Figure 1.

The impact of knotting on technology: a) Spherical stones thought to be bola weights, which would need to be tied together for hunting, date back 500 000 years.1 b) The oldest surviving man‐made knots are those of the Antrea net, a fishing net made of willow with a 6 cm mesh dating to 8300 BC.2 c) Knots, in the form of quipu, have been used to record and communicate information, with the earliest examples possibly predating the invention of the written word.3 Image (a) “Stone ball from a set of Paleolithic bolas” reproduced from https://goo.gl/vyAh85 (downloaded 5 May 2017) under a wikimedia creative commons license. Image (b) “Pieces of the Antrea net” reproduced from https://goo.gl/y0026E (downloaded 5 May 2017) under a wikimedia creative commons license. Image (c) “Quipu from the Inca Empire” reproduced from https://goo.gl/tqZyPW (downloaded 5 May 2017) under a wikimedia creative commons license.