When I was young, my older brother taught me how to make different designs with a looped string by criss-crossing it through my fingers in specific ways. Some examples of the “designs” were to make the string look like a crows foot, a cup and saucer, and my favorite (and hardest to do) the “Jacobs ladder”. Has anyone out there ever heard of this before? I have always wandered if there were more “designs” in a book somewhere, but I don’t even know what the “art” is called.
I had completely forgotten about this until I read your post. Now I need me some string!!
I completely neglected to mention that they’re called “string figures” and if you google that phrase, you’ll come up with all kinds of sites.
This is a great book, in my opinion.
It’s a game played, mainly by girls, in English schools (or it used to be!). It’s called Cats Cradle .
Not to nitpick (well, ok) but I think Cat’s Cradle is specifically the string games played by two people (girls in English schools, in this example). String figures can be executed by just one person.
If you’re going to nit-pick, nit-pick right!
Most string figures are intended to be made by one person. There are others which either can only be made by two people, or which are easier to make when two people co-operate.
Of the figures which two people co-operate to make, there is a family of figures, or more correctly sequences of figures, which are often known by the name ‘Cat’s Cradle’. However, there are many different sequences known by this name, and other two-person sequences which are not known by this name.