Eleonora di Toledo's Stockings Replicas

A friend with a late period Italian persona was elevated and so I decided a mere two months beforehand that I was going to knit her replicas of the silk stockings in which Eleonora di Toledo was buried in 1562. I had no real goal in mind other than pretty silk stockings that were reasonably historically accurate.

As they’re very well studied, I looked at patterns drafted up by other re-enactors, such as Dame George Anne of Æthelmearc OP, and compared them to high resolution photos of the originals as well as Richard Rutt’s section on them in A History of Hand-knitting. The modern interpretations were accurate for my purposes as I intended to shape them to fit the recipient rather than making carbon copies, although I did mix methods and came up with my own version.

Looking at commercial yarns used by those who’ve knitted them before, I went with Ashford Silk 20/2 since it was available at a local yarn shop. The silk was undyed and the recipient’s favourite colours were silver and purple. I happened to have some logwood on hand, courtesy of Isabella da Firenze, and, following the directions on Maiwai.com, I dyed it a silvery lavender. I don’t remember weights or percentages, especially since the logwood was in an old yogurt container that had been kicking around in my supplies for awhile, but it worked out just fine, I think. Logwood isn’t lightfast, but as these are stockings, the colour should hopefully hold up well. While I don’t know whether this dye was available in period, there are certain lichens that were used to produce similar hues. At the very least, they’re obviously hand-dyed with natural plant-based dye in a colour she likes, which was most important.

To get the same gauge as the extant pair (12 stitches and 20 rows per inch), I used size 00/1.75mm double-pointed steel needles, which are the modern equivalent of what would have been used in period if the many extant paintings of knitting Madonnas are anything to go by.

Luckily, the recipient’s measurements are similar to my own only she’s a touch shorter with slightly smaller feet so I was able to try them on as I went. I decreased approximately every three rows along the calf, leaving a series of ribs down to the ankle, which I figured would help with fit as ribbing is notoriously stretchy and will hopefully prevent wear more so than plain stockinette.

There were an unusual number of knots in the skein, which often weren’t discovered until it was nearly too late as I was knitting, so I had to cut those basic knots out and tie another one with longer tails to weave in for greater durability. In nearly 30 years of knitting and almost half of that in the SCA I haven’t uncovered anything about how this would have been handled in non-feltable fibers in the 1500s so I went with the quick and dirty method because I was so frustrated with the sheer number of questionable knots.

While Melinda Strehl makes a good argument in Tournaments Illuminated for knitting the cuff separately and then sewing it onto the stockings, I didn’t want to bother with that as I hate sewing knitted sections together; I can never match the stitches up properly. Instead, the stockings were knitted inside out until I got to the heel flap, which I knitted back and forth before turning the heel with a Dutch heel, ending on a right-side row. There’s not enough left of the heels to make out the characteristic line of most types of turning methods, nor do I remember what Rutt said of the heels as I lent my copy to someone who’s since quit playing and I haven’t managed to get it back. I like Dutch heels and the method was used in the modern patterns as well as Tournaments Illuminated issue #126, spring 1994.

Unfortunately, I didn’t document my process well enough to follow on the second one and had to read my stitches a lot and rip back at least once. At such a tiny gauge, this resulted in some twisted and skipped stitches at the ankle. I forged on ahead anyway after discovering my mistake as they’d already taken 8 months (took a break over the summer) to finish and I did not want to rip back the heel a second time and risk more mistakes.

Why the break?  You can knit so much with tiny needles that the pad of your finger will split along the lines of your fingerprint.  Superglue helps, but can catch on the silk.  That and sweaty hands made the dye bleed.

I used a toe method from one of the modern patterns, I believe it’s a star toe, that I’ve never knitted before. It’s supposed to result in a rounder toe, which would be more accurate to the originals, I believe, but I’m not entirely sure I executed it correctly.

Lace really needs to be blocked (washed and pinned out into the proper shape while still wet) in order for the pattern to really pop and hold its shape. I have no idea how it was done, or if at all, but I wasn’t about to gift a pair of rumpled looking stockings after all that work.

I reinforced the heck out of the soles by weaving in more silk, which I have no idea if it was a period practice or not, but I worried about the thinness of the fabric and would cry if they wore out quickly. I also sent a bit of extra silk for future darning needs.

The garters were knitted using the pattern in The Typical Tudor with the addition of a stitch marker that broke during the construction of the stockings. It as well as the needles used were gifted to me by the family of a mutual friend of the recipient and who has passed away. So, in a sense, the hose were a gift from both the deceased and I. I don’t care that it’s not a period practice, they’ll be covered by the cuffs, and nobody should be looking that closely at a lady’s garters, anyway.

The final product fit my goal of reasonably historically accurate and I believe that they would hold up even under the most intense scrutiny, as long as one looks at it with the understanding that the quality of work would be considered that of an amateur. These types of stockings would have been knitted by skilled artisans and frankly, I don’t have the time nor patience to devote to perfecting anything at this small a gauge.

When I entered them in my barony's Arts & Sciences championship, I actually taught one of the judges beforehand how to judge them.  I went through the rubric and applied it to quite honestly to the hose.  One of the judges told me I shouldn't be so hard on myself.  I was like I'm pointing out technical errors for the non-knitters amongst the judges?  I'm being honest?  I won by default as the only entrant, but they reassured me I still would have won.

While I say I’ll never again knit at such a tiny gauge, I think I have enough silk left to make another, much simpler, pair of stockings. If I had to do these over again, I’d choose a different toe method and note my decreases and patterning at the heel better so I wouldn’t have to rip back to match the first one. I’d also take better notes of the dyeing process for documentation as at the time I was in a hurry to get them done as fast as possible with only a passing thought of perhaps entering them in an Arts & Sciences competition.  I also wish I'd gotten good photos of the finished pair, but I'd blocked them the night before the competition and then they went straight from the competition to someone who couriered them to Twelfth Night to be passed along to the recipient.