Page 103 - Frank Rosenow "Seagoing Knots"

IN LIEU OF

BIBLIOGRAPHY

I have tried to share some knots in the sense they became memorable to me.
Other writers on cordage have approached the subject in different ways.
The first modern (meaning legible, and fairly comprehensive) work on
knots was penned by Dr. Hjalmar August Ohrwall (1851-1929), a profes¬

sor of physiology at Uppsala University in Sweden. Ohrwall, a follower of
the then “radicals” Charles Darwin and John Stuart Mill, had previously
written an anonymous guide to contraception (which led to his temporary
dismissal from the university) and a work on the tenacity of frogs (Uber die
Erstickung und Wieder erweckung des isolierten Froschherzens, 1887). In his
free time, sailing on the east and west coasts of Sweden, Ohrwall con¬
cocted Om Knutar (About Knots), which appeared in 1908. Combining
scholarship with common sense, the book was later hailed as a trailblazer
by the major American knot authors, Ashley and Day.

The first edition was illustrated (an important point this, when it comes
to communicate a knot) with the author’s photographs of knots. These he
suspended on glass in order to eliminate backdrop shadows which would
tend to confuse. The photographs were rather small, though, and the sec¬
ond edition (1916) was illustrated with ink line drawings by Ohrwall’s
daughter Elli. In Sweden, the book has recently been reissued so there may
someday be an English translation.
Clifford Warren Ashley (1881-1947), who was born in New Bedford,
Massachusetts, and trained with Howard Pyle, was primarily a marine artist
but is best remembered for his heavyweight Ashley’s Book of Knots (New
York, 1944). Illustrated with his own charming if sometimes difficult to
follow drawings, the work ranges over a vast area and is the most compre¬

hensive knot book we are likely to see for a century or two. Some of Ash¬
ley’s knots are shown in the context of their proper use, another
achievement.

IN LIEU OF BIBLIOGRAPHY