Sharon MacIsaac, age 12, of Niagara Falls, Ontario, Canada, for her question:

When did people start knitting?

Portraits of Henry VIII show his lavish apparel in fine detail. His cocky hat is trimmed with fur and feathers. His knee length robe and bulky jacket are rich tapestries, embroidered and studded with gems. And his snug, knee length hose are hand knitted from silken thread. Henry's subjects wore hand knitted hose and pullovers made of wool. But at this stage of history, knitting was already a very ancient skill.

Your hand knitted sweater is nothing new. Neither are our suddenly stylish basket and cable stitches, our ribbing and bumpy popcorn patterns. Perhaps the first knitters were Bronze Age shepherd families and the various fancy stitches were added through the past 6,000 years or so. There are no written records because past history was concerned mainly with kings and conquests. Knitting is a folk art and the everyday doings of ordinary folk were not considered worth mentioning.

However, the ordinary folk managed to keep their own records, though not in writing. They carved stone figures, illustrated manuscripts and painted their pottery. And, naturally, they used the everyday designs of their times. Their stone figures reveal what sort of fabrics were worn in past centuries. A surprising number of these olden garments were expertly knitted from wool, linen and silk threads. Manuscripts and carvings of the Middle Ages reveal saints and even angels wearing robes of ribbed knitting.

The potters of ancient Cyprus added fancy scrolls, most likely copied from knotted and knitted, braided and netted threads. Other evidence suggest that the first steps of these crafts were known to our Neolithic ancestors, around 5,000 B.C. They twisted natural fibers to make cords and ropes, then invented all sorts of knots to form these threads into fabrics.

Knitting is a peaceful handicraft that gives a person time to think serene thoughts. Knitters of the past associated religious and nature themes with their creations. There is evidence that the sacred seamless robes worn by ancient priests were tubes of ribbed knitting. In later centuries, the expert knitters of Ireland attached various meanings to their fancy stitches. The famous cable stitch,was a fisherman's robe. A squared pattern outlined with bumps represented cultivated fields surrounded by stone walls. A fancy ribbed design was a ladder of life, from earth to heaven.

Certainly our ancestors were great knitters before recorded history. In ancient times traders and travelers took the latest stitches throughout the known world.    Some twisted their threads around bobbins, some used primitive hooks or needles. In Germany there is a 14th century painting of the Madonna. She sits serenely knitting a long seamless robe, on four needles.