Marlinspike seamanship — a term used in the maritime world to describe expert ropework and knotwork — has been a pillar of coastal communities for thousands of years.

Archaeologists date the oldest known sailing knot to a 10,000-year-old clove hitch on a fishing hook in Denmark. Mariners have used rope — referred to as line — and its many iterations in their daily lives, passing this information down from generation to generation.

A wide variety of knots were created for practical purposes — tasks like raising sails, lengthening a line or tying up to a dock.

Although many use the word “knot” interchangeably regardless of style, sailors have a more complex vocabulary to specify the intent of their braiding.

Knots are created by turning the line in on itself. A true knot is capable of holding its own form, independent of anything it might be wrapped around.

By contrast, bends are used to secure two ends of a rope together. Hitches cannot exist independently of the object they are adhered to. Once the hook, ring, or spar is removed, the hitch falls apart.

Other techniques are more decorative. This kind of fancywork, or fancy knotting, is an age-old craft that has been as synonymous with the maritime community as the whalebone-based art of scrimshaw.

Life at sea has historically been isolating and monotonous. Repurposing damaged lines that had been declared unusable was both a great way to keep a sailor occupied and an opportunity to reuse materials that needed a second life.

Sailors turned weavers would create intricate chafing mats that protected the decks of their vessels. The mats would be placed in high-traffic areas to prevent wear and tear.

Creating these designs takes a certain amount of spatial intelligence and lots of practice.

Elaborate knots are woven from a single piece of line and, in many cases, nailed to a pattern board to make it easier to handle. Although some knots have accessible patterns to learn from, others are more often passed down from mariner to mariner.

Historians consider the height of fancywork to be during the Golden Age of Sail, which peaked in the 18th and 19th centuries.

By the late 1800s, steam power was replacing sail power, which meant voyages were significantly shorter and sailors didn’t have as much time to dedicate to their craft.

Not only this, but some argue that increases in global literacy changed the way sailors viewed their time at sea.

Bringing books onto oceangoing vessels gave people another outlet to spend their free time, and fancywork’s popularity died down moving into the early 1900s.

Thankfully, the art of weaving traditional maritime mats was not entirely lost.

An upswing of interest in the mid-20th century helped revive the craft.

Given that most vessels by this time were made of metal or fiberglass, the mats were less utile and more decorative than they had been on traditional sailing ships.

Today, coastal communities — including those at the mouth of the Columbia River — uphold this tradition by repurposing line used by the region’s commercial vessels.