Quilt Musings

This afternoon my back and shoulders began to ache from bending over a quilting hoop too long, so I decided to do some research through my quilting books about the history of quilting.

As a book nut and collector - Is that redundant? - I have about fifty books on quilting.  Most of them are recently published, with patterns for quilts or are about quilting techniques.  Two, however, are older and provide a pretty good history of quilts, focusing primarily on US quilts but also how Europe and Asia influenced the development of US quilts.  Interestingly, to me at least, neither of these books provided any references or bibliography.  They weren't intended for scholars but for quilters.  They are both also completely ignore the possibility that there were, or are, male quilters.

The older of these books is "The Standard Book of Quilt Making and Collecting", by Marguerite Ickis [1949, Dover Publications, New York].  At first it seemed strange to find the history of quilts as the very last chapter of the book, but it is actually a good place to have it.  Once you read about quilting patterns and techniques, like Chapter 1 "Planning Your Quilt", Chapter 3 "The Quilt's Design and Its parts", Chapter 5 "Borders", and Chapter 6 "Quilting", the author moves through less technical topics: Chapter 8 "Other Uses for Quilting", Chapter 9 "Unusual Quilts", and finally, Chapter 12 "The Story of Quilt Making".  The Table of Contents has a brief description of each chapter.  The one for Chapter 12 is perfect.

Personal memories of old quilts ...Where quilting began in early civilization.  How the Crusaders brought quilting art to Europe and British Isles.  ... How quilting was connected with figures of history - Marie Antoinette, Mary of Scotland, William Shakespeare, Sir Samuel Pepys. ... The quilting party and social life of settlers; old traditions linked up with new. ...

The other book is "Quilting Manual" by Dolores A. Hinson [1966, 1970 Heartside Press.  Dover edition published 1980, New York, NY].  It begins with Chapter 1: " A Short History of Quilts".  The first two paragraphs hooked me pretty well.

   The lovely designs of American quilts, the highly imaginative names used for patterns, and the documentation of the many famous, and other not so famous, quilts combine to for a little-known section of the American story.  Through Quilts, we are able to view history from a woman's perspective

   The quilting of cloth came into being when the people who invented weaving reasoned that two or even three thicknesses of cloth would be warmer than one thickness.  For centuries the Chinese used quilted cloth to make their characteristically padded winter clothing.  The Crusaders found that the quilted shirts worn by the Arabs in the Near East when worn as an undergarment beneath chain mail prevented chafing more effectively than the shirts of single layers of cloth they had always worn. [Page 13].

Ms Ickes ends her book with these final poignant paragraphs:

What's In A Quilt?

   Then with the completed quilt on the re-finished antique four-poster she can run her fingers over the glowing, smooth stitched surface and remember the past as did one great-grandmother back in Ohio.  That kindly, ancient lady reminisced as she passed her work-worn fingers over a quilt she had pieced together while her family was growing up.
   "It took me more than twenty years, nearly twenty-five, I reckon," she told me softly, "in the evenings after supper when the children were all put in bed.  My whole life is in that quilt.  It scares me sometimes when I look at it.  All my joys and all my sorrows are stitched into those little pieces.  When I was proud of the boys and when I was downright provoked and angry with them.  When the girls annoyed me or when they gave me a warm feeling around my heart.  And John too.  He was stitched into that quilt and all the thirty years we were married.  Sometimes I loved him and sometimes I sat there hating him as I pieced the pieces together.  So they are all in that quilt, my hopes and fears, my joys and sorrows, my loves and hates.  I tremble sometimes when I remember what that quilt knows about me."

And something close to that, friends, is why I quilt.