A Prick With Pointy Needles

What kind of weird wedding traditions do you have?

In Swedish folklore and tradition you see a lot of wedding pillows. They’re usually heavily embroidered and have the initials of the couple and the year incorporated in the design. Instead of doing the really traditional thing this wedding pillow that I’ve made for my brother has a maritime theme. But it connects to medieval Swedish intarsia gilt leather embroidery as well as the later folklore stuff.

You cut out the pattern from both colours of wool, switch their places, and sew it back together. Then you cover the seams in gilt leather and embellish a little bit. Then you have a perfect mirror pattern in two colours and if you sew them together you get a pillow. Success!

I recently found out another folklore and textile history crossover fact (everything is textiles, realistically).

It has to do with baptisms.

Historically, the belief in trolls and magical spirits was very strong in rural Sweden and any child born but not baptised was a pagan, and fair game for child stealing/changing by the trolls. Kids had to be baptised as soon as possible, but unless you lived right by the church there was a journey to get there, which was the most dangerous time.

On the journey the child would not be accompanied by its parents, but rather its godparents, since the child’s mother was seen as a heathen herself - having borne one.

So to protect the child from evil influence on the journey you’d wrap it up in a “doppåse”, a baptism bag.

The super intricate embroidery and embellished nature of the bag was meant to protect the child from the trolls.

It would feature anything precious, to show that the child was precious and cared for. Some of them are made from a piece of the mother’s wedding dress. A lot of them are red, which is seen as a protective colour. And some of them have crosses or T’s on them, a strong symbol of protection both during and before Christian times.

Besides the bag the child would then be carried in a “dopkasse”, a baptism basket.

The basked would also be full of protective ornamentation. A woven motif, or a grid carved into the side was known as a “marspjäll” and would act as protection against the Mara. She had to count all of the crossing points and couldn’t count to more than 3, so it would keep the child safe from her.

Some of the baskets also have holes singed into them, which was a part of the belief that things touched by fire would retain the strength of the fire itself.

Lastly the godparents would carry steel on the journey, and a hymn book. Both were known as magic repellants. And if you could afford it a piece of silver in or around the child’s swaddling was a last line of defence.

So, historically being in your shirtsleeves only was seen as something quite unchaste. People could really see everything if the wind came from the right direction.

However, in Sweden there was one exception that made it acceptable: if you were wearing a belt!

Wearing a belt meant you were wearing something on top of your shirt and therefore you were “dressed”. This was good as harvest time was sweaty work and you would want to wear as few garments as possible while working. So in the late summer you’d often see women toiling away with rakes under the sun. Wearing next to nothing, according to the standards of the time.

Peasant girl, Sweden ca 1850.

Just kidding it’s me this morning.

You know that feeling when your just happily crafting along and it’s going fine. The weather is the perfect kind of ambiance that you want (sunny, stormy, pattering if a soft rain idk you do you), the pattern is understandable and you’re generally enjoying yourself.

Then it happens. There’s a knot on your thread.

Now in Swedish folklore there are three (3) kinds of thread knot, depending on the situation.

Number 1: the love knot (kärleksknut).

This is a kind of knot that is easily undone. Usually the thread just went over itself and made a little slip knot that you can just tug the end of. It means someone who likes you is thinking of you and it made your thread tease you about it. Might be slightly bothersome, might also make you think of them back.

Number 2: the envy knot (avundsknut).

Perfection will always attract envy. The lesson is that faults in your work is not only fine, but encouraged. Lest you should draw the gaze of the evil eye, or even worse - the gods.

An envy knot in Swedish folklore is usually caused by humans who are envious of your work. It’s the kind of knot where however you pull it it won’t release and you end up making it tighter until you just cut the thread off to make a new start after it.

Number 3: the troll knot (trollknut)

This is comparable to the other two just a knot that happens on its own. But instead of humans it’s blamed on trolls. The trolls are fickle and you can never really know what they want. But they’re hindering your progress in the project so it’s probably not your best they have in mind. Watch out.

Source: institutet för språk och folkminnen (ISOF)

So I recently went to the institute of language and folklore to do some stuff and was digging in the archive for inspiration when I came across “folklore concerning weaving”.

One of the stories was recorded from several places in Sweden and it concerns the spoiling of the weave by someone with evil intentions.

So of you’ve ever woven by hand you know that it can go from easy peasy squeeze the lemon to swearing and cursing the loom, the warp, and yourself within minutes. This general hardship, like broken warp threads, a shed that sticks together and won’t be beaten, weft that won’t run through the shuttle, etc., was thought to be caused by someone casting an evil eye on you or walking three times around your home with mischief on their mind.

The only way to remedy this was to take a coal out of the hearth and put it, red hot, in the shuttle.

Then you would run it through the weave three times before you put the woof back in and beat it. This would solve your problems with the evil eye. It’s worth a try, I suppose.