HISTORIAN PENELOPE Hemingway is an expert on the tradition of Dales glove knitting, and the motifs on her ‘Swaledale Mitts’ were inspired by a historic example called the ‘G.Walton 1846’ gloves. This type of mitt or wristwarmer was sometimes called a ‘muffatee’. “In her unpublished diary, Marie Hartley, the writer of the 1951 book The Old Hand-Knitters of the Dales, commented on a now lost pair that she saw, after the book’s publication: ‘…Mrs Alderson… showed
us a pair of muffatees that had come from Mr Alderson’s home. They were knitted like the Swaledale gloves with the date 1867. (Very thick and warm)’”