Did you tie anything up this morning, like your shoes or your hair or maybe your dog for the morning walk?
We tend to take these mundane knots for granted. They are everywhere as intricate parts of daily life. Threads and knots are important when rigging a ship, they make up our clothes, and many bracelets and necklaces are shaped like a knot. Knots can be inspiration for tattoos like an endless knot or a Celtic knot.
Way back in prehistory made probably from plant or animal fibres they might have been part of the first human technologies.
In this virtual exhibition you find two distinct knots, one is the Salomon’s knot from an appliqué – a decorative element of a bag or costume of an individual buried in the barrow in Chodlik in Poland [open 3D model in new tab], and the other a knot that once was a part of a Viking ship in Norway [open 3D model in new tab]. The first one, probably reflects the early Slavic worldview, while the other points towards the Norse and the mythological world of the Vikings.
See the task below to make your own knot.
Activity:
Tie a Solomon’s knot in a few simple steps!
For this we will need a thick string about 2 m long and a lot of patience.
Download the tutorial to follow the process step by step.
