How it started

In the Netherlands, fishermen wore hand-knitted sweaters in the period between about 1860 and 1940. These sweaters were knitted by the women in the fishing villages. Many fishing towns had their own patterns, so you could recognize fishermen by their sweater. After the Second World War, the fisherman's sweater disappeared. The increasing prosperity caused people to buy clothes instead of making them themselves.

Origin

The United Kingdom played a major role in the origin of the fisherman's sweater. In England, so-called smocks were worn, this was a linen smock with wrinkles that were secured with embroidery. It was a brilliant idea to use the circular knit seamless sweaters initially worn as underwear instead of the smocks, as outerwear in which they could move more easily. Motifs were incorporated into the sweaters to make them look a bit like the embroidery of a smock.

These types of sweaters were already knitted in the sixteenth century in Guernsey (Channel Islands). Later this was extended to places along the entire English coast, up to the northern coastal towns in Scotland.

Fishermen were also the first in our country to wear hand-knitted sweaters as outerwear. When Dutch fishermen in English and Scottish towns came into contact with wearing sweaters as outerwear, they were smuggled to the Netherlands, or exchanged sweaters for tobacco and gin. These sweaters were studied by Dutch women after knitted in sajet (a pure woolen yarn).

From about 1920, Coco Chanel (who was inspired by the sweaters of the Breton fishermen) made the sweater as an outerwear. And so the sweater became fashion for everyone as an outerwear.

Each place has its own pattern

Knitting was a women's affair. Girls learned to knit from their mothers at a very young age. Mothers passed on the patterns to their daughters. These patterns were not written down but were in the head of the knitter. In this way, every fishing community developed its own pattern on the sweater. Although this was not entirely certain, because if the bride came from another place, she took her own hometown patron with her. Sometimes a fisherman who had drowned could be identified by means of his sweater. Due to the motifs and layout of the sweater, the origin of the fisherman could be traced approximately when he washed ashore somewhere.

Motifs and patterns

All kinds of symbolic motifs were knitted on the fisherman's sweaters. These motifs had all kinds of meanings that were derived from everyday life. Religion, the sea, the weather and fishing were important themes.

Some examples are:

⦁ Zigzag pattern stands for lightning bolts.

⦁ Blocks stand for the nets of the fishermen, as well as for bricks of houses.

⦁ Alternating horizontal strips of jersey or motif strips stand for ebb and flow.

⦁ Checkers represent the eye of God, the eye that perceives everything. It protected, watched, but in the eyes of the women also kept the fisherman faithful when he was in a foreign port.

⦁ Wave pattern, represents the waves at sea

⦁ Cable pattern, stands for hold. The ropes with which the sails were hoisted and the boat was moored.

⦁ Ridges stand for the sand ridges on the beach.

On the fishermen's sweaters of Moddergat you can see the eye of God, lightning, cables and ridges, among other things.

Special facts

The sleeves of the fishermen's sweaters of the past were short. This was to keep hands and forearms free during work.

There were no seams in a fisherman's sweater. This was to stop wind and water. The sweaters were knitted in a T-model so that they could easily be hung on a stick on the ship by drying the sleeves.

Sometimes a cord was threaded through the neckband to make it close well against the cold. The cord was often provided with tassels or pompoms at the ends. These tassels had a special function. If there was bycatch of jellyfish, and fishermen got the poison of the jellyfish in their eyes, they knocked the poison out of the eyes with these brushes.

In the past, sweaters were endlessly darned or reknitted when they were damaged. If the sweater was worn down to the thread and could no longer be repaired, it was used as a mop or cleaning rag. This is also the reason why very few original fisherman's sweaters have been preserved. But fortunately, there are still many photos and postcards featuring fishermen wearing fisherman's sweaters.

A skipper's sweater is sometimes confused with a fisherman's sweater. Skipper sweaters are machine-knitted smooth sweaters with a turtleneck that has a zipper. These sweaters are inspired by the English navy sweaters that were worn after the Second World War.