According to the International Lace Dictionary, aantal is number and speld is pin. Obviously the ...en ending will alter the meaning somewhat.
As Sue says, the number given definitely equals the count of the footside pinholes of one complete pattern repeat. What I'm trying to work out why this is considered to be an important enough piece of information to given up-front, as the lacemaker can see quite easily that it's a short/medium/long repeat just by looking at the pattern. Does the precise number of pinholes make a lot of difference. It was traditionally worked on a block pillow so the length of the repeat doesn't affect the working a lot. Perhaps the end use of the lace (this count only seems to be given with the traditional patterns) governed whether it was a short repeat or a more ornate pattern. Jacquie in England, still waiting for summer (or even spring!) - To unsubscribe send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] containing the line: unsubscribe lace [EMAIL PROTECTED] For help, write to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
