I'm up past the heel gusset on the second of the Trekking XXL (the "That 70s socks") socks.

The copy of Viking Patterns for Knitting that I ordered on clearance from KnitPicks came yesterday. I want to make many of the things in that book. Cablework excites me in a way that colorwork cannot.

And it got me thinking about the false dichotomy that seems to have been set up between "traditional" and "radical" (or maybe you call it "hip" or "new") knitting of late. I mean, you can hardly get more historical than patterns from pre-Christian Scandinavia (well, you CAN, I suppose...there's old Arabic knitting patterns out there, and Barbara Walker has a couple of motifs called Dura Europos I and II that were based on fragments of knitting found in ruins at that community). But anyway. A lot of the patterns in the book - the clothing, I mean, not necessarily the cable patterns - look like they could have stepped out of Tolkein or Arthurian legend (there's one, it's a sort of hooded tunic that's longer in back than in front, that I absolutely MUST HAVE even though there's really nowhere I can wear it).

But anyway. Back to "traditional" versus "radical". I would argue that it's also possible to be "radically traditional," which is what Elsebeth Lavold IS in her patterns - she's taking something very old, very historical, and creating something that is artistic and, in its own way, very modern-looking to me. It's the kind of thing I love - taking bits and pieces of the past, updating it as (and if) necessary, and then using it and celebrating it and saying "this is my heritage" or, if it's not your heritage, "I really like these designs and I celebrate the work of the artisans who first developed them."

Because, really, when this sort of thing hasn't been done for a long time, or hasn't been done in this form, ever, before, isn't it as new and radical as angora brassieres or backpacks with intarsia Harley Davidson logos?

I like the idea of being "radically traditional."

At what point has something been "not done" for so long, that when someone picks it back up, it's no longer seen as hidebound and traditional by those on the cutting edge?

And, to go back to the use of traditional designs on knitwork: there's also a pattern in there called "Rafn" (meaning Raven) that also called to me. My surname, although it's not in any way Scandinavian, is also based on an old word for Raven. (It is, as far back as we can determine, probably Norman French). And I like that idea. Wrapping myself in something that is based on a pattern that bears the same name as I do. Or, at the very least, incorporating the "raven" cable pattern into a pair of socks.

And as for the Dura-Europos patterns, I always wanted to work up a pair of socks using those patterns. Or perhaps a hat. Something appeals powerfully to me in using those designs, in imagining back hundreds or thousands of years and trying to think what life was like then, what the designs meant to the people who wore them - did they have religious significance, as some of the Viking designs did, or were they merely something pretty and clever that the knitter could do to stave off boredom while working? Or do they have a practical purpose? In "Folk Vests," Cheryl Oberle quotes a spinner as suggesting cabled designs may have been developed as a way of contolling the natural tendency to bias that a simply-spun "singles" yarn would have.

And to think - all of that, so much of the symbolism and usage and meaning of the designs we use is gone or changed, and we may never get back the old ideas about some of them. (For those on the Knitlist, consider the commentary recently about the fact that a Barbara Walker mosaic-stitch design contains a sw*stik*, which used to be an ancient symbol of good-luck, but now is one of the most hated symbols in the world, because of what one evil man chose to use it for...[N.B: asterisks used to try to stave off potential scary websearches]).

History interests me tremendously, particularly the sort of "everyday" history - what people ate, how they spent what free time they had, how they celebrated. I enjoy and cherish being able to work some elements from that everyday history into my knitting, I see it as a way of honoring those who came before, and somehow trying to feel a connection with them.