Definition of "knop"

The thin shaft of each stick, composed of two cylinders on either side of a central knop, is engraved with a scrollwork pattern known as vermicule for its wormlike appearance.

1992, Elizabeth C. Parker, The Cloisters‎, Metropolitan Museum of Art, page 148

In the thirteenth century come the chalices of the treasuries of Troyes and Orléans, the one in the latter having been dug up with its paten. They are of very simple design, squat in outline, with a circular foot and a gadrooned knop; the same design occurs in the fourteenth century, on the chalice in the Bordeaux Treasury.

1966, Jean Taralon, Treasures of the Churches of France‎, G. Braziller, page 35

In the three upper elements, the knop-finial-fillet, both masters use all three squares from the base plan forming widths of 1:2:√2 (another pleasing rhythm). In the gable over the window the finials have width in the ratio of √2:4:2. The elements on the pinnacle relate to those on the gable as 1:√2, 1:2 and √2:2.

2007, John James, In Search of the Unknown in Medieval Architecture‎, Pindar Press, page 438

The thick places are created by winding effect yarn around the core yarn. We can distinguish the length of the knop L, its thickness D, the distance between them Q, and the nominal diameter of continuously twisted component yarns d. The sum of the distance between the knops and the length of a knop is the stitch of this kind of fancy yarn.

2015, Katarzyna Ewa Grabowska, Izabela Ciesielska-Wróbel, “Characteristic and Application of Knop Fancy Yarn”, in Fibres and Textiles in Eastern Europe‎, volume 23, number 1(109), archived from the original on 2023-11-04, pages 17-25

On these shawl borders the knop and flower are often also combined, the knop becoming the cone or Cypress-like trunk of a tree, the branches of which fam out like the fronds of the Hom. [Plate III., fig. 6]. In some Indian and Persian carpets the knop or cone throws out graceful Hom fronds, one on either side, from the ends of which hangs a large flower, presenting the alternation of a branching cone and flower.

1878, Sir George Christopher Molesworth Birdwood, Paris Universal Exhibition of 1878: Handbook to the British Indian Section‎, Offices of the Royal Commission, page 106