Muslin

Etymology and history

Muslin (AmE: Muslin gauze) from French mousseline, from Italian mussolina, from Mussolo ‘Mosul’ (Mosul, Iraq, where European traders are said to have first encountered the cloth). Although this view has the fabric named after the city where Europeans first encountered it (Mosul), the fabric is believed to have originated in Dhakeshwari, now Dhaka the capital of Bangladesh. In the 9th century, an Arab merchant named Sulaiman made note of the material's origin in Bengal (known as Ruhml in Arabic). Bengali muslin was traded throughout the Muslim world, from the Middle East to Southeast Asia. In many Islamic regions, such as in Central Asia, the cloth was named Daka, after the city of Dhaka.

Some believe Crusaders of the First Crusade found the cloth in the Middle East and brought it back to Europe.

Subsequently, the word Muslin found its place in various European languages as French mousseline, Italian mussolina etc.,

In 1298, Marco Polo described the cloth in his book The Travels. He said it was made in Mosul, Iraq. During the 17th and 18th centuries, Mughal Bengal emerged as the foremost muslin exporter in the world, with Mughal Dhaka as capital of the worldwide muslin trade. During the Roman period Khadi muslin was introduced in Europe and a vast amounts of fabrics were traded to Europe for many centuries. It became highly popular in 18th-century France and eventually spread across much of the Western world. During British colonial rule in the eighteenth century, the Bengali muslin industry was ruthlessly suppressed by various colonial policies, which favored imports of industrially manufactured textiles from Britain. Brutality to muslin weavers was intense, William Bolts noting in 1772 that "instances have been known of their cutting off their thumbs to prevent their being forced to wind silk." As a result, the quality of muslin suffered greatly and its finesse was nearly lost for two centuries. There have been various attempts at reviving the muslin industry in modern Bangladesh.

At the end of the 16th century the English traveler Ralph Fitch greatly admired the muslin of Sonargaon. The Portuguese traveler Duarte Barbosa described the muslin of Bengal in the early 16th century. He mentioned a few types of fabrics, such as estrabante (sarband), mamona, fugoza, choutara, and sinabaka. In present day, many different types of muslins are produced in many different places, including Dhaka.

The word muslin is also used colloquially. In the United Kingdom, many sheer cotton fabrics are called muslin, while in the United States, muslin sometimes refers to a firm cloth for everyday use, which in the UK and Australia is known as calico.

Under British rule, the British East India company could not compete with the local Muslin with their own export of cloth to India. Muslin production was repressed and the knowledge eradicated. Local weavers were systematically rounded up and their hands mutilated with removal of their thumbs.

Dress-making and sewing

When sewing clothing, a dressmaker may test the fit of a garment, using an inexpensive muslin fabric before cutting pieces from expensive fabric, thereby avoiding potential costly mistakes. This garment is often called a "muslin," and the process is called "making a muslin." In this context, "muslin" has become the generic term for a test or fitting garment, regardless of what it is made from.

Muslin is also often used as a backing or lining for quilts, and thus can often be found in wide widths in the quilting sections of fabric stores.

Shellac polishing

Muslin is used as a French polishing pad.

Culinary

Muslin can be used as a filter:

Muslin is the material for the traditional cloth wrapped around a Christmas pudding.

Muslin is the fabric wrapped around the items in barmbrack, a fruitcake traditionally eaten at Halloween in Ireland.

Muslin is used when making traditional Fijian Kava as a filter.

Beekeepers use muslin to filter melted beeswax to clean it of particles and debris.

Theater and photography

Muslin is often the cloth of choice for theater sets. It is used to mask the background of sets and to establish the mood or feel of different scenes. It receives paint well and, if treated properly, can be made translucent.

It also holds dyes well. It is often used to create nighttime scenes because when dyed, it often gets a wavy look with the color varying slightly, such that it resembles a night sky. Muslin shrinks after it is painted or sprayed with water, which is desirable in some common techniques such as soft-covered flats.

In video production as well, muslin is used as a cheap greenscreen or bluescreen, either pre-colored or painted with latex paint (diluted with water). It is commonly used as a background for the chroma key technique.

Muslin is the most common backdrop material used by photographers for formal portrait backgrounds. These backdrops are usually painted, most often with an abstract mottled pattern.

In the early days of silent film-making, and up until the late 1910s, movie studios did not have the elaborate lights needed to illuminate indoor sets, so most interior scenes were sets built outdoors with large pieces of muslin hanging overhead to diffuse sunlight.

Medicine

Surgeons use muslin gauze in cerebrovascular neurosurgery to wrap around aneurysms or intracranial vessels at risk for bleeding. The thought is that the gauze reinforces the artery and helps prevent rupture. It is often used for aneurysms that, due to their size or shape, cannot be microsurgically clipped or coiled.

Muslin is also commonly used in the manufacture of bandages. It provides a compact yet strong improvised material in emergency medicine, and is used for slings, swaths, and tourniquets.

Early aviation

The Wright Brothers, in search of a light and strong covering for their gliders and the 1903 Wright Flyer (the first heavier-than-air powered aircraft), selected Pride of the West muslin as a covering for wings and control surfaces. A large piece of the fabric used on the original Wright Flyer (1903) was passed down to Wright descendants. The fabric was made available to The Wright Experience(reproduction of the Wright gliders and Flyer and reenactment of the first flight on its 100th anniversary) for examination as it was no longer commercially available a century after its use by the Wrights. To create an authentic modern reproduction of the original fabric, three different companies were needed which produced the thread, the weaving, and the finishing).