Aran Stitches and their Meanings
Almost everywhere you read about Aran Knitting there are lists of stitches with the ‘traditional’ meanings attributed to them, sometime simple, sometimes very elaborate stories.
The truth is there aren’t really authentic meanings to any of the stitches, at least not ones that have any tradition or history behind them. Aran knitting is a relatively recent invention and the stitches were created for their decorative appearance by clever and skillful knitters because they looked nice, not to convey any meaning.
The Creation of the Meaningful Stitch Myth
The meanings that are generally attributed to Aran stitches have several origins:
- An article written in 1938 by a German man called Heinz Keiwe, who never visited Aran, never met anyone who knit a sweater and simply made up the meanings. His work however was widely accepted as truth by many people and the sellers of Aran knitwear were not about to contradict such marketing magic.
- The so-called meanings were embellished and added to by many later writers who found little literature on the knitting, were relieved to find Keiwe’s and freely expanded on his ‘meanings’ and added others – a fair few of them totally contradictory.
- The reason the myth have persisted so long and are so widely belived is down to marketing. Aran knitting was always a commercial enterprise and the attribution of meaning to stitches greatly increased interest in the sweaters. Those producing them realised that and played up to it in promotional literature. In a similar way they now play up the notion of there being clan patterns, specific to families, which is a complete fiction but it sells sweaters.
The best work on the history of Aran is a book by Alice Starmore, who picked though all this fog of made up stuff and got to the truth in her book, Aran Knitting.
Some Meanings Attributed to Aran Stitches
For those who are interested, these are the meanings most often associated with commonly found stitch patterns in Aran knitting.
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| The most commonly seen Aran stitch is the cable, of which there are many variations. These are said to symbolise fishermen’s ropes. | |||
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| The blackberry stitch represents nature. Some call it the trinity stitch and give it religious significance. | The Moss stitch, said to symbolise abundance and growth. It is often used as a ‘filler’ in diamonds. | The Honeycomb is a said to be a lucky stitch, signifying plenty and in the case of fishermen a good catch. | Lattice or Basket stitches to represent the fisherman’s basket – again an omen of a good catch. |
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| The Ladder of Life and Tree of Life represent the stages of life. They are sometimes given a religious significance, symbolising a pilgrim’s path to salvation. | Plaited or braided stitches said to represent the interweaving strands of life. | Diamonds to represent the shape of the fishing mesh, and wealth and success. | |
Regarding the history of Aran knitting – what comment have you on the claim that Aran patterns represented different fisher families and that when an accident occurred, the victim could be recognised by the pattern of the sweater he was wearing. (found on another website on Aran knitting)
It’s a nice story, but there is not a shred of truth in it.
That fable was originated with a stage play that mentioned she identified a body by the number of stitches she dropped in a garment. The Scottish, not the Britons, were known to have family patterns and such, but did not use Aran to do this.
In the book ‘World Textiles” published by Thames and Hodder there are some very old photographs of fishermen wearing Aran sweaters and apparantly the patterns on their garments indicate which area they came from.
‘Apparantly’ is a good word. This misconception was very, very widely disseminated and believed, but that doesn’t make it true.
Doesn’t make it not true either
I took a class on Aran knitting and the instructor started by asking us what happens when a wool sweater gets wet. Of course, it weighs a ton! Had the fisherman and sailors worn these sweaters to sea they would have been hampered by the weight of the wet sweater, not to mention being drowned had they gone overboard. Additionally, due to the amount of time these decorative sweater took to make they would have been saved as Sunday clothes. They would have worn plain garter or stocking stitched sweaters UNDER their macintoshes. The “meanings” as the author notes here are purely romantic.
Except for the fact the wool was “unscoured” meaning the natural lanolin was left in the wool making the sweater water proof–as the sheep themselves are as they stand in the elements of nature.
@jd The wool when it’s growing on a sheep is pretty much waterproof, but when woven into yarn and knitted it is more water-resistant than waterproof. You’ll stay dry for a good time in a shower of rain, not so much when submerged in water.
Fishermen, not just in Ireland, were somewhat resigned to their fate if things went wrong and they ended up in the water. Few learned to swim, and in the past they didn’t have lifeboats or flotation aids on board, or wear life jackets. While not being able to swim is less common now, it’s still not unknown, though of course safety standards otherwise have immensely improved.