Unravelling Knitting

Knitting is something various people in my life have tried to teach me, starting with my mum. I have only recently managed to finally sort of master knitting for myself without too many mistakes and usually can correct them if I make them. 

This hasn't stopped the fact that every time I pick up my needles or think about knitting (and crochet, let's bet honest), I begin to wonder who on earth had the idea of using the fleece of a sheep and turning it into yarn and then knotting it in such a way that it became knitting? 

So began my deep dive into the history of wool and knitting and a fascinating journey it was. 

It started way back with a primitive man in 10,000 BC who first discovered they could use the fleece of dead sheep to keep warm or cool and dry in difficult terrains. In 1900BC, it was realised that this was a waste of resources, so they began to farm wool with live sheep instead.

Egyptians in the first century are thought to be the first knitters, possibly developing it from Nalbinding, where one needle is used to splice and knot wool together by adding another needle.  

In 55BC, the British had developed intricate knitting technique, and the conquering Roman emperors cherished British woollen cloth likening it to silk. 

When the Saxons invaded in the 5th Century, the wool industry was all but destroyed. By the 8th century, however, Britain was exporting woollen fabrics to the continent, and after the Normans invaded, the wool industry expanded. In the 12th Century, cloth making was widespread, especially in the south, nearer the European continent and quickly becoming the most significant national asset.  

The first example of European knitting was detailed silk pillows found in the tomb of Prince Ferdinando de la Cerdo of Spain in 1275AD. Most Spanish knitting around this time was liturgical garments for the Catholic Church. 

The most mindblowing thing (to me anyhow) that I found was this.  In the middle ages, there were knitting guilds that were men only. No women allowed! These guilds were formed to protect the highly guarded secrets of the trade. It took 13 weeks of constantly knitting various garments before members decided if you were in or out to get into the guilds. To become a master knitter, a young man would have to embark on six years of gruelling training, including three years of travelling and learning knitting in other countries and, at the end of it all, sit a horrendously difficult exam.

By the 15th century, knitting as a craft had been established, driven by the new powerful fashion trend of knitted stockings.  Men started to wear knitted stockings around the 15th Century when doublets got shorter. Soon afterwards, women began also to wear stockings in the 16th Century during Elizabeth I's reign. William Lee had invented the circular knitting machine in 1589, which used a spring and a barbed needle that, although was still manual, was faster than hand knitting.

Queen Victoria was a keen knitter, which did wonders for the craft and wool industries in the 1800s. Many people of different nationalities improved upon William Lee's knitting machine, and it went in and out of use over the next couple of centuries. One of the improvements made was a machine that could knit lace quickly and inexpensively, and this was widely used in the City of Nottingham. 

In the 1900s, knitting was used for several things, for cheap clothing during the great depression in the 1930s and making some money. In the 1940s knitting, was used as a way to express affection and goodwill to troops on the second world war's frontlines.

In the 1980s, factories began to mass-produce clothing, yet knitting as a pass time has hung on as it has many times before.

Knitting is mostly unchanged from how it started all those thousands of years ago, and if the health benefits that equal meditation and the apparent 500% stretch factor are anything to go by, Knitting is here to stay for a while yet.