page_title: Wadmal
hierarchical_section_title: Wadmal
context_page_description: Wadmal is a coarse, dense, usually undyed wool fabric woven in Iceland, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Greenland, and the Orkney, Faroe and Shetland Islands from the Middle Ages into the 18th century. Wadmal was woven on the warp-weighted loom used throughout these areas of Norwegian influence, and was usually a 2/2 twill weave, although some medieval sources outside Iceland describe wadmal as tabby or plain-woven. In remote regions, wadmal remained the primary fabric for working people's clothing into the 18th century.
  Wadmal was a medium of exchange throughout Scandinavia. Wadmal was accepted as currency in Sweden, Iceland, Shetland, and Ireland, and exchange rates defined the equivalent of various grades of wadmal in silver and in cows. According to Bruce Gelsinger, the term watmal was known in Germany and the southern Baltic region as a rough cloth primarily used by the poor.
context_section_description: Wadmal (Old Norse: vaðmál; Norwegian: vadmål, "cloth measure") is a coarse, dense, usually undyed wool fabric woven in Iceland, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Greenland, and the Orkney, Faroe and Shetland Islands from the Middle Ages into the 18th century.  Wadmal was woven on the warp-weighted loom used throughout these areas of Norwegian influence, and was usually a 2/2 twill weave, although some medieval sources outside Iceland describe wadmal as tabby or plain-woven.  In remote regions, wadmal remained the primary fabric for working people's clothing into the 18th century.
  Wadmal was a medium of exchange throughout Scandinavia.  Wadmal was accepted as currency in Sweden, Iceland, Shetland, and Ireland, and  exchange rates defined the equivalent of various grades of wadmal (measured in ells) in silver and in cows. According to Bruce Gelsinger, the term watmal was known in Germany and the southern Baltic region as a rough cloth primarily used by the poor.
caption: Faroese postage stamp with a picture of a Viking helmsman in a wadmal tunic.
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