Page 408 - The Ashley Book of Knots

CHAPTER 32: SQUARE KNOTTING

But here's a Queen, when she rides abroad,

Is always knotting threads. 'l.._ .... / ............. -'

,

SIR CHARLES SEDLEY (1639-17°1): From a Poem "

Dedicated to Mary, Queen of William of Orange /
---

Mary is held responsible for having introduced square knotting

into England, having herself become adept in the art while living

in Holland.

Square knotting is supposed to have originated in Arabia, where

it was called macrame which means in Arabic fringe. Apparently

the practice was first applied and limited to coarse cord fringes, o

until it became known in Italy, at the time of the Crusades. Here

nuns, using a much finer material, developed it into a lacelike textile

of great beauty and strength. For a long time it was employed al-

most exclusively for altar cloths, church vestments and the like.

There was (at least until recently) in the Louvre a painting by Paul

Veronese (lp8-88) of "The Supper of Simon the Canaanite." A

square knotted table cover formed an important part of the painted

design.

Exactly when the sailor first took up square knotting is not known.

But in the middle of the nineteenth century crews in both the Amer-

ican and British Navies specialized in square knotting, perhaps be-

cause their narrow quarters gave little or no opportunity for stow-

ing larger work.

Much of the square knot work aboard ship took the form of

fringes for sea-chest covers, tablecloths, shelf covers, binnacle, sky-

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