Page 290 - Geoffrey Budworth "The Pocket Guide to Outdoor Knots"

CARRICK BEND

Purpose

Traditionally this bend was recommended for cables and large hawsers and—
perhaps as a consequence of its being used in this way—it has an undeserved

reputation for being a strong knot, when it actually reduces the breaking strength

of lines by up to 30% or more. It is, nevertheless, a useful bend and just as well
suited to smaller cordage.

Tying
Create a loop in one line and interweave the working end of the other line as

shown (figures 1–2). Make sure that the short ends emerge on opposite sides of
the knot, since there is a belief that it is more secure like that. When pulled tight,

the knot capsizes into another form entirely, and it is this final arrangement that
it is useful (figure 3).

Knot lore

Some knot tyers know this as the true or double carrick bend, since there are
other lesser versions. This one was featured in Seamanship for the Merchant

Service (1922) by Felix Reisenberg, but named even earlier in Vocabulaire des
Termes de Marine (1783) by M. Lescallier. As a heraldic device, with both ends

on the same side of the knot, it is older still. A number of them in plaster are
used as decorative devices in the Elizabethan plasterwork of Ormonde Castle at

Carrick-on-Suir in Ireland, and it was the badge of the English leader Hereward
the Wake who, from his stronghold on the Isle of Ely, revolted against William

the Conqueror in 1070.