Minoan ladies, Scythian warriors, Roman and Sarmatian merchants, prehistoric weavers, gold sheet figures, Vikings, Medieval saints and sinners, Renaissance noblemen, Danish peasants, dressmakers and Hollywood stars appear in the pages of this anthology. This is not necessarily how they dressed in the past, but how the authors of this book think they dressed in the past, and why they think so. No reader of this book will ever look at a reconstructed costume in a museum or at a historical festival, or watch a film with a historic theme again without a heightened awareness of how, why, and from what sources, the costumes were reconstructed. The seventeen contributors come from a variety of disciplines: archaeologists, historians, curators with ethnological and anthropological backgrounds, designers, a weaver, a conservator and a scholar of fashion in cinema, are all specialists interested in ancient or historical dress who wish to share their knowledge and expertise with students, hobby enthusiasts and the general reader. The anthology is also recommended for use in teaching students at design schools.

The NESAT symposium has grown from the first meeting in 1981 which was attended by 23 scholars, to over 100 at the tenth meeting that took place in Copenhagen in 2008, with virtually all areas of Europe represented. The 50 papers from the conference presented here show the vibrance of the study of archaeological textiles today. Examples studied come from the Bronze Age, Neolithic, the Iron Age, Roman, Viking, the Middle Ages and post-Medieval, and from a wide range of countries including Norway, Czech Republic, Poland, Greece, Germany, Lithuania, Estonia and the Netherlands. Modern techniques of analysis and examination are also discussed.