onsdag den 16. september 2009

Knitted purse

Knitting is not a textile technique normally allowed at the Medieval Centre. Certainly not when it is modern socks, mittens and the like.

But knitting did exist around the year 1400.

Though never found in Denmark, there are archaological evidence of knitted tektiles from northern Germany from the 14th and 15th century. It could have been known in Denmark too. Problem is, that we don’t really know what the knitted pieces actually were.

Then we have the nice knitted little purses from i.e. Sion, Switzerland. See http://spindlesend.net/sionsilkpurse.htm

Spending 11 hours on a train travelling to a conference in Sweeden, I just had to try knitting a purse. Not beeing very skilled as a knitter, I decided to start using wool, instead of ruining several metres of expensive silk, a very nice, thin tread of embroidery wool, though.

It should be 16 stitches to the inch, that is, 16 stitches to 2,5 cm. The needles proved to be troublesome, the local store could only provide what they called size 2 needles, supposedly the thinnest you can get in Denmark (?) The result was 16 stitches to 2,8 cm.

Strangely enough the Sion purses are guite big, in lengh 8 1/8-13 3/8 inches = 20,6-33,8 cm and in width 6 1/4-10 3/8 inches = 15,9-26,2 cm

Well, I didn’t guite finish the purse, it’ll have to wait till the next time I travel a really long time by train. And anyway, I can't use the purse, being made in wool instead of silk and supposedly being a purse for relics.

co