Ane Marie Aleksandersdatter, great-great grandmother of the author.
By Lill-Karin Elvestad
One day in 1863. Joy ignited in her chest as she closed the door behind her. It was chilly in the room, but she would soon warm up. The evening light that wandered past the window made the colors in the cloth stand out clearly. Green at the bottom and horizontal lines in red, black and blue. She knew each thread, they had slipped through her fingers as she spun them, and the colors were hers too. She still wondered how moss, lichen and birch leaves that were always just there, out in the landscape, could be transformed into strong colors and give life to grey-white wool.
They said she was good. They said she had her own flair for weaving, that what she created was beautiful. And maybe it was like that, but she thought mostly about getting the next thread as smooth as the previous one.
She settled herself, tightened the knot of hair at the nape of her neck and spread her arms over the weave like a pianist over the keys. Soon the rhythm found her and she fell into it and danced along.
Women’s Day, March 8, 2024. Today I think of my great-great-grandmother Ane Marie Aleksandersdatter, who was only 16-17 years old when she wove the dress you see in the picture. The thin, thin wool threads are perfectly even, and the pattern stands out clearly in four colors. Most likely she had carded and spun the wool herself, and perhaps also sheared the sheep. She gathered plants and vegetation to dye the yarn, and knew exactly which plants produced which color.
Jacket woven and sewn by Ane Marie Aleksandersdatter, front
The whole painstaking process from wool on the sheep until she could put on the beautiful dress life and accompanying skirt, required knowledge, accuracy and creative urge.
But Ane Marie could not write. Maybe not read either. I know that because when I wrote the book Til livet skilte oss ad – skilsmissehistorier 1879-1909 [Till Life Did Us Part – Divorce Stories 1879-1909], in which her and her husband Theodor’s divorce is one of the stories, I saw that all the documents she had signed include m.p.p. underneath, which means med påholden penn [with held pen] – someone had held the pen for her.
Was she illiterate? I don’t know.
But what I know today is that she had great abilities in textile art, on the same level as many other women of her time. Perhaps Ane Marie would have had a career as an artist and weaver if she had been placed in another place, in another time. But like thousands of other women whose significant knowledge and artistic abilities were given little recognition, Ane Marie came to live a quite anonymous life, a cog in the wheel of grey everyday existence.
Fortunately, Ane Marie’s daughter Anna, my great-grandmother, was far-sighted enough to give the dress life as a gift to the Tromsø museum sometime in 1935. Thanks to this, one day earlier in February this year I was able to join a conservator in the magazine at the museum and look at the art created by my own great grandmother.
Which again says a lot about the importance of preserving our cultural history! Happy Women’s Day!
Jacket woven and sewn by Ane Marie Aleksandersdatter, back. Aleksandersdatter’s dress was delivered to Tromsø museum by her daughter Anne (my great grandmother) in the 1930s, and is now being used by students and other textile-interested people as an example of the great handcraft that existed in Northern Norway at this time. The museums page for this is: https://www.unimus.no/portal/#/things/dcc035d0-5749-4baa-9bff-ab728d5dd854
Editor’s note: Lill-Karin Elvestad wrote this tribute to her great-great-grandmother on Instagram recently, and I asked if I could include it with her other article, “Old Clothing Tells our Story.” She responded, “I’m just thrilled that the story of Ane Marie gets known. Her fate became somewhat dark and miserable, but she had outstanding skills that today would have brought her out in the great world, I think.”
Lill-Karin Elvestad is a writer, journalist and historian from Troms. Her interests lies in cultural history of Northern Norway, and she’s written several books and a lot of articles for various magazines through the years. She lives at a little farm in Balsfjord, in the midst of Troms, with a husband, two cats and two nearly grown up kids. On the farm there’s a house from 1926 which she restored in 2022 and now uses as a meeting place for arrangements, writing-courses and story-nights. More about Elvestad on Instagram: @lillkarinelvestad or Facebook: Lill-Karin Elvestad forfatter
Translated by Robbie LaFleur
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