snip...
Maybe what I really meant to say was "Derek, dude! You're getting on my nerves (and I think I'm not the only one), so cut it out! Love, Carol."
LOL
"Carol, babe! You are a breath of fresh air (and I am sure others agree with me), so please continue to chastise me and try to keep this irritating male in his proper place! Reciprocated Love, Derek
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Homonym, in the strict sense, one of a group of words that share the same spelling and the same pronunciation but have different meanings
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HomonymThere are many many words that are homonyms and can only be differentiated by their context. But in the sense of this discussion, I hope we can ignore all those homonyms for knot that are clearly nothing to do with cordage, and restrict this discussion to the use of the word in our field, where we cannot differentiate sense of meaning between true knots and decorative structures.
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So - Yes Please, as per your post title - let's talk about knots some more, even at the expense of getting on your lovely nerves again.
I doubt any word was
"basic to human existence... even before spoken language" (I think the former requires the existence of the latter, but I take the gist of your meaning). However. the term ligare the Late Latin word meaning to bind; to tie; bind, tie, fasten does indicate that BINDING is a fundamental concept of critical importance to man. Not only physically in the fixing of objects, but also psychologically in binding loyalties.
I believe it is 'binding' that man has been doing since before he was man, and 'Knots' are a tiny specialised subset of 'bindings', that were developed as man developed 'Cordage'.
If we take ABoK as a source, we can see clearly that 'Stopper Knots' range from the simplest overhand to ever larger and beautified creations which eventually took looks beyond functionality. Eventually, we can see the use of rope and other cordage moving through all sorts of ornamentation. Along the way we meet sinnits, plaits, mats, weaves, nets etc etc. Jack Tar never needed to differentiate them other than they were 'ropework' and every item had its unique name.
Today in this Guild we deal with names collected from many nations, trades and times. The internet and this forum has given us a window that has never existed before into the 'world' of bindings and what we see happening is the broadening of the term 'knots' to encompass all decorative ropework, including that which used to be functional (i.e. stopper knots etc.) but is now purely decorative.
As we here can see this blurring of a working definition of 'knots' from functional bindings to include decorative bindings (which sensibly already have clear definitions - sinnits, braids, weaves etc), only we will be able (or interested) in retaining the clarity that once existed for knots to be functional working bindings in cordage and to differentiate them from purely decorative structures.
Derek