First of all: Happy St Distaff’s day! I’m celebrating with some distaff spinning of my own and watching spinning videos.
I found a couple of inspiring clips of some beautiful and very old distaff spinning technique in Ecuador. The spindle is held almost horizontally in the outer end and the thread goes over the spindle tip closest to the distaff. In the first video the spinner is using wool and has a belt distaff.
In the second video the spinner is using cotton and a separate floor distaff. She is also rolling the yarn onto a temporary cop, just like I do when I spin supported. Now and then she dips her spinning hand in what looks like water, perhaps to get a better grip on the spindle.
I would like to know more about fiber processing without cards. What techniques were / are used to align fibers?
I think the most common method has been to just tease the wool by hand, and is still in places like the Andes. You can take a look at this post and video, where I have linked to other people’s videos where they hand-tease the wool.