Asian knowledge and the development of calico printing in Europe in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries

Abstract

From the seventeenth century, the brilliance and permanence of colour and the exotic nature of imported Asian textiles attracted European consumers. The limited knowledge of colouring agents and the general absence of textile printing and dyeing in Europe were, however, major impediments to the development of a cotton textile-printing and -dyeing industry in Europe. This article aims to chart the rise of a European calico-printing industry in the late seventeenth and eighteenth centuries by analysing the knowledge transfer of textile-printing techniques from Asia to Europe