Silk

Silk is a natural fiber that can be woven into textiles. It is typically produced by certain insects, such as silkworms and silk gargoyles. It is often produced by boiling insectoid cocoons, unraveling their filaments, spinning them into reels of thread, dying the thread into colors as desired, and weaving the thread into fabric. Other sources include spiders (as well as giant spiders) and other arachnids.

On Golarion

The markets of Niswan likely sell locally produced silk from one of the city's several silk mills.

Silk is or has been produced or sold in many parts of Golarion, including:

• Niswan, Jalmeray, home of at least four silk mills and a dozen silk weavers in its Low-Caste District alone.
• Isger, where silkworms found in the Chitterwood are cultivated to produce fine silk valued throughout Avistan.
• Kyonin, particularly Iadara, where clothiers craft delicately layered silken garments popular with traders.
• Across Tian Xia, whose brightly dyed silk garments interwoven with metallic threads are considered prestigious imports in cosmopolitan locations in the Inner Sea region, such as Absalom and Katheer, and where silken kimonos often play a pivotal social role.
  • The Cresting Blossom silk shop in Goka's trade district.
  • The House of 1,000 Silks in northwestern Quain.
• Thuvia, where close-fitting silk jackets with gold embroidery are fashionable.
• Katapesh, Magnimar, Qadira, Falcon's Hollow, Ordu-Aganhei, and Port Ice, where silk is sold as a trade good or in clothing, magic items, and other products.
• Formerly in Nystra, Galt, a now-abandoned town founded by silk merchants and home to mills harvesting silk from enslaved silk gargoyles.

Bolts of silk cloth can vary widely in value, from 120 to 140 gold pieces for fine specimens, to 75 gp as trade goods, to as little as 10 gp in storage.

Silk fabric is used to make fine clothing and bedding, Varisian dancing scarves, rope, upholstery, tents, tapestries, curtains, carpets, ship's sails, bowstrings, and is even used in the colorful banners that fly from the roofs of Niswan's buildings. Its uniquely sensual texture also makes it a popular material for corsets and courtesans' outfits.

In trade

Red silk flags demarcate the Red Silk Route through The Coins district of Absalom.

Aren is a silk merchant who may sometimes be found trading in Dimayen, in southern Qadira.

In poisons

An adhesive produced by spider silk glands can be used as a binding agent in some poisons.

Magical generation

A sea silk shell can generate magical silk cloth, sails, and garments woven from pen shells.

Creature associations

Jorogumos can take the form of silk-shrouded humanoids.

References

Silk production is described in detail within the Pathfinder Module Cult of the Ebon Destroyers.

For additional as-yet unincorporated sources about this subject, see the Meta page.