St Cuthbert’s Cap.

This tam celebrates St Cuthbert, the reluctant Bishop of Lindisfarne Monastery in the 7th century AD. After an aristocratic childhood, he devoted his life to the spread of Christianity in the remote and war-torn pagan kingdom of Northumbria in Northern England. He preferred really to spend his time meditating in his solitary stone cell in isolation on the Farne Islands, where he protected the “cuddy ducks” i.e Cuthbert’s ducks (eider ducks) from hunters, as one of the earliest known environmentalists. They still flourish there.

I have designed the tam in hand spun, vegetable-dyed and undyed sheep colours that would have been familiar to St Cuthbert’s community, and all of which grow in Northern England, so it could have been made locally in 700 AD; a sort of historic reenactment hat. The slightly odd colour combinations reflect the availability of dyestuffs/pigments at that time, and have affinities with the colours used on the 8th century Lindisfarne Gospels illuminated manuscript, produced also in honour of St Cuthbert at his own monastery, and now in the British Library.

The hat includes motifs of waves around the Farne Islands; a Celtic cross for St Cuthbert; eider ducks, and in the crown, the rays of the Lindisfarne Light which still warns mariners of these low offshore islands.

The design is strong enough that you can work it in just 2 or 3 colours and achieve a good result: or you can use all 8 colours for a complex and subtle effect. Separate charts are given for each option. If you chose 2 colours, make sure there is a good tonal contrast between them: or add a pop of a brilliant 3rd colour as indicated on the chart. It’s a good stash-busting project that utilises small amounts (less then 50 gms) of each of 2 main colours, or tiny amounts of 8 colours.

If you want to knit the authentic, historic version, you can buy a kit containing the vegetable-dyed, hand-spun and hand processed wool yarns you need, made by us from our own Shetland flock, (+ the printed pattern and charts) from our Etsy shop:
Naturally Woollen
www.etsy.com/uk/shop/NaturallyWoollen
Or dye your own!

It is knitted in the round in traditional Fair Isle fashion, with no more than 2 colours in use at once, from a ribbed brim to a segmented crown of 7 pattern repeats, narrowed by centred double decreases to its centre. Although the design looks complex, the colour changes are frequent enough that weaving in at the back isn’t much needed until the crown, and there are no colour changes on decrease rounds. You should achieve a neat, close, thick finish using needles slightly small for DK weight.

Skills needed: knit, purl, decreases and increases (instructions given), knitting in the round in 2 colours, reading a chart.

Suggested colours, with closest equivalents from Jamiesons’ of Shetland range. The commercial colours are brighter and more conventional than the veg. dyed.

DK weight wool yarn in:

Mid purple (alkanet* with alum mordant): (Jamiesons’ Anemone)
Soft blue (woad, no mordant) (Jamiesons’ Blue Danube)
Yellow- green (carrot tops, no mordant) (Jamiesons’ Chartreuse)
Coral red (wild madder, alum mordant) (Jamiesons’ Ginger)
Natural Black
Natural White
Natural Oatmeal (Jamiesons’ Eesit)
Natural silver grey (Jamiesons’ sholmit/white)

Alcanet root: a more sustainable alternative to the lichen dye that probably would have been used for this colour in the 7th century.

There are 3 pdf files for you to download: 1 of written knitting instructions, 1 chart for the 8-colour version, and 1 for the 2(3) colour version: they are not identical patterns.