Weaving

Weaving is taking seperate threads and combining them to make fabrics or braid (woven or knotted cords).

There are several types of weaving:

• Tablet weaving
• Loom weaving
• Various braiding techniques
• Naalbinding (can vaguely fall under the term of "weaving" though also is like knitting)
• Various knotting techniques
• Various lace techniques

In short, any technique that takes threads and entangles them in a more-or-less orderly fashion so that you end up with a solid piece of fabric or braid.

In the most common form, weaving is performed on a loom which holds several threads in place (called the warp threads) while the weaver passes another thread back-and-forth, lacing these threads in place (this other thread being called the weft thread).

The warp threads generally form the stengthening shape for the cloth/braid, while the weft thread basically holds them into the shape they are held into while on the loom - so that once the cloth is removed from the loom, it retains its shape.

In period, early wheel-spun techniques for spinning thread made a softer, less strong type of thread than the traditional whorl-spun thread. The wheel-spun threads were actually illegal to use in the weft-thread as they were considered too weak - especially where the cloth/braid was to carry weight. Whorl-spun thread was thus used for quite a long time after spinning wheels were invented and put to use.