Elblag (Elbing) - a city in northern Poland - was founded in the 13th century by the Knights of the Teutonic Order and populated with settlers from Germany. The town grew dynamically and quickly became one of most important Hanseatic ports. Elblag is very interesting because it is probably the best archeologically explored city in Poland. Excavations in Elblag started in 1980 and have continued over the past 30 years. A large part of the Elblag textile collection has already been examined by J. Maik, and the results of his work have been presented in numerous papers. The rest of the finds from Elblag are still being examined. Knitted items form part of the Elblag textile collection, which has been neglected until now. The set of Elblag knitted pieces is not numerous but it is interesting. It consists of wool and silk artefacts in different states of preservation - including small unidentifiable pieces, as well as an almost complete cap. These finds represent a wide chronological range from the Middle Ages to the 18th century. The provenance of knitted items discovered in Elblag is problematic. Very interesting data are provided by old port customs books which recorded goods imported to the port of Elblag by sea. Several places of origin may be listed from which knitted products were transported to Elblag. These were mostly from England and the Netherlands. Unfortunately, no sources could provide information about the origins of local knitting production. Hard data on Elblag knitting production can only be found for later periods. These show that by the mid-18th century, knitting production in Elblag had reached a very advanced level.
