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...and spinners. I've often wondered at the patience of those who weave and spin. And other similar occupations. I don't have such patience. My daughter knitted me a scarf--and is busily knitting one for my mother--and I wonder at her patience.
And that wondering takes me back to the first beings who thought to twine and twist. Were they the primaeval knitpickers who found that by picking and twisting, something longer and more substantial would be formed? I'm amazed today by my kids who collect rubberbands and combine them into huge balls--and those who do something similar with paper clips.
And has anyone seen a spider slow motion actually connecting all those points in the classic Halloween spider's web? I'd really like to see that being done.
If there's something to be twisted or spun or looped or connected, some being will set to do it--and the results are fabulously worth the effort in many cases.
Oh, one more observation: my daughter sat next to a passenger on the flight home for the holiday who knitted two scarves at once on very long needles! I would have loved to have seen that, too.
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The lovely AnnaS and I went to a concert last Sunday and watched a kitter who spent not one moment watching what she was doing. She was knitting on full automatic.
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spinning and weaving are very old.
twine (a heavy, coarse material made by hand spinning (often just rub twisting it on one's leg) is the simples of spun fibers.
with time and practice, the material got finer.. and you end up with cord, and finally yarn. (and eventually thread)
Textile (fabric)are the 'original' technology. (a word now used to mean almost everything but textiles! (remember this from the fabric and fabricate (the idea of building!) thread?
as for knitting, i regular knit 2 socks (on 2 needles (seamlessly!) and some thing as simple of as socks (except for the heel or toe (which get shaped) are 'mindless knitting', i don't have to look at the work to do it.
(last year, when i was teaching knitting, i taught a blind woman to knit.. just the simplest of stuff, but she learned to knit!)
but knitting is no where near the oldest of the textile arts. weaving is far older. (pre-historic!) we know this because we have 'loom weights' (donut shaped stones, weighting between 3 and 10 pounds. most museums have a collection, but the curators, in 'acts' of purity never show looms, because no scrap of fabric nor any pieces of looms have survived. Nor do they show early man wearing woven cloth. Bog men, and bodies like the one of the man found frozen in alps some years ago are incredible, because they often preserve small scraps of woven cloth --different types of looms are used for different weaves (or were) so even small scraps of cloth give some understanding to the type loom it was made on)
i suspect in ancient times, some clever person realized a loosely 'woven' mesh would be good for catch fish (the same way a spider catches flies.
twine was often made by men, so its would be expected that men were the first weaves. (as the scots song "the work of weavers' always declares! (but women seemed to have created/learned basket weaving on their own, so there were no doubt, cross polination of ideas about what to do with twine, string, cords, yarns and threads!
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In reply to:
Oh, one more observation: my daughter sat next to a passenger on the flight home for the holiday who knitted two scarves at once on very long needles! I would have loved to have seen that, too.
They allow knitting needles on board planes these days?
Bingley
Bingley
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Thanks, of troy! Good reading from you as usual.
And good point, Bingley. Apparently, yes--and very long ones!
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weaving gives us great words, weft and warp, headle, treddle, shuttle, and a gazzilion words for types of 'weave' (plain, tabby cloth, monks cloth, gingham, muslin, poplin, satin, velvet, corderoy, twill, lino, pique, diaper(cloth)--to name a few.)
we have discussed many but not all of these words over time.. (and there are lots more words specifically associated with looms, that i don't know/remember--(that is i might recognize them as words describing a specific part of a loom, but i don't really know which part.. i do know the headle, treddle and shuttle(by sight) and the beater board.
finished fabric can be fulled or felted (as can knitted fabric)
fabic has a selvage, a 'grain', it can have a nap, or be biased.
some terms are very common, many are somewhat... most of us know muslin or poplin, percale or broadcloth --all common fabric for sheets and bed linens, but how many of us know the difference between a muslin and percale?
when home weaving was more common, almost every would have.. these words are classifies, but understanding the classification is an obscure art.
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knitting needle are permitted on most US domestic flights, (internationally, there are sometimes different rules.)but you still can't take a pair of scissors aboard.
straight needles aren't very good 'weapons'. the points are rather dull, and aluminum is likely to bend and warp if you try to 'stab' someone (rather than peircing them) even if you do peirce them, it unlikely to be fatal. plastic or bamboo might be a bit more 'dangerous' but hardly.. (i suppose you could blind someone with a knitting needle, but a ball point pen could be used to that effect too)
curiously circluar needles (ridged points at an end of heavy duty nylon cable (fairly think cable.. think of the cable on grass trimmers/edgers) are also permitted.
since these can be 40 inches long (about 1 meter) the cable is long enough to be use to garrot someone!
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I find tatted works to be particularly interesting. I suspect tatting is an offshoot of crocheting, which may be an offshoot of knitting, but I’m not sure. To think that so many knots could be tied so small, into such intricate patterns amazes me – the time, effort, and physical dexterity that must go into such endeavors!
I wonder if knitting, in some form, preceded weaving, or if the knitting type of fabrication is on a wholly separate branch from the weaving type of fabrication.
Could it be that tatting was a way of skirting sumptuary laws?
Any thoughts, Helen?
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I would think that knotting would have been the first type of such endeavors. It seems that knotting is one of the first things that we learn how to do --- tying and knotting -- so perhaps just tying things together might have been the first such action. And later: tying the things tied together so as to make a broader dimensional form.
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tatting, is really the same 'stitch' as many fishing nets--just done in miniature.. not related to knitting or crochet really in any way!
crossing threads with you, yes, i am sure tatting (knotted mesh work) which had been around for eons, was adapted to make ever finer 'lace' as a way to skirt sumpuary laws.
"real lace' is called pillow lace. is a kind of free hand weaving. bobbins of thread are hand woven, and twisted about each other.(sometimes as many as 300, even narrow bands of lace often have over 100 bobbins! small straight pins keep the twists 'in place' until the weight and tension will. (think of braiding hair.. the braid will un'ravel' unless secured. (less so with curly hair, more so with straight hair.) the fine threads used on lace will unravel (when cut!) or if left unsecured even while working them. so the lace is made on large pillows,(giant pin-cushions) and held in place with pins till secure.--pillow lace is very much like braiding.. (weaving has warp and weft, lace only has weft!)
'lace like' things can be made by
tatting-- a form of knotted mesh (identical to mesh used by some fishermen)
crochet
knitting
sewing. (eyelet lace, 'drawn thread', and battenburg (fine ribbons loosely sewn together with open stitches.)
Its generaly held that weaving came first (knitting of any sort was unknown in new world, but there were many groups that specialized in weaving (cotton is native to both new world and old)-- so weaving was 'invented' in both new world and old--or it was so old it came with the settlers to new world.
something similar to tatting was used in New world --shuttle-made mesh for fish nets. (and basicly that is what tatting is, you use a shuttle to form a 'hitches' half hitches and double hitches (a hitch is a basic knot, consult a boy scout manual if you don't know it) but it was never miniaturized. (matter of time and desire)
extra thread between the stitches makes picot's. tatting is made of loops (rings) of hitches, and 'lenghts' of straight work.
its not that hard to learn, (i taught myself)but i never practiced enough to get fast (but i still made yards of tatted lace.. (several pillow case edges worth!)
crochet hooks were in use for almost as long as knitting, but mostly as repair tools. (think of them as darning needles for knitted items) crochet really didn't take off (no art work of anyone doing it, till late 17th century)and it seems to have been an european invention.
you can find pictures of the madonna knitting for (or with)the christ child starting in the 13th century, and much older knitting in near east (eygpt). knitting was invented somewhere near egypt, and was spread through out near east by islamic traders. (south americans (many) still knit in an islamic style, no doubt taught the skill by 'spanish' sailors who also knit in that style
there are 3 major styles of knitting (european, Eastern and combo) and with european, many sub styles. hell, the UK alone has a half dozen!-- knitting in shetland island is different than in the fair isle (what less than 50miles away?) and scot's knitting is different than 'English' and English has 2 major styles! (think of the alphabets.. most I-E languages have A (alpha, allef, etc..) and A still looks something the old cuniform character.. but just as hebrew uses an A, it also is very different than most romance languages. sure scholars can 'see' similarites..
All knitting LOOKS the same. but there are RADICALLY different ways to form the stitches. (clockwise motion vs conterclockwise, vs. 'combo' (both clockwise and counterclockwise motions!) Combo (the least common) is how i knit.
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crossing threads with you !
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Thank you, Helen. That was a very interesting read. The history of fibers, weaving, knitting, etc. is something I hadn’t really considered before. The more you dilate on the subject though, the more interesting I find it. It seems to have many historical, anthropological (cultural), artistic, and mathematical aspects.
While reading your post, I found myself associating the designs I’ve seen in lace, etc. with the appearance and structure of fractals. Wouldn’t it been amazing if the advent of intricate lace, etc., was in some way influenced by some sort of biological sympathetic reaction to chaos, and the patterns therein?
I know, I know: “Earth to Spaceboy: Your mom says it’s time to come back to reality now.”
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chaosI just saw a site today where someone had knitted/crocheted Lorenz attractors... I believe I found it at boingboing, and I can't get there from here... so maybe later, unless someone wants to look. it was pretty cool stuff. editfound it! http://www.bristol.ac.uk/news/2004/589
formerly known as etaoin...
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Thanks for the link, etaoin! Wow!
From the article:
Osinga and Krauskopf’s work gives much-needed insight into how chaos arises and is organised in systems as diverse as chemical reactions, biological networks and even your kitchen mixer.
Whada-ya know! Maybe I’m not such a Spaceboy after all!
Apropos to weaving: most of you probably already know this, but the computers with which we so cheerfully communicate, can trace their ancestry, at least in part, back to the loom.
Knitting, crocheting, weaving, computers, chaos: who’da thunk they’d have a common thread?
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ask and you shall recieve. Knit Fractals: http://www.ylem.org/artists/ekent/index.htmfrom one of my bookmarked sites on 'geek knitting' (if you want more i won't inflict them on the general public again, you can send me a PM or email and you too can read about how to knit a klein bottle hat, or how to turn ascii code into a knitted patterns (complete with link to a perl script you can download to do the math --if you're not total proficient in hex to binary, and then from binary one's and zero's to knitted knit's and purls.)or about how to teach many math concepts with knitting. (its great stuff) i could also show you a links to images of geo-tectonic plate movement (knitted, of course, into a scarf for a geologist. ) the double helix of DNA has also be done as knitting pattern (and made the cover of NATURE magazine.)as part of a Phd work! (talk about understanding the relationships of the bonds!) and dr bill sent me reminder about Venus of W. with a link to info about her. (the carving of the image seems to indicate she is wearing woven cloth, (she is not naked) and her 'hair' isn't hair but some sort of head covering.. my latest interest is in anoltolian style socks. (which are extremely similar to Latvian style mittens..) the general theory is: North/south trade routes (the Volga and other rivers) brought northern russian (and other tribes/groups) into contact with turkish/islamic culture, and turkish style socks HEAVLY influenced the styles and patterns knit in the far north. (google Anna Zilboorg for more info) Most knitters freely admit they suffer from a Obsesive/ compulsive disorder.. (gee, me obsessed? i dunno...)
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...and shakers. After giving it much thought, this is what I think about who invented the process of weaving... Fishnets. One day a man was sitting on a rock by a stream and saw a tangled fish struggling in some waterweeds and said "fish net!". Hurriedly he gathered up all the women and then drew a simple pattern in the sand. He then told the women to get up and go weave. Then the man went back to the rock to sit and think. And the rest is history. Hey, of troy, have I got a deal for you! I could make millions! Look, I got a idea about a weaving design that would sell. Listen, you weave one of them Chaos things with a fractal design and add a twisted length that would make the whole affair a one-sided Mobius strip and supply ten thousand of them to me at less than fifty dollars each. I'll get rich and you will make a more or less comfortable living. Deal? 
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sure milo, i'll spend 10 or more hours knitting a mobius strip scarf for less then $50. Why i just want to jump at the chance to use a specialized skill to earn less than minimum wage!
most 'hand knit' stuff today is from china. people there are forced to work for less than living wages. in terms of time,
a scarf =2 to 10 hours
a sweater 10 to 100 hours
a hat 2 to 5 hours
a pair of socks 4 to 7 hours
you might not like the hand knit gifts you recieve, but there are many hours of work involved on making them.
(but knitting is FASTER than setting up loom, weaving, cutting, fitting, sewing a garment together.) in times past, knitting was generally clothing for the poor. the very rich (ie royalty) some times had 'specialty' knitting, like King Charles' (he with out head)knit silk undershirt, but generally speaking knitting is a folk craft.
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Some people stick to their knitting And others knit scowls and brows The former is only fitting The latter is painful to browse.
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Actually what happened was a woman invented the net, and one day she got one wrapped around her legs as she walked to the shore to fish. All the men saw her and were ensorceled by this new look. One man in particular kept pestering her for a date and when she refused he began to spy on her night and day. Thus was invented the fish net stalking.
TEd
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Thus was invented the fish net stalking.Fish net stockings are very fetching, TEd Rem. As one who has stalked the odd pair myself, I thank you for sharing this history with me.
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Now the cat is mad at me too. When I read "fish-net stalking" I laughed out and kicked over the stool on which he was sleeping. Stop it, TEd, my cat is too old to kick. ______________________________________________________ Forgive me of troy, it was greed what led me to try to con you into subjugation. Besides, I am checking into spiders who work cheap. But as Plutarch pointed out, I was deviating from the deviation taken from the original theme here so I am moving my asides over to Animal Safari so I won’t further offend. __________________________________________________________ Oh my gosh, what a tangled web we weave When first we practice to deceive, Plutarch, truth quark, a rhymer most superior Plutarch, loan shark, a schemer most ulterior.
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Plutarch, loan shark, a schemer most ulterior.If my rhyming is usurious, I am indebted mostly to you for it. If my scheming is injurious, methinks I have been repaid in full. Oh, what a tempting leg we fashion When fish net stockings incite such passion.
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We're a' met the gither for tae sit and tae crack
Wi' oor glasses in oor hands and oor wark upon oor back,
And there's nae a trade amang them a' can either mend or mak'
Gin it was nae for the wark of the weavers.
Gin it was nae for the weavers wha' wud we do,
We wud nae ha'e a claith made o' oor woo'
We wud nae ha'e a cloak neither the black nor the blue
Gin it was nae for the wark of the weavers.
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i went to threaded mode to see if you picked up on my comment (friday) about the scots song work of the weavers, but i guess you missed my comment, and thought of it yourself.
now, seeing the words, its become an earworm.. (but for now, a welcome one)
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There are actually two of those songs about weavers, this one and one that is hundreds of verses long. This one is known as the lesser of two weavers.
TEd
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