A Spools Enigma? The Iron Age Case at Arslantepe (Malatya, South-Eastern Turkey)

Spools are textile objects usually interpreted as loom weights. They have been discovered in the Iron Age levels of a large number of sites in the whole Mediterranean area. Their massive spread throughout the entire region suggests the presence of some significant change in the textile production; but what kind of change? Unpublished data from the Iron Age levels at Arslantepe (Malatya, south-eastern Turkey) shed some new light on the reasons behind the appearance and profusion of these tools. The systematic study of hundreds of clay spool-shaped objects discovered at the site shows a clear change in the use of the textile techniques at the beginning of the Iron Age, characterized by a progressive decline of other types of loom weights and probably related to an increase in the weaving activities. A combined typological, diachronic and techno-functional analysis allows us to examine some significant aspects of this production as well as the chronological distribution of these objects.