Celtic Art in the Global Village, continued

The particular genius of the Celts lay in their ability to draw together the strands of primitive pattern. From these strands they synthesized a system of decoration worthy of computer technology a thousand years later.

The final synthesis spread out from Ireland to Turkey, along the pilgrim routes to Byzantium. The appearance of Pictish knots on the caravanserai archways of Anatolia underscores the cosmopolitan reach of this nomadic impulse.

That knotwork was once a universal art form of all Europe was first pointed out by the Scottish antiquarian, J. Romilly Allen, a century ago.

"Knotwork was gradually evolved from plait by introducing breaks at regular intervals during the Bizantino-Barbaro period (C.E. 600 to 800); and subsequent to this we find still more complicated forms of interlaced patterns were introduced, which I propose to call circular knotwork and triangular knotwork.