Historical Knitting Can be Hysterical

The new issue of Piecework Magazine is a Special Issue:
Textile for Historical Reenactment.

They have a 17th knit shirt as well as some lovely American Civil War items.

I was delighted when I got my issue yesterday.

I've been practicing my knitting my making a lot of mundane hats of late, and am comfortable enough with my basic techniques to develop some period patterns. I'm familiar with the late period flat caps from portraiture, and some of what the call the monmouth caps. But what else is out there in knitted hats?

One of the girls in our shire has a mongolian persona and we don't have a clue as to if they knitted. Felting yes, Weaving yes, but Knitting? No clue. So what about these far flung asian countries? Was there knitting in Asia? What about India?

I know there is knitting in the Europe and the Middle East & North Africa, but beyond that I've never paid attention or remember anything. 

Comments?

Husbandman and I want to have a go at dying our (my) own yarn. Honest to goodness he is the one pushing this idea.

For those of you who have dyed your own yarns ....

What yarns would you recommend? Are they local or online? I prefer Wools and Silks in Sock or laceweight yarns if that helps in the recommending.



Jamie

Thanks. :)

Islamic pattern from Rutt Finally finished, July 08! Very slow colourwork project, from a pattern in Rutt's history of hand knitting, graphed by someone on HistoricKnit yahoogroup. Shown here while blocking, w/ 20p piece for scale. It's going to be a very small, delicate pouch for moi. It qualifies as 3Rs because all the yarn is from stash, and the white is a remaindered cone of mixed wool fibre. The pink is a handspun gift. The maroon is a single ply of a 2-ply that I 'unspun' to try it as a knitting yarn. Getting consistent tension w/ colourwork remains my main problem! that, and following a detailed pattern.

http://www.wspinesfiberandherbs.com/wst_page4.html

and/or

http://www.etsy.com/view_listing.php?listing_id=11951016

and/or

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kKXca2l0RPo

My husband sent me the link as a response to the post on my LJ this moring.
If spinning is something I want to graduate into, I need to do my research on what system might work best.

My LJ moira_ramsay for thos who are curious about the second attempt at drop spindle. I posted photos there.

That is exactly what I did last night. I embraced the suck!!!! And I had a grande time in the process.

Last night was knit night at the lodge. My friends TT and Ba came out to play. Ba brought drop spindles and roving and proceeded to attempt to teach me spinning with a drop spindle. I have my first “Yarn/Spinning” ever and it’s suckage is so completely awful that it is borderline genius!!!! – you enjoy your delusions and I will enjoy mine!

I can get the spindle to spin, I think I had a reasonable handle on the drafting. Mix them together and that is where the suck occurs. I finally had to let the spindle spin, then stop the rotation and work on the drafting part of yarn making. It is going to take me a while to figure out how to get both of them to work together.

TT was doing a great job and I think that my ineptitude made her feel much better about her own project. GO ME!

Ba was generous enough to give me some roving and to borrow a spindle so I can practice. Though in her opinion (And one think is correct) I am most likely suited to a spinning wheel so I can focus on what my hands are doing.

Last night I hade SO MUCH FUN embracing the suck!!!!

Okay. I'm a little enthusiastic about what I just made. Please forgive me. :-)

I made myself some DP knitting needles because I didn't want to work on the only things I know how to knit, extemely plain little bags, at events, with plastic knitting needles. I presumed that people would make their own wooden knitting needles, and when I came here to post this, I noted an entry about just such a thing, albeit 19th c (I'm a 16th c. girl, myself). Still, it's wonderfully serendipitous!

And, because I am a heraldic embellishment geek, I could not resist making my needles with my heraldry. There's 3 needles with black and gold tips, and 5 needles with my badge, On a water bouget sable, two ermine spots Or. If you would like to see larger pictures, please feel free to click these links:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/merouda/2577403351/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/merouda/2577403169/

Thank you ever so much for letting me geek at you!!!! :-)

Ball or Cake?

Do you prefer your skeins wound into balls?
or
Do you prefer the cakes that skein winders make up?
or
Do you use a knitty knoddy?

I have some very fine cobweb weight yarn. I am looking to start another lace project.
I want to buy lace weight needles US 000, 00, 0, 1 or 2 (I have not decided yet)
I have the Addi Turbo Lace Weight US 3, 4, 5 ...

What have been your successes with Addi Turbo vs Knit Picks Options? Knit Picks is a great deal less expensive, but how do they handle with fine/cobweb weight yarn?

I cannot seem to find an online vendor for Addi Turbo's and my LYS in Santa Rosa did not have what I wanted.

Any other knitting needles I should consider?

Long planned to post - still wrestling with uploading to LJ.
Over the winter I was sick, and had several weeks on the sofa. I spent much of it trying out patterns charted by xrianin a Tournaments Illuminated article.

	first try at circ pouch Better side showing - had trouble w/ tension and green and white pattern!
	madder pink and checks knitted flat, w/ i-cord
	gray w/ madder red and gold This is one of my favourites.
	another flat knitted pouch tried stretching out one of the TI patterns
	first try at pouch flat knitted
	flat knit pouch, from charted patterns in Historic Knit yahoo This is based on a piece shown in Rutt's history of knitting book - islamic knitting, 11-13th c. Trying out a complex colourwork pattern. Happy with it, but slow going!

Has anyone found any references to Mrs. Montague outside of Barbara Walker?
I have seen the reference on some modern patterns that I purchased recently and I have seen the reference in BW's Treasury....

I thought I saw a reference to her in Richard Rutt, but I returned the book to the library.

I am hitting dead ends and need to reset my "Think Outside the Box" button.

Home made needles, to inspire you to try making your own.

( Pic behind cut )

Greetings,

I'm trying this pattern for Eleanor of Toledo's 16th c. stockings on my smallest wood DPNs, 2mm. I think I'm getting pretty close to the 12 st/in gauge by knitting tightly, but have to do a few more rows to measure properly. Because of the tightness, I'm finding it going a bit slowly right now.

I'm using a fine 2-ply wool, probably fingering weight (found in a charity shop, unlabelled, so not certain).

Has anyone else tried the pattern? What needles did you use? Any other thoughts?

I was leafing idly through Moda a Firenze ("What," you say? "That's a costume book!") And I run across the bit about Eleanora of Toledo's knitted stockings-- the crimson silk stockings she was buried in, in 1562.

There's a color plate, I says. Uh, they've been straightened out and someone's done conservation work on them, I says to myself. How very cool.

I can dig around in my books to find the exact source of the quote, but it is now thought that those mysterious bands shown with Eleanora's stockings in the original black and white photos from the Pitti are actually the bands used to tie her feet and hands together. She was buried in haste-- in the winter of 1562, four of the de' Medicis died in a malaria epidemic, and even Eleanora's white gown was hastily laced up around her body incorrectly. They may have even forgotten her sleeves; there is no evidence of sleeves in the grave.

I've been sort of on a quest to find evidence of pre-1600 knitted garters for the last month, but so far I've struck out.

From Moda a Firenze: All the stockings belonging to Eleanora that are mentioned in the documents (9 pairs), apart from two white pairs, are in crimson silk, like those she was dressed in for her funeral, with some in silk and gold. They are made 'in knitwork,' with needles, in line with a fashion which was to become extremely popular from teh sixteenth century on.... They were worked starting from the top, and then joined with a seam under the foot.

"It may be that Eleanora introduced, or expanded, the use of knitted stockings in Florence, ordering them from Naples in the early years; there is no doubt that by the 1560s there were able aguacchiatori, or knitters, in the city, capable of meetings(sic) the Duchess's requirements. For the sons and daughters, as for Cosimo, stockings made of wool cloth were frequent.

"...In these years the demand from the Court for knitted stockings must have reached considerable dimensions: there are at least for knitters mentioned: Pagolo, Giorgio, Guido and Camillo. In the sumptuary law of 1562 Cosimo forbids ladies to wear silk stockings; Lisabetta Bonsi, who married Giovanni Capponi in 1574 still featured in her trousseau stockings made of wool cloth, as well as two pairs "in knitwork."

"In the cold season the foot was further protected by socks worn underneath the stockings: "and the Duchess wants wool socks...", wrote Vincenzo Ferrinin from Livorno to the Maggiordomo Pier Francesco Riccio on 19 December 1545. Another pair of socks belonging to Eleanora is mentioned in 1560. These knitted socks made of wool were possibly for wearing in bed. As in the case of shoes, the number of stockings recorded as belonging to Eleanora, concentrated in the 1540s, is undoubtedly much smaller than the number she actually possessed.

"With the garters, too-- known as becche or cinte per gambe-- albeit in a slightly larger number, the records practically cease in 1550. They are almost all in red taffeta, with the exception of two white pairs and two yellow. Although the notebooks of the Guardaroba do not mention them, it seems logical to suppose that these were edged with lace or precious trimming, albeit possibly less showy than the fashion of the end of the century, when they became similar to those of the men with hanging lace trimmings. The garters were worn tied below the knee, as superbly illustrated to us by Piccolomini in the Dialogo della Bella Creanza delle Donne, when he narrates the regrettable incident of the young lady who had lost one in church because she had tied it above the knee."

Footnotes omitted. "The documents" refers to the Florentine Grand Wardrobe accounts, which is the Medici equivalent of the records of the Great Wardrobe in London.

Also, the COLOR! picture of the stockings as they are shown in Moda a Firenze makes them look very similar to rather shapeless cloth stockings; they've evidently been put back together and had some conservation work done on them recently-- and the photo credit is the Galleria del Costume in Florence, not the Pitti.

However, there's a VERY interesting bit in the footnotes about the knitter guys: ""For Guido and Giorgio, who are provided with white linen thread for stockings, evidently for summer wear, for Leonora, daughter of Don Garzia da Toledo, and red silk to mend a 'camiciola.'" GM 69, c.2v

WHAT. There's that waistcoat thing again...

Has anyone here contemplated figures 47 Page 73 & 48 page 74 of this book?
Museum of London Textiles and Clothing 1150-1450

I do not have a lot of historical knitting references so book suggetions are always appreciated.
I do have the Rutt book on my wishlist, I just need to stop buying other goodies first. *g*

I have put together a couple of suppositions in support of a theory. Some of you who read my dress diary also read my regular journal and have seen the bit of reading that inspired this. I've since fleshed out my thoughts a little bit more.

This is what started everything:

I was reading Felix Pryor's "Elizabeth I, Her Life In Letters," one of the books I ordered from David Brown's OMG huge sale a couple of weeks ago, and ran across this tidbit in the discussion of a letter from William the Silent:

Fulke Greville recollected his first encounter with William in 1579: "His uppermost garment was a gown, yet such as (I dare confidently affirm) a mean-born student in our Inns of Court would not have been well-pleased to walk the streets in... his waistcoat (which showed itself under it) not unlike the best sort of those woolen knit ones which our ordinary watermen row us in; his company about him the burgesses of that beer-brewing town, and he so fellow-encompassed with them as (had I not known his face) no exterior sign of degree of reservedness could have discovered the inequality of his worth or estate from that multitude."  (emphasis mine)

That is... very interesting. So the watermen of London commonly wore knitted waistcoats...

But we have no physical evidence of knitted fabric for a garment for an adult of that economic class other than small pieces, such as accessories like scoggers, caps and the like. BUT.




This is a picture that I have shamelessly lifted from the Online BBC, of two garments from the Museum of London, which they date from the 1500s.  They are children's knitted items.  On the right is a vest.  Is it my imagination, or do we have here the physical survival of a knitted garment knitted similarly in structure to that almost completed in the famous "Knitting Madonna" discussed in Rutt?

But the MoL child's vest is felted-- you can only see individual stitches around the neckline. That begs the question, was the felting done deliberately or during its long interment in the earth?

At any rate, I am wondering whether it is a huge leap of unjustified conclusion to assume that Sir Fulke Greville's chance remark and the MoL 'sweater' can lead me to safely assume that a waterman of the latter 16th century could have worn a felted knitted vest larger in size than the child's one depicted here.

Case in point: 

•  We know that purl stitches were not in use until they appeared in Eleanor of Toledo's stockings in 1562, where they were used in relatively simple, but masterful knit/purl patterning that decreased down the leg. Therefore, innovative purl stitches are not going to be found in England until much later.
• Elaborate color work is going to be used for a higher economic class. Watermen are not exactly the highest social strata, and they're going to be wearing something functional that will keep them warm when wet. Wool it is.

What think you?

Hey all of my Knitterly forwards friends.

I am looking for Universal Yarn Co. - Ditto - 4813

I am three inches from the end of a sock and ran out.

I cannot afford to buy another skein right now, but I would be willing to trade some sock yarn in exchange.

I have some lovely Crystal Palace Panda Cotton as well as Panda Wool. I also have some nice yarn that I believe is antique yarn. I have other yarn, but I want to try to keep the trade comparable if at all possible. Let me know if you have some extra in your stash.

Posted a few days ago in my personal journal.

This article was recommended as a good read.
Not about historical knitting (more hysterical knitting)
but friggen brilliant!

http://online.wsj.com/public/article/SB119766934184930123.html

Cross posted to my LJ

Is there anyone on this list familiar with White Rock/Surrey BC?

I will be in White Rock/Surrey in January for an SCA Event and reportedly there is a Yarn Shop near the hotel I will be staying at.

I have come to the conclusion that often Yahoo Yellow Pages is hopelessly out of date, so I was hoping for more current information. I want to come home with some new yarn. Something I may not be able to find local to me. *grin*

Moira
West

There are any number of wonderful things to look at on this site.
I was looking for sock patterns and entertaining myself until it was time to go home.

http://www.plimoth.org/embroidery-blog/index.php?mode=viewid&post_id=164

Check out their shop - they sell patterns for 17th C Stockings and the Plimoth Socks.

**Edited to add**
OH and there is this!
http://www.plimoth.org/embroidery-blog/index.php?mode=viewid&post_id=139

For people to volunteer with the making of historically accurate stocking for the interpreters.