of sticks into a band of
which the threads are slightly separate, dresses the whole by dipping it into thick boiled rice
water.
After this the skein is slightly squeezed and again stretched into a hand, which is brushed
and; suffered to dry: by this process each length becomes stiffened and set apart from the rest.
.Silk is generally used for the warp on the border of the shawl, and has the advantage of showing
the darker colors of the dyed wool more prominently than a warp of yarn, as well as hardening
and strengthening, and giving more body to the edge of the cloth. When the border is very
narrow it is woven with the body of the shawl; but when broader, it is worked on a different
loom, and afterwards sewn on the edge of the shawl by the " rafugar," or fine drawer, with such
nicety that the union can scarcely bo detected. The silk is twisted for the border warp by the "
tabgar.''
The warp differs in breadth, the narrowest counting of twenty, and the broadest of a
hundred threads. From the tabgar 1 the silk is handed to the 11 Alakaband, "who reels it, and cuts
it to the proper length.” The operation of drawing or of passing the yarns of the warp through the
heddles, is performed precisely in the same way as in Europe, and the warp is then taken by the
shal-baf, or weaver, to the loom.
The weavers are all males, commencing to learn the art at the ago of ten years. In all
transactions there are two parties, the Master, or Ustad, and the scholar, or Shagird, the former
being the capitalist, the latter the mechanic. Work is executed under four different conditions.
First, for wages, when it almost always happens that a system of advances has occurred, by
which the workman is so deeply indebted to his employer that he may, in some sort, be
considered as his bond-slave. Secondly, upon contract, of which the common term is, that one
price is paid for every hundred needles carrying colored yarn that shall have been easily once
parsed round and many yarns of the warp. Third, a sort of partnership, in which the Ustad finds
all the materials, and the workmen give their labour. When a shawl is sold the outlay of the
Utttad indicated from the price, and the remainder is divided into five shares, of which one goes
to the matter, and the other four to the workmen. The fourth mode is; all equal division of the
proceeds; in which ease the master not only finds the materials, but feeds the workmen.
Three men are employed upon an embroidered shawl of an ordinary pattern for three
months, but a very rich pair will occupy a whop for eighteen months. The loom differs not in
principle from that of Europe, but is of inferior workmanship. [Master] has from three to three
hundred in his establishment, and they are generally crowded together in long low apartments.
When the warp is fixed in the loom, the nakanh, or pattern drawer, and the tarah-gurn,
and tuh'm-guru, or persons who determine the proportion of yarn of different colors to be
employed, are again consulted, The first brings the drawing of the pattern, in black and white.
The tarah-gurn, having well considered it, points out the disposition of the colors, beginning at
the foot of the pattern and calling out the color, the number of threads to which it is to extend,
that by which it is to be followed, and so on in succession, until the whole pattern has been
described.
From his dictation, the talim-guru writes down the particulars in a kind of character or
short hand, and delivers a copy of the document to the weavers. The workmen prepare the tojis,
or needles, by arming each with colored yarn of the weight of about four grains; these needles,
without eyes, are made of light, smooth wood, and have their sharp ends slightly charred, to
prevent their becoming rough or jagged through working. Under the superintendence of
tarah-guru, the weavers knot the yarn of the tuji to the warp.
The face or right side of the cloth is placed next to the ground, the work being carried on
at the back or reverse, on which hang the needles in row. and differing in number from four
hundred to fifteen hundred, according to the lightness or heaviness of the embroidery. As soon as
the Ustad is satisfied that the work of one line or woof is completed, the comb is brought down
upon it with a vigour and repetition apparently very disproportionate to the delicacy of the
materials.
The cloth of shawls, generally, is of two kinds one plain, or of two threads, one twilled,
or of four. The former was. in past times, wrought with a great degree of fineness, but it has been
of late less in demand. The various twilled cloths are usually from five to twelve girahs, or nails
wide, shawls are twilled, and are commonly about twenty-four nails broad and differ in their
extent of field. Two persons are employed in weaving a cloth of this breadth. One throws the
shuttle from the edge as far as he can across the warp, which is usually about half way. It is there
seized bv the second weaver, who throws it onwards to the opposite edge, and then returns it to
his companion, who, in his turn, introducing his ringers into the warp, forwards the shuttle to the
edge whence it started, and then re-commences the operation. The cloth thus made is frequently
irregular, the threads of some parts of the woof being driven up tightly, and in others left open,
from which results a succession of bands, sufficiently distinguishable whilst without colour, but
still more obvious when dyed. The open texture is in a degree remediable by the introduction of
fresh threads: but there is no sufficient cure for that which has been much compacted.
One might be led, to suspect that there existed some radical defective ness in the principle
of this mode of weaving not readily mastered, were not pieces of cloth found occasionally of an
almost perfect regularity of texture- But the greatest irregularity is discoverable in those shawls
which have the deepest and heaviest borders, and a further examination compels me to retract an
observation somewhere made, of the artist being so much engrossed by attention to the work of
the pattern as to neglect the structure of the field.
The edge of the warp in the loom is filled with the heavy thread of the airi, yarn, charged
also with colour, so that lines the front of the worked part advances beyond that of the plain part
or rich, and an endeavour to equalize this betrays the weaver into a work which proves fruitless;
and, in general, the heavier the embroidery on the border, and, of course, the higher the price of
the shawl, the less regular is the structure of the cloth. Such, indeed, in some instances, is the
degradation of the cloth in the field, as to induce some foreign merchants to cause it to be
removed, and another piece to be engrafted within the edge of the border. But in this case there is
no other remedy than in a judicious selection of a sheet of the same breadth and fineness; for,
although two breadths of the narrow cloth might fit the vacant space, yet these must be joined by
the refugar in the mid-line; and although this can be done that the band differs not in thickness
from the rest of the cloth, yet the joint is discernible when held between the eye and the light,
from the threads in the joined breadth being not continuous in the same line, whereas any
irregularity of this nature is drowned in the edge of the bonier. The best practice to ensure a good
field bcoms to, consist in weaving the border, in every case, separately and inserting the field by
the refugar.
When finished, the shawls are submitted to the purnsgar or cleaner, whose business it is
to free the shawl from discoloured hairs or yarn, and from ends or knots: he either pulls them out
severally with a pair of tweezers, or shaves the reverse face of the cloth with a sharp knife. Any
defects arising from either operation are immediately repaired by the refugar. At this stage of the
manufacture the shawls are sent to the Collector of the stamp duties, by whom an ad valorem
duty of twenty-six: per cent is levied, and each piece is then stamped and registered.
The goods are now handed over to the wafarosh, or person who has advanced money on
them to the manufacturer, and to the mokkim, or broker, and these two fix the price, and effect
the sale to the merchant; the former charges interest on his advances, the latter a commission,
varying from two to five per cent. The purchaser takes the goods unwashed, and often in pieces,
and the fine drawer aud washer man have still to do their part. When partly washed the dhobi
brings the shawls to the merchant, that they may be examined for any holes or imperfections;
should such occur, they are remedied at the expense of the seller: if there are none, the washing
is completed.
This is done with clear cold water, using soap very cautiously, to white parts alone, and
never to embroidery: coloured shit wis are dried in the shade; white ones are bleached in the
open air, and their colour is improved by exposure to funics of sulphur. After being washed, the
shawls are stretched in a manner which answers I in some degree to calendering: a wooden
cylinder in two parts is employed for this purpose, round which the shawl, folded so as not to be
quite as broad as the cylinder is long is carefully wrapped, being occasionally damped to make it
fold tighter; the end is sewn down: two wedges are then gradually driven between the two parts
of the cylinder at the open extremities, more as to force them asunder, and the surrounding folds
of the shawl are thus stretched to as great an extent as is consistent with its texture.
The piece remains in this state for two days, when it is removed to be packed. The
packages are of various dimensions, but they are formed on one principle: these shawls are
separated by sheets of smooth glazed, and coloured paper, and they are placed between two
smooth planks of wood, with exterior transverse bars, which, projecting beyond the planks, offer
a purchase for cord to tie them together: the whole is then planed in a press, or under heavy
weights for some days, when the planks are withdrawn, the bale is sewed up in strong cloth, and
the whole is sewed up as smoothly and tightly as possible in a rawhide, which, contracting in
drawing, gives to the contents of the package a remarkable degree of compactness and
protection.