Medieval Silk Knitting

I've been knitting for more than fifty years, exploring a wide variety of styles and techniques. The first time I saw photos of medieval silk knitting in Richard Rutt's A History of Hand Knitting, I really wanted to reproduce some of the reliquary purses, but I couldn't find the appropriate silk anywhere. At the International Medieval Congress in Kalamazoo, Nancy Spies gave a talk on her marvelous book, Ecclesiastical Pomp and Aristocratic Circumstance (on brocaded tabletweaving). She had brought samples of the work done for the book, and they were obviously made with the silk I needed. It turns out she had bought 60/2 silk from The Handweavers Studio in London. The next time I was there, I bought a few colors.

This first purse was close to the fourteenth-century original, although not all the shades are accurate (but they were what I had). As in the originals, two strands of each color were used. I worked with 00000 or 1 mm needles, 18 stitches and 22 rows to the inch. At first, they really hurt my hands, but I became used to them and had no problems with other projects using them. I often needed a magnifier if the colors were close in tone. The drawstrings are fingerloop braids in two colors. I put this in the Indiana State Fair but received no award. (One of the volunteers told me that the judge had said it had to have been machine made because no one could knit that fine!!!)

This next ones uses a design from a thirteenth-century cushion from Spain. When I put it in the State Fair the following year, I displayed it on a board with a sample on needles and information about medieval silk knitting. It won both best in accessories and best of all knitting!

This one uses designs from one of the fourteenth-century purses but in single-colors instead of breaking up the design with a contrasting color in the center row.

The zigzag design is from other medieval motifs. I haven't decided which kind of fringe to use, but I'd like to use a more complex one than the other purses have.

Here is another, again using more modern two-color taste than the broken and multicolor medieval tendency, and only using a single design instead of multiple different bands.

I have more purses I would like to make with the ridiculous number of colors I have collected on my trips to London! Of course, I use them for tabletweaving and other work! And yes, I do wear these when I reenact in fourteenth-century style clothing, so I really am able to enjoy them.

Bobbin Lace Collars

Back in the 80s and 90s, I made several bobbin lace collars. My favorite style is Bedfordshire lace, which is often characterized by plaits (braids) and tallies (leaf-shaped, square, rectangular, etc.).

The first is adapted from a two-piece pattern by Mo Gibbs. At the time, I loathed the few leaf-shaped tallies and usually stopped a few days before attempting each set! The raised and rolled ones on top of the cloth stitch were less hard because I figured the cloth stitch would hide errors .

This is the second collar, with the tallies worked over half-stitch ground. At the time, I disliked half-stitch ground because I didn't like the pairs separating. I still like starting with bobbins in pairs!

This is Christine Springett's Thousand Tally collar. Yes, more than 1,000 tallies, which certainly got me over my tally fear! Of course, the drawback is that there is a difference between the wobbly ones at the start and the more consistent ones at the end! Anyone close enough to spot the difference is invading my space!

Back when Christine Springett still ran the British College of Lace in Rugby, I signed up for a class with Barbara Underwood. I let Barbara know that I was particularly interested in learning more about raised and rolled tallies at the intersection of plaits. She didn't have a collar specifically designed for that, but she said that this redrawn nineteenth-century collar had so many intersecting plaits that I could decide where I wanted them.

I've collected many collar patterns in different lace styles, and I really want to get back to making more of them instead of motifs or trim (however fun or useful).