Craeft: An Inquiry Into the Origins and True Meaning of Traditional Crafts

by Alexander Langlands

Overview

“Hypnotic.… [Langlands] begins to see not just the beauty of an object.… but the deeper purpose for which each has been created.” —New York Times

Faced with an endless supply of mass-manufactured products, we find ourselves nostalgic for goods bearing the mark of authenticity—hand-made tools, local brews, and other objects produced by human hands. Archaeologist and medieval historian Alexander Langlands reaches as far back as the Neolithic period to recover our lost sense of craft, combining deep history with detailed scientific analyses and his own experiences making traditional crafts. Craft brims with vivid storytelling, rich descriptions of natural landscape, and delightful surprises that will convince us to introduce more craft into our lives.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780393356571
Publisher:	Norton, W. W. & Company, Inc.
Publication date:	01/15/2019
Pages:	352
Sales rank:	297,647
Product dimensions:	5.30(w) x 8.10(h) x 0.90(d)

About the Author

Alexander Langlands is a British archaeologist and medieval historian. He is a regular presenter for the BBC and teaches medieval history at Swansea University. He currently resides in Swansea, Wales.

Table of Contents

Foreword: The Strimmer and the Scythe 1

Preface: Why Cræft? 7

1 Defining Cræft 13

2 Making Hay 39

3 Sticks and Stones 55

4 Grenjaðarstaður 79

5 The Skep-making Beekeeper 91

6 Taming the Wilds 109

7 Weft and Warp 131

8 Under Thatch 165

9 The Shoe and the Harness 193

10 Seed and Sward 217

11 The Oxna Mere 235

12 Fire and Earth 263

13 The Craft of Digging 295

14 Baskets and Boats 311

Postscript: Craft and Contemplation 335

Acknowledgements 344

Editorial Reviews

A coherent and enjoyable argument for ‘not just a knowledge of making but a knowledge of being.’

Guardian

Part how-to, part memoir, the book gets at what it means to make things with your own hands, and how this experience connects us both to the past and to our present sense of place.

American Scholar

[Langlands] is a sort of method archaeologist, understanding ancient processes through a kind of performative osmosis…His genuine passion for the activity at hand makes his account hypnotic…He is clearly addicted to that place where labor is transformed through mastery into art…Beyond the mastery of specialized skills, Langlands is talking about something more holistic: a way of looking at the world. In reconnecting with craeft, he begins to see not just the beauty of an object or a building or a landscape, but the deeper purpose for which each has been created. And he understands, too, the environment they shape and upon which they depend. "Archaeology became so much more than just stuff in the ground," he says about his own journey. "It became an exploration of what it was to be human, not only because we are makers but because we are resourcers, gatherers with an inveterate knowledge of the natural world around us"…At a time where our disconnection from the world around us is not just tragic but downright dangerous, recovering our status as Homo faber, the species that makes things, may be our salvation.

The New York Times Book Review - Michael Bierut

★ 10/30/2017
Archeologist and BBC presenter Langlands brings his approachable voice and unique firsthand experience to this exploration of the history behind traditional crafts. Despite its modern usage, craft—or cræft, in Old English—is about more than just making; it also connotes the knowledge and resourcefulness needed to adapt in the face of changing materials and circumstances. Through a series of short histories focused on such crafts as thatching, weaving, and leather making, Langlands recovers craft as a model for a more engaged, resilient, and sustainable way of life. Interlacing each history with accounts of his own attempts to practice traditional crafts, Langlands reveals the intricate balancing acts required by craft processes while also reflecting broadly on human interactions with landscapes. Langlands makes a strong, if sometimes unnuanced, argument against the mindlessness of modern consumption, urging readers to prioritize long-term use over profitability and disposability. In the ingenuity of craft, he sees not dead tradition but rather a way forward for an uncertain, unstable world. Sustained by Langland’s clear yet lyrical prose, this book is sure to interest readers concerned with history, human know-how, and the future of this Earth. Illus. (Jan.)

Publishers Weekly

Alexander Langlands is spot-on: crafting isn’t just about creating beautiful, useful objects. It’s about reclaiming the knowledge, wisdom, and power that link us to the collective history of civilization. Craeft is what makes us human.

Carleen Madigan

Erudite, deftly argued, well written, and timely—Langlands weaves together the basic human desire to use our hands to make things with tradition, landscape, and the natural world. A delightful book that should be widely read.

Robert Penn

In Craeft, Mr. Langlands excavates the scintillating history of our truest super power: making clever things with our hands. This history is rife with real-life magic and affection, for our earth as well as one another. I am damn grateful for this book.

Nick Offerman

I am in no way crafty, but this book had me yearning to thatch my own roof just to be in touch with the physical and attendant mental labor of putting something useful together.

Pamela Paul

Archaeologist and BBC presenter Alexander Langlands offers a fascinating and surprisingly relevant dive into a subject that might seem niche to many—the origins of traditional crafts in medieval Europe... Readers get a richly atmospheric peek into “craefts” like the thatching of roofs, the spinning of wool, and the tanning of hides... What Langlands is advocating for in his book is more widespread knowledge about the time when craft was integral to daily life. In the era he studies, activities like beekeeping weren’t escapes from reality, but essential to it.

The Atlantic

Alex Langlands is probably the only person who could have written this wonderful book, drawing as it does upon his extraordinary combination of experiences as an archaeologist and as somebody who has actively learned such a huge range of the traditional crafts which he explains. This is literally heritage in action, and artistry which produces practical rewards.

Ronald Hutton

Whether it’s the small-batch hot sauce or the rage for craft beer, today’s consumer wants tradition, quality, and artisan everything. Langlands offers a fascinating history of what’s setting trends today.

Booklist

Using a combination of memoir, history and cultural commentary – in the first chapter Langlands has his own Poldark moment with a scythe – Langlands makes a coherent and enjoyable argument for 'not just a knowledge of making but a knowledge of being.'

The Guardian

Hypnotic... In reconnecting with craeft, [Langlands] begins to see not just the beauty of an object or a building or a landscape, but the deeper purpose for which each has been created. And he understands, too, the environment they shape and upon which they depend.... At a time where our disconnection from the world around us is not just tragic but downright dangerous, recovering our status as Homo faber, the species that makes things, may be our salvation.

Michael Bierut - New York Times

Whether it’s the small-batch hot sauce or the rage for craft beer, today’s consumer wants tradition, quality, and artisan everything. Langlands offers a fascinating history of what’s setting trends today.

Booklist

★ 11/15/2017
Inspired by several BBC historical re-creation series including Victorian Farm (2008), which Langlands (lecturer, Swansea Univ.; The Ancient Ways of Wessex) participated in, this book dissects medieval British cræft as a lost amalgam of "knowledge, power, skill." The intersection of the author's archaeological background and love of historical farming yields a fascinating analysis of the disappearing arts of wattlework, hedgerow maintenance, thatch rooves, pond making, pottery, and basket weaving. "To be cræfty is all about resourceful living and about going back to the basics: a mindful life achieved through beautiful simplicity." It's not just about how you replicate the arts in the modern sense, but what we can learn about past civilizations of Great Britain. The enduring virtues of increasingly obscure tools such as scythes, pitchforks, skeps (straw beehives) and hedging hooks are extolled. Langlands isn't only writing about research, he's actually farming in his daily life with these lost arts. He's a living experiment, just as he depicted in his television work. VERDICT An engaging read imparting a wealth of historical knowledge with a touch of infotainment. With the current interest in authentic arts and handmade goods, this unparalleled scholarly work will appeal to both specialists and casual readers.—Jessica Bushore, Xenia, OH

Library Journal

2017-09-12
Tracing human existence from prehistory on, a historian celebrates resourcefulness and skill.British archaeologist and medievalist Langlands (Medieval History/Swansea Univ.), presenter of the BBC series VictorianFarm and Edwardian Farm, makes his literary debut with a delightful, informative melding of memoir and history. Like Ruth Goodman did in her books How to be a Victorian (2014) and How to be a Tudor (2016), Langlands conveys the reality of daily life in earlier times, focusing especially on "physical adeptness, strength and fitness" along with hard-won wisdom about materials and techniques, all components of cræft. He believes that society today is "going backwards," relying on machines that have rendered us "lazy, stupid, desensitised and disengaged." On his journey of discovery, Langlands finds evidence of craftiness in museums, such as the Museum of Welsh Life, where he investigated beekeeping; and an Icelandic farmstead museum containing implements and artifacts of daily life: a cornucopia of tools and gear, along with "skilfully made baskets, chests and trunks" to hold them. Much of what he learned came from his own determined efforts. "As is often the case with my experimental historical crafts addiction," he admits as he faced the challenge of making a thatched roof, "one extremely long and arduous task leads to another extremely long and arduous task." The author discloses the complex processes involved in creating items we take for granted: woolen fabric, for example, requires an understanding of "how fleeces translate into fibres, how fibres translate into yarns, how both respond to dyes," and how yarn becomes fabric for particular uses. The tanning of hides into leather is similarly complicated, with multiple steps of cleaning, preserving, and drying. Farming, haying, weaving, basketry, and boat-making are some of the crafts Langlands describes in fascinating detail as he travels through time and place. He regrets that workmanship is no longer revered: "we have become detached from making," he writes, "and it isn't a good state for us to be in."Humans are makers, the author argues persuasively in this illuminating book, in need of renewed connection to the intelligence and ingenuity of craft.

Kirkus Reviews

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