Re:about the Venus of Willemdorf(?sp.), who was at first said to have an elaborate hairdo, until a lady amateur arhaeologist declared that the venus was actually wearing a knitted cap.

i remember reading something about that-- but not that the 'hairdo' was definately knitting... just that is was a textile of some sort, woven, or knit, or netted.... its hard to tell. knitting might well be much older than 1,500 BCE-- but i don't know of anything that is definative..

weaving is a much more logic thing. since you can weave with out a loom (finger weaving) or even woven sticks, strips of wood-- kids still do it to day out of 'popsticks' the stick in the center of a frozen popcycle..

and weaver birds -- really do weave (over/under with bits of grass and strings..) but there is no 'natural' form of knitting..

it starts with finger loops.. (which are univeral) a slip knot and nested loops from the knot.. but moving from that single strand to knitted cloth is a big leap.

early knitting might have been done on spools- of various sizes.. large ones for garments, medium ones for socks, small one for fingertips on gloves..

and in scandinavia, there is a knitting style that uses what i would call a knitting jenny-- similar to a spool, but rectangualar, not round; it is made from parallel pieces of wood, set with pegs on top. the yarn is wound over the pegs in a pattern (similar to the shape of 'loop' in script writing, but doubled) and the stitches are formed by using a hook or pin to pull one layer of yarn over an other..(just as done in spool knitting)

no one knows if this form of 'knitting' came first, with needles knitting following..

knitting with needles is much more versital.



my other obsession