Knitting terminology in the 1840s

Here are glossaries from four early knitting-book writers, three of them English and the other American. 

Note that Mrs. Copley is the only one to not use or even mention the word "seam" for the purl stitch!

From My Knitting Book by Frances Lambert (1843), using English terms --

Explanation of Terms used in Knitting. 

To cast on.—The first interlacement of the cotton on the needle. 

To cast off.—To knit two stitches, and to pass the first over the second, and so on to the last stitch, which is to be secured by drawing the thread through. 

To cast over.—To bring the cotton forward round the needle. 

To narrow.—To lessen, by knitting two stitches together. 

To seam.—To knit a stitch with the cotton before the needle. 

 To widen.—To increase by making a stitch, bringing the cotton round the needle, and knitting the same when it occurs. 

A turn.—Two rows in the same stitch, backwards and forwards. 

To turn.—To change the stitch. 

To turn over.—To bring the wool forward over the needle. 

A row.—The stitches from one end of the needle to the other. 

A round.—A row, when the stitches are on two, three, or more needles. 

A plain row.—That composed of simple knitting.

To pearl a row.—To knit with the cotton before the needle. 

To rib.—To work alternate rows of plain and pearl knitting. 

To bring the thread forward.—To bring the cotton forward so as to make an open stitch. 

A loop stitch.—Made by bringing the cotton before the needle, which, in knitting the succeeding stitch, will again take its own place. 

To slip or pass a stitch.—To change it from one needle to the other without knitting it. 

To fasten on.—The best way to fasten on is to place the two ends contrariwise, and knit a few stitches with both together. For knitting, with silk, or fine cotton, a weaver's knot will be found the best. 

To take under.—To pass the cotton from one needle to the other, without changing its position. 

Pearl, seam, and rib-stitch—All signify the same.

 

From Miss Watts's Selections of Knitting, Netting & Crochet Work (1844) -- English terms.

From Lonely Hours: A Textbook of Knitting by "An American Lady" (1849).

From The Comprehensive Knitting Book by Esther Copley (1849), using English terms. The explanation on p.12 for "take in from the back" reads, "By reversing the right hand pin, so inserting it in two stitches, not in front but in the back of the left hand pin, and knitting them off as one" -- a modern K2tog tbl, or "through back loop".

What is a cephaline?

Esther Copley, in her Comprehensive Knitting-Book (1849), writes of the cephaline, "A very simple and useful article of this kind is merely a straight piece of knitting worked in wide ribs, and gathered in at the ends to ribbon strings, by which to tie it under the chin. It suits equally well as a ruff for the neck.  It may be made merely as a wide band to cover the ears, or to spread out as to cover the head.  The only difference is in the number of ribs" (p.146).  A netted version in Miss Lambert's 1840 The Ladies' Knitting and Netting Book ("second series"), notes that it is "to be worn on the head on leaving heated rooms", and various encyclopedias of the day (such as Alden's in 1888 and the Columbian of 1897), presumably having copied wholesale from each other in those days before copyright, defined it as "a knitted woolen band passing round the head and over the ears, as a preservation against cold, worn by ladies" (though note that these two at least were long after patterns for a cephaline disappeared from knitting receipt books!).

I have found a few instances of "Cephaline" used as a first name, for American girls born here and there throughout the 19th century (all in Southern states) -- in one instance at least, it was possibly a feminized version of her grandfather's name, Cephas, a Biblical name meaning "rock" in Aramaic.  However, the prefix cephalo-, used in another definition of "cephaline," means "head" -- Dictionary.com gives "<Greek kephalo-, combining form of kephalḗ head; akin to gable," so this seems the more-likely origin of the word for this particular garment.

The cephaline sounds quite like a melon hood or an opera hood except that the latter, at least in Godey's 1856 version, is longer, sort of a cap/muffler combination (though, to add to the confusion, sometimes it isn't), where Mrs. Copley says that the cephaline is tied "under the chin", much like Mrs. Weaver's melon hood of 1859.

In addition to Mrs. Copley's pattern, one for "A Sontag, or Cephaline" (sic!) can be found in Frances Lambert's My Knitting Book of 1843 (Ravelry link here), and one in Miss Watts's Selection of Knitting, Netting & Crochet Work (1844).

"My Knitting Book" by Miss Lambert

 From the introduction:

The examples of knitting, contained in the following pages, have been selected with the greatest care,—many are original,—and the whole are so arranged as to render them comprehensible even to a novice in the art.

Knitting being so often sought, as an evening amusement, both by the aged and by invalids, a large and distinct type has been adopted,—as affording an additional facility. The writer feels confident in the recommendation of "My Knitting Book," and humbly hopes it may meet with the same liberal reception that has been accorded to her "Hand-Book of Needlework."

The numerous piracies that have been committed on her last mentioned work, have been one inducement to publish this little volume; and from the low price at which it is fixed, nothing, but a very extended circulation, can ensure her from loss. Some few of the examples have been selected from the chapter on knitting, in the "Hand-Book."

3, New Burlington Street,
November 1843.

The full text (with typographical errors corrected) of Miss Lambert's My Knitting Book (1843) is available on Gutenberg.org.