Welcome to Litsy!

I learned so much in this fascinating overview of knitting traditions around the world: ie soy yarn from Asia is made from spraying the whey (leftover from making tofu) through a nozzle then spun into a very soft fibre. A Japanese fibre is made from silk & fiddlehead ferns. Aran sweaters with fancy cable patterns only date back to about 1946. Musk oxen went extinct in North America & were reintroduced from Greenland. 🧶🤓 #knittersofLitsy

“The art of knitting stockings is not near so generally understood among the ladies as it should be. I would tell you how it should be done had I time and knew how myself.” –Brigham Young
(An interesting variation of mansplaining.)

In Estonia, “the dead were buried wearing mittens” … and “mittens were thought to offer protection and would be worn while standing trial, when sowing seeds, when cutting hair, when treating sick animals & humans, and also used when choosing a new homestead: Three mittens were filled, one with grain, one with soil, one with ashes. A child then chose a mitten. If it was the one with ashes, a new site was required” (otherwise the house might burn).

In Latvia, “mittens helped establish a girl‘s identity. A young maiden could prove herself worthy of marriage through the quality and quantity of mittens she knit.”
…”After the wedding ceremony, the marriage contract was finalized with a meal during which the bride and groom ate with mittened hands.”

Several pairs of socks were worn all at the same time by Greek women, who believed that the thicker their legs, the more attractive they looked.

Kurdish “fluffy stockings” knit of mohair from angora goats, traditionally attained their fluffiness by being placed inside a hot loaf of bread taken straight out of the oven.
#knittersofLitsy

Another weird knitting-related law: in 17th c Denmark, where men, women & children knitted countless socks for export, they were forbidden from *wearing* stockings—by order of King Christian IV in 1636—because stocking were considered at that time to be part of the dress of the higher class.

I learned that Monmouth caps (what we Canadians call a toque) were common in the 16th century in Britain because it was the law that every boy over the age of six (who wasn‘t a “gentleman”) was required to wear an English-made wool cap on Sundays and holidays, by decree of the Cappers Act of 1571.

I‘m loving all the obscure terminology in this history of knitting. “A thropple—the windpipe of a goose filled with a few dried peas & bent into a circle—would be wound inside the ball of wool, the noise of which would make the ball easy to find in the dark should a knitter drop it.” Also: scroggers (knitted sleeve coverings) & hoggers ((footless stockings).

#knittersofLitsy

Lincoln Longwool breeder Louise Fairburn was married in a dress made of Lincoln tresses. Staples on a Lincoln fleece can be as long as 18 inches. #knittersofLitsy

In 1588 in England, the first knitting schools, meant to teach the poor a viable skill, began to open nationwide, and by the end of the century the sock industry was employing an estimated 200,000 people a year, engaged in the making of twenty million pairs of socks. #knittersofLitsy
(Illustration: an example of Sanquhar socks in Duke pattern.)

There are paintings from the Middle Ages that depict the Virgin Mary knitting. 🤓😮
File under: learn new things every day. #knittersofLitsy

Image is reproduced in the tagged book. Detail from Visit of the Angel, Master Bertram of Minden (c 1345-c 1415)