Page 87 - The Pocket Guide to Outdoor Knots

HUNTER’S (or RIGGER’S) BEND

Purpose

This mid-20th century knot joins two ropes or cords. It is strong and secure, but
can be prised loose when the load has been removed.

Tying

Form two interlocked loops, as shown (figure 1) and then tuck each working end
in turn to transform the initial layout into a couple of interwoven overhand knots

(figure 2). Coax the knot into shape and tighten it. This is one of the best of an
entire family of bends comprising two overhand knots, its recognizable

hallmarks being the obliquely entwined couple of knot parts (figure 3) and a pair
of twin bights (figure 4). By rolling these two bights down (into the page) the

knot can be readily loosened and then untied.
The tying method illustrated is not Dr. Hunter’s— which was prone to go

wrong in unfamiliar hands— but one first described by that innovative knot tyer

Dr. Harry Asher, a founder-member of the International Guild of Knot Tyers in A
New System of Knotting—Volume 1 (1986), and then published in The
Alternative Knot Book (1989).

Knot lore

On Friday, 6th October 1978, the Times newspaper of London devoted a 28-cm
(11-in) column on its front page to a report that retired consultant physician Dr.

Edward Hunter had invented this new knot. Other newspapers ran the story,
naming the knot Hunter’s bend. I was contacted and between us we shared the

load of radio and television interviews that followed.
Knot tyers around the world wrote to us for more information. Then—with

all of this publicity at its height—the American physicist Amory Bloch Lovins