I continue to be puzzled by the sheepshank --not sure of
how it was much ever used.
While I can see that putting one in on a ship’s stay
when an upper mast is brought down might be needed,
so to keep terminals the same,
I get the impression that a lot of larger ships must have
had stays well beyond the size that would be knotted,
even so simply as the SS (just a loop around an otherwise
uninvolved-in-knotting bight!) !?
And the rumored use for capturing & holding excess line
in some crane/derrick/whip strikes me as rather awkward
–esp. if the structure was to be seized for stability, as is
claimed (both ends and the center of the span)?! That,
after loading/unloading top of ship, bights are let out
so that the hook can now reach lower --and so the take-up
mechanism is again starting at the end of the rope, though
it will now be taking in more & more as the work descends!?
In any case, were this so, I’d think we’d find examples of
it in some old images, and --why not-- in some not-so-old ones!?
(I have similar doubts about the “jury mast knot”!)
Makes one wonder if such reported usages were more along the lines of modern day urban legends. (I know someone who knows someone who used it in this way…)
It’s much that knotting literature seems to take prior
literature as its reference, not a new (maybe first!)
LOOK at the actual-factual. The Hensel & Gretel
makebelieve world now several editions & many printings
of their huge Encyclopedia of Knots & Fancy Ropework
is a grand, in-your-face testimony to the publication
of pure rubbish (with some actual things in the mixture)!
(E.g., I challenge everyone to tie that book’s “Cape Horn Hitch”
–“an old-style hitch now seldom seen.”,
a #255 maybe p. or pl. 91 (memory) !?
Re the sheepshank, it’s use for a stay would be one
that shouldn’t be concerned about lacking tension
–it would be set up with at least some tension and
hold. It’s reputed use in holding extra rope of a
“whip” /crane, well, leaves me trying to understand;
and I’d think we could see better evidence of such
usage, had it occurred!?
Re the jury mast knot, that strikes me as having
dubious purchase on a mast to take much force
–Ashely as much concurs in this, in suggesting
the putting in of supporting wood. But, really,
would why would one rely on some clever pulling
out of eyes --which are compromised in their
ability to grip the mast, by having to get around
into each other-- vs. a direct attachment of each
stay; or of making a multi-eye provision in a
dedicated piece of cordage!?
And for supposed use on derricks,
wouldn’t the maker of said device anticipate its
need for guy lines with attachment points, and
not require the too-clever-by-half knotting?!
After all, while jury rigging of mast one must
hope is an INfrequent occurrence,
use of a derrick is of the expected, frequent sort!
i have always taken the iffy Sheephshank as more decorative than serving utility as i came to know the ropes.
To me has classic fails that would not allow in a Bowline, as loses/rolls out of the Half Hitch that gives lock.
i like close toggled, if tension maintained. Have used sticks, rods, prefer a keeper of rubberband over each end trapping into service. Have used carabiner spine clipped into place as keeper, but consider this ‘unsanitary’/errant use in the purist sense. Old garage door rollers give nice small tempered toggle, mushroom cap on roller end as pull handle, that also can protect hand if using hammer on that end.
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The opposing, counter-torquing rather than continuous direction ‘list’ of HHs does make sense here for Sheepshank.
. solar.lowtechmagazine.com/2010/06/lost-knowledge-ropes-and-knots looks sharper now but a fave reference ty.
i too think that knotting is THEE 1st technology where outside of self had to do a list of steps IN ORDER to reach proper result or fail(just like computer steps must be correct and in correct order as a later technology).
There was about no other way to take more than one and make it larger or hybrid mix with other utilities to make tools, clothes, shelter, extend force reach/bridge etc. And these understandings are root to our intellect. Tying knots has us following and L-earning same unwritten lessons and understandings; as fumble thru the same steps and paths as the Ancients; catching same glimpses and aha moments, that became root to evolvements of mechanics etc.
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And all done with a light, formable, pocketable substance, that did not have to carve even before knew to try to heat to reform some materials much later.
The above being said, and at the risk of contradicting what I said above, I have no reason do doubt Ashley’s veracity when he wrote about what he himself had seen:
1161. If there is a considerable length of material to be expended
in the Sheepshank, a number of turns may be taken. To make this
coil doubly secure, place a Clove Hitch at each end. I have seen this
knot used in color halyards that are to be hung well above deck.
This particular usage also seems very believable to me since this is how I usually tie hanks of smaller cordage (paracord and the like), and can verify that this version stays tied while slack.