KNIPPERDOLLINCK (or Knipperdolling), BERNT (Berend or Bernhardt) (c. 1490–1536), German divine, was a prosperous cloth-merchant at Münster when in 1524 he joined Melchior Rinck and Melchior Hofman in a business journey to Stockholm, which developed into an abortive religious errand. Knipperdollinck, a man of fine presence and glib tongue, noted from his youth for eccentricity, had the ear of the Münster populace when in 1527 he helped to break the prison of Tonies Kruse, in the teeth of the bishop and the civic authorities. For this he made his peace with the latter; but, venturing on another business journey, he was arrested, imprisoned for a year, and released on payment of a high fine—in regard of which treatment he began an action before the Imperial Chamber. Though his aims were political rather than religious, he attached himself to the reforming movement of Bernhardt Rothmann, once (1529) chaplain of St Mauritz, outside Münster, now (1532) pastor of the city church of St Lamberti. A new bishop directed a mandate (April 17, 1532) against Rothmann, which had the effect of alienating the moderates in Münster from the democrats. Knipperdollinck was a leader of the latter in the surprise (December 26, 1532) which made prisoners of the negotiating nobles at Telgte, in the territory of Münster. In the end, Münster was by charter from Philip of Hesse (February 14, 1533) constituted an evangelical city. Knipperdollinck was made a burgomaster in February 1534. Anabaptism had already (September 8, 1533) been proclaimed at Münster by a journeyman smith; and, before this, Heinrich Roll, a refugee, had brought Rothmann (May 1533) to a rejection of infant baptism. From the 1st of January 1534 Roll preached Anabaptist doctrines in a city pulpit; a few days later, two Dutch emissaries of Jan Matthysz, or Matthyssen, the master-baker and Anabaptist prophet of Haarlem, came on a mission to Münster. They were followed (January 13) by Jan Beukelsz (or Bockelszoon, or Buchholdt), better known as John of Leiden. It was his second visit to Münster; he came now as an apostle of Matthysz. He was twenty-five, with a winning personality, great gifts as an organizer, and plenty of ambition. Knipperdollinck, whose daughter Clara was ultimately enrolled among the wives of John of Leiden, came under his influence. Matthysz himself came to Münster (1534) and lived in Knipperdollinck’s house, which became the centre of the new movement to substitute Münster for Strassburg (Melchior Hofmann’s choice) as the New Jerusalem. On the death of Matthysz, in a foolish raid (April 5, 1534), John became supreme. Knipperdollinck, with one attempt at revolt, when he claimed the kingship for himself, was his subservient henchman, wheedling the Münster democracy into subjection to the fantastic rule of the “king of the earth.” He was made second in command, and executioner of the refractory. He fell in with the polygamy innovation, the protest of his wife being visited with a penance. In the military measures for resisting the siege of Münster he took no leading part. On the fall of the city (June 25, 1535) he hid in a dwelling in the city wall, but was betrayed by his landlady. After six months’ incarceration, his trial, along with his comrades, took place on the 19th of January, and his execution, with fearful tortures, on the 22nd of January 1536. Knipperdollinck attempted to strangle himself, but was forced to endure the worst. His body, like those of the others, was hung in a cage on the tower of St Lamberti, where the cages are still to be seen. An alleged portrait, from an engraving of 1607, is reproduced in the appendix to A. Ross’s Pansebeia, 1655.
See L. Keller, Geschichte der Wiedertäufer und ihres Reichs zu Münster (1880); C. A. Cornelius, Historische Arbeiten (1899); E. Belfort Bax, Rise and Fall of the Anabaptists (1903). (A. Go.*)
KNITTING (from O.E. cnyttan, to knit; cf. Ger. Knütten; the root is seen in “knot”), the art of forming a single thread or strand of yarn into a texture or fabric of a loop structure, by
employing needles or wires. “Crochet” work is an analogous
art in its simplest form. It consists of forming a single thread
into a single chain of loops. All warp knit fabrics are built on
this structure. Knitting may be said to be divided into two
principles, viz. (1) hand knitting and (2) frame-work knitting
(see Hosiery). In hand knitting, the wires, pins or needles used
are of different lengths or gauges, according to the class of work
wanted to be produced. They are made of steel, bone, wood or
ivory. Some are headed to prevent the loops from slipping
over the ends. Flat or selvedged work can only be produced on
them. Others are pointed at both ends, and by employing three
or more a circular or circular-shaped fabric can be made. In
hand knitting each loop is formed and thrown off individually
and in rotation and is left hanging on the new loop formed. The
cotton, wool and silk fibres are the principal materials from which
knitting yarns are manufactured, wool being the most important
and most largely used. “Lamb’s-wool,” “wheeling,” “fingering”
and worsted yarns are all produced from the wool fibre, but
may differ in size or fineness and quality. Those yarns are largely
used in the production of knitted underwear. Hand knitting is
to-day principally practised as a domestic art, but in some of
the remote parts of Scotland and Ireland it is prosecuted as an
industry to some extent. In the Shetland Islands the wool of the
native sheep is spun, and used in its natural colour, being manufactured
into shawls, scarfs, ladies’ jackets, &c. The principal
trade of other districts is hose and half-hose, made from the
wool of the sheep native to the district. The formation of the
stitches in knitting may be varied in a great many ways, by
“purling” (knitting or throwing loops to back and front in rib
form), “slipping” loops, taking up and casting off and working in
various coloured yarns to form stripes, patterns, &c. The articles
may be shaped according to the manner in which the wires and
yarns are manipulated.
KNOBKERRIE (from the Taal or South African Dutch, knopkirie,
derived from Du. knop, a knob or button, and kerrie, a
Bushman or Hottentot word for stick), a strong, short stick with
a rounded knob or head used by the natives of South Africa in
warfare and the chase. It is employed at close quarters, or as a
missile, and in time of peace serves as a walking-stick. The name
has been extended to similar weapons used by the natives of
Australia, the Pacific islands, and other places.
KNOLLES, RICHARD (c. 1545–1610), English historian, was a native of Northamptonshire, and was educated at Lincoln
College, Oxford. He became a fellow of his college, and at some
date subsequent to 1571 left Oxford to become master of a school
at Sandwich, Kent, where he died in 1610. In 1603 Knolles
published his Generall Historie of the Turkes, of which several
editions subsequently appeared, among them a good one edited
by Sir Paul Rycaut (1700), who brought the history down to
1699. It was dedicated to King James I., and Knolles availed
himself largely of Jean Jacques Boissard’s Vitae et Icones Sultanorum
Turcicorum (Frankfort, 1596). Although now entirely
superseded, it has considerable merits as regards style and
arrangement. Knolles published a translation of J. Bodin’s
De Republica in 1606, but the Grammatica Latina, Graeca et
Hebraica, attributed to him by Anthony Wood and others, is the
work of the Rev. Hanserd Knollys (c. 1599–1691), a Baptist
minister.
See the Athenaeum, August 6, 1881.
KNOLLES (or Knollys), SIR ROBERT (c. 1325–1407), English
soldier, belonged to a Cheshire family. In early life he served
in Brittany, and he was one of the English survivors who were
taken prisoners by the French after the famous “combat of the
thirty” in March 1351. He was, however, quickly released and
was among the soldiers of fortune who took advantage of the
distracted state of Brittany, at this time the scene of a savage
civil war, to win fame and wealth at the expense of the wretched
inhabitants. After a time he transferred his operations to
Normandy, when he served under the allied standards of England
and of Charles II. of Navarre. He led the “great company” in
their work of devastation along the valley of the Loire, fighting
at this time for his own hand and for booty, and winning a terrible
reputation by his ravages. After the conclusion of the treaty
of Brétigny in 1360 Knolles returned to Brittany and took part
in the struggle for the possession of the duchy between John of
Montfort (Duke John IV.) and Charles of Blois, gaining great
fame by his conduct in the fight at Auray (September 1364), where
