Tunisian Crochet (in Swedish: "krokning")

This summer I had signed up for a class in Tunisian crochet. Unfortunately the course was cancelled. I then decided to see what I could learn on "my own" - I was especially intrigued by Tunisian crochet in the round, since I had been told that Tunisian crochet usually was not done in the round. I always prefer to work in the round when knitting, so I found this very interesting.

With  the help of books, internet and Youtube -  I started a "learning swatch" to try out the technique and various stitch combinations that I found. The new double-ended crochet hook  is a  genial solution enabling working in the round.

Trying out two simple stitches I made a pair of wrist warmers:

I also tried to find out something of the history behind Tunisian crochet, which is called "krokning" in Swedish, but soon found, that that was not an easy task. The following is a brief summary of information gathered from the internet, encyclopedias and my book-shelf.

Tunisian crochet is known by many different names. In Swedish "krokning",  in English "Afghan stitch", in French "tricot Eccossais" and some strange American ones: "Idiot stitch", "fool stitch" and "railway stitch"....

Some sources state that it is an ancient technique, but there is no reliable evidence supporting this, other than that Tunisian crochet is described as a mix of knitting and crochet and therefore could be the predecessor of them both.

Tunisian crochet was popular during the Victorian Era, only to be almost forgotten in the beginning of the 20th Century. In 1859, in USA, Tunisian crochet was described as an addition to crochet under the name of "Princess Frederick William Stitch" in "The Lady´s Manual of Fancy Work" by Mrs Pullen. 

In Sweden Tunisian crochet had a revival in the 1950´s, but has since been almost forgotten. There was some interest during the "knitting -boom" in the 80´s, but it never came close to the interest shown in the 1950´s.

Today there seems to be a new interest in the technique, books and workshops are becoming more and more frequent. Could it be because the double-ended crochet hook makes working in the round possible, thus facilitating making mittens, hats and even bigger garments, such as sweaters?

2013-11-02:
More about Tunisian Honeycomb Stitch in this post:
Tunisian crochet - Honeycomb Stitch