Cavechat.org

chh wrote:Subsequently, as a sticking point, I call the butterfly knot the butterfly knot. Whereas the "alpine" butterfly is when the loop of the butterfly captures a rope join of some kind. Don't know if that's correct or not. Also, don't really care. My wife calls the butterfly the "alpine butterfly", or sometimes the "alpine moth" but I think this is mostly because she is enamoured of the word "alpine" and likes to use it whenever possible.

Previously... Butterfly or Alpine Butterfly?

Alpine Moth

"Farmer's hitch" clearly isn't a hitch ; one can at least get
past that misnomer, with "farmer's loop".

As for the "butterfly" knots : Bob came around to noting CLDay's
note (Art of Knotting & Splicing) about this knot's surfacing
in some older-than-Wright&Magowan-Apine-Journal-article 1928 date,
as "lineman's loop" --which is how Ashley has it, though his book is
well later than those two sources. Bob (Thrun) found the source work
cited by Day; so far, I've not found any nice antecedent reference
to that (such as some lineman's reference), which is a general work.

So, some have thought to use "alpine" as a qualifier for the *Real
McCoy*, a handy distinction to build; but I think it's likely more
confusing to get into such distinctions vs. "false" for what isn't
wanted (which I think is rumored worse than it is).

One can note that the farmer's loop can be dressed to be rather
bowlinesque when loaded on one of the ends, and more like
a "tugboat bowline" when loaded on the other; it --just like
the butterfly-- isn't symmetric, though you'll not find this
point made in any testing of the knot.

*kN*