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Origin
Champa, Chhatisgarh, India
Fiber
There are seven varieties of Kosa silk i.e.
(1) Shukinda
(2) Dabha
(3) Jadav Dabha
(4) Ranad
(5) Railly
(6) Lariya
(7) Bhrafvala
Railly, Lariya and Barf cocoons are found naturally in the forest collected by the forest dwellers mainly the tribals.
The threads which come from Rally cocoons are generally black in colour while others are yellowish or creamish.
Yarn
Ghicha: Ghicha yarn is produced out of those cocoons, out of which live worm has come out. In the process, the cocoon is damaged and one cannot get a continuous filament. In such cases the cocoons are boiled with soap solutions and several filaments are joined and reeled. This process creates a yarn called as Ghicha and is characterized by its very typical coarseness.
Katiya: After making the yarn from Gheecha process, some quantity of waste material remains in the cocoons. This waste material then cut together into finer pieces and then reeled into yarn. This yarn is called Katiya.
Nassi: Before making cocoon, the larva joins it with the help of a stem like structure. This structure also contains filaments. However, this is quite stiff. It has to be soaked and boiled in a soft solution and beaten with wooden hammer till it becomes soft. Then it is reeled on thigh in the form of yarn and out of which the fabric is made which is characterized by its typical softness. However, this yarn is costly as a large number of stems are needed to make the fabric.
Technique
The looms being used now are mostly fly shuttle pit looms though there are some throw shuttle looms in Raigarh
The three shuttle technique is to be found in most Kosa silk areas
Sizing is done by hand with the help of brushes, specially meant for this purpose.
The loss of Sericin during reeling can be off set by what is known as ‘weighting’ or loading, which adds to the volume and weight of raw silk, as also adds to the luster and rustle of silk. In Chhattisgarh, weighting is a compulsory process which is done during the process of sizing, especially for fabrics like ‘Korahs’, undegummed and unbleached fabrics. The weighting is done with starch normally cooked rice water. This is applied to wet the warp and weft yarn during weaving
In the cottages of the weavers a usual warp is of one piece length i.e. one sari, or one piece of malmal of 6 yards or safa of 9 yards.
Surface Ornamentation
The Phera indicates the meaning of ‘round’. Phera method of weaving the body of saree and its border weft threads has rounded each other. The body weft threads are not interlacing with border warp threads and vice versa. They are interlaced by rounding each other at the point of body and border following the phera method. The designs are made using the jhala, jacaurd and dobby.
Uniqueness
The designs are prepared with the dexterous process of Dobby system& there is also no use of jacquard.
References
