Viking Knit Wire Jewelry
A pattern for a circular chain in double or single  knit
Ladyship Ivegard Sask (Teryl Basinger)
Class handout  Uprising, 2008
Sweden's Museum of National Antiquities (Historiska Museet) from the Vårby hoard, Sweden, 10th ce.
Background
When thinking of Viking art, do images of fancifully carved mast-
heads or tent staves come to mind? What about guilded brooches with
intricately twining loops and figures? Whatever the medium, Viking art is
stylized by interlaced lines, worked in regular precise patterns. Other
handcrafts mirrored this sceme  from woodworking to tablet-weaving and
naalbinding to jewelrymaking. Everything in the Viking worldview was
interconnected. Wire weaving is also called  Trichonopoly.
The silver necklace at left is one from a silver hoard from Denmark,
dated to the 10th Century (WOV 5059.) It is not chain, but rather knitted or
woven wire which forms a flexible tube when stretched. This technique has
been compared to a naalbinding stitch called the  Mammen Stitch. To form
the links, a length of wire is looped successively through previous loops
around and around a central rod. The rod is removed to stretch this cord of
woven wire to its final length. Finials of cone-shaped beads, twisted wire, and even
highly decorative animal heads were all used to close the necklaces or connect them to
pendants.
 Urnes style animal-head clasp on a silver Wire edging in 4mm silver wire on a man s
necklace found in Norway. Dated to 1100 ce. garment sleeve. Denmark, 10th ce.
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This technique of jewelry-making was not as prevalent as the multi-strand twisted
wire torques and bands, but was nonetheless widespread. Examples have been found
dating to as early as the 8th century and as late as the 12th, and pieces wrought of silver,
tin, tin-alloys, and gold have been found in many Scandinavian countries, including
present-day Norway, Sweden and Gotland, and Denmark.
Wire-weaving was used in other decorative applications, including edgings for
textiles. The embroidered fabric (above, right) is actually a hem of a man s tunic (WOV
2383.) The wire-weaving applied to the edge helps to protect the hem from wear as well
as being an interesting embellishment.
The patterns
The technique is a simple one to recreate. It requires minimal tools  in fact it can
be accomplished with just a nail or allen wrench or another slender rod. Metalworking
tools in period were much the same as those we have today (the non-powered type, that
is) and include pincers and clamps, hammers, punches, awls and files. I didn t end up
needing any of these, but I did use wire cutters and jewelers pliers however. The wire I
used was not silver, but alloys readily available through the local craft store. Since the
Vikings sometimes used alloys, I felt this was an acceptable compromise. Here s how to
weave wire:
Step 1: Make 3 loops out of a piece of wire and twist
them together at the top. Splay the bottom of the loops like
an open tulip, and slip the allen wrench in the middle of the
 blossom.
Step 2: Take a length of wire and twist the top of it
around the twisted end of the group of wires. Thread the end
through  from right to left  behind two overlapping loops.
Draw it out and loop it over itself.
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Step 3: Turn the allen wrench to the left in your hand so that you have the
next pair of adjacent overlapping loops facing you. Thread the end through again 
from right to left  behind these two loops. Draw it out and loop it over itself.
Step 4: Turn the allen wrench again the same
direction and thread a loop through the last pair of
adjacent starter loops. The direction of the turning and
the threading must be consistent for the entire project.
Step 5: When you return to the first loop you
threaded, insert your wire end behind the criss-cross and
draw it through in the same direction as the first row of
loops. Continue to do this around and around, ad
infinitum, until you have about 2/3 to 3/4 the desired
finished length.
Note: When you run out of wire, simply slip a new
length in approximately where the last one left off, and tuck
in the short ends. Continue looping.
Double knit is accomplished
in a similar way to single knit, above.
Only for the loops in the second row,
insert the wire end in the same place
but behind the first loop, and draw it
over itself as before. For loops after
the second row, the wire end will be
inserted behind TWO loops instead of
one. This weave will get impossibly
tight if you draw your wire too hard,
so be careful!
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Bibliography & Sources
Peterson, Irene. Great Wire Jewelry. Lark Books, NY. 1998.
Theophilus, (trans. John Hawthorne and Cyril Smith.) On Divers Arts. Dover Books.
New York, 1979.
York Archaeological Trust and the National Museum of Denmark, The World of the
Vikings (CD-ROM), Past Forward Limited, undated.
On-line:
Danr Bjornsson (mundanely Don Willadson.) 10th Century Woven Wire Arm Ring.
From: http://willadsenfamily.org/sca/danr_as/woven-arm-ring/woven-arm-ring.htm
Historika Museet (Historical Museum of Sweden)
From: http://www.historiska.se/collections/treasures/medeltid-e.html
Viking silver in Arctic Norway, December 2005.
From: http://saltosobrius.blogspot.com/2005_12_01_saltosobrius_archive.html
Apollonia Voss (Lora-Lynn Stevens.) Viking Chain Knitting. 2004.
From: http://userweb.suscom.net/~apolloniavoss/trichinopoly4.htm.
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