Knitting - old knitting

and how old knitting  and crochet was done has been occupying my mind recently....in between the day job and caring for the Senior Cat and trying to manage without the fridge.
I think I mentioned the matter of the bicentenary of Queen Victoria's birth? Yes?
I now have to do a workshop on the topic so I have been doing yet more research.
My previous research was largely confined to pattern sources and the items people were knitting. I won't say "women and girls" because men knitted too. It was a common occupation among sailors and also among invalid men.
I have explored the delights of "Miss Watts" and her "Ladies Knitting and Netting Book",  "Miss Lambert" and her "My first knitting book " and even ventured into Cornelia Mee's "Crochet Collars".  There are many more too.
The Antique Pattern Library has provided some other resources in French, Dutch, German and Italian. They are a double, perhaps triple, challenge. They are old. They are in another language. They are knitting terms which have changed.  I have worked with other people in trying to work out what some of these "instructions" tell us. 
There is a pattern I came across which says, "Cast on sufficient stitches". It is for a "quilt" and only vague instructions are given for how to work out the required number of stitches. This would not suit the modern knitters I know. 
Another, rather easier, one begins with "make eight. Join then knit one plain" - in other words "using four needles cast on eight stitches, join and knit one round".
But the other day someone asked me, "But what about needle sizes Cat, were they the same? And what sort of wool did they use?"
That meant doing more research. It's been interesting. There has been the difference between British and US terms to contend with as well as inconsistencies in sizing. The answer to J..... has, in simple terms to be, "Not always. They used wool and other things."
The Victorians did not have plastic needles. They had not been invented. They had bone or steel needles. The finest needles were always steel.  They used wool - Shetland lace shawls were being knitted with cobweb weight wool which was handspun by outstandingly good spinners.  They used heavier wool - but all of it tended to be finer than wool used now. The Victorians also used cotton and silk. There are books on "How to use Florence knitting silk" - something very popular at the time.
I think one of my favourite finds is a book with the title "Spool knitting". This is a book of patterns made with what knitters would now call i-cord or what is sometimes known as French knitting or tomboy stitch or the cord made with a "knitting Nancy".  It is all rather fascinating. 
If you are interested in old patterns start with the Antique Pattern Library. Warning though - it takes time away from actually doing the craft.