The Good Luck Knot
吉祥結, 吉祥结, 菊結び, 동심결매듭
Generalities
Tied on the bight, the good luck knot is somewhat fragile (eg. don't put one in your pocket and expect it to come out unscathed), but used where appropriate and reinforced when necessary, it is extremely decorative and easily varied with nice effects.
The good luck knot is different from most of the other knots with multiple ears in that there are double the number of ears than the size number of the knot would indicate. The 4-knot has 8 ears, 4 short and 4 long. But, of course, ear size is subject to the whims of the knot tyer so basing terminology on that would be foolish. However, notice that what is traditionally the "long" ear comes out of the side of the knot and the "short" ear wraps around the corner of the knot. Just because I can't leave well enough alone, I will point out that when you have a bigger knot (with more sides) the corner and sides get more diffcult to distinguish, but in this instance I doubt that mathematical terminology, like "verticies" and "edges", is going to help.
Nomenclature
Chen 1: Good Luck Knot (吉祥結) [jí xiáng jié] (4)ABoK: #1097 a three part crown in the bight (½ 3), #1105 a four-looped knot with a double square crown (4), #1106 extend the three "snug loops or bights" to give a seven looped knot (4)
Maedeup: The Art of Traditional Korean Knots by Kim Hee-Jin: error: URL for one-mind not set [dongsimyeol maedeup] One Mind Knot.
Ruri-Ishikawa: 菊結び [きくむすび, kiku musubi] Chrysanthemum Knot.
Translation Notes
The knot in question was reportedly a "nameless orphan" until Ms. Chen named it the Good Luck Knot. The Chinese name, 吉祥結, machine translates as "auspicious knot", so apparently it was a nameless orphan in Chinese as well as English (if we don't want to count "a four-looped knot with a double square crown" as a proper name ¯\_(ツ)_/¯). The Japanese and Korean names (chrysanthemum and one mind, respectively) do not appear to be varations on the good luck theme, so one is tempted to assume that it was named in those disciplines prior to its naming in Chinese. Perhaps its identification in Chinese prior to Ms. Chen's christening was of the four-looped knot with... variety. ( ᐛ )
How To
General Tips
- The basic premise of this knot, twice crown a cord formed into multiple bights radiating from a centre point, lends itself to seemingly endless variations. Try a few. Some might be unstable, some might strike you as ugly, but you also might find a new favourite. Play around and then tell us all about it!
Variations and Expansions
I've been blogging about my own experiments with variations on the good luck knot. Eventually, I will make step-by-step how tos for each as would be appropriate. Until then, see the pictures and read about what I was thinking at the time (sorry if some of them sound like freestyle skiing manoeuvers (‾◡◝ ):
You might ask yourself: what happens if I flip the knot back to front after the first crown? Well, your corner ears get folded under and hidden, leaving what looks more or less like a standard good luck knot with only side ears.
Similar Knots
- Crown Knot
- Crown Sinnet
- Flower Knot