Welcome to BrainStuff, a production of I Heart Radio.

Hey Brain Stuff, Lauren Bulbobolm here.

In most wars, bullets and bombs tend to steal the show.

But knitting is also a weapon, and a wily one at that.

And no, it's not because of the sharp needles.

For centuries, wartime knitting has conjured shadowy powers in secret knitted codes.

Encripted messages crafted directly into the stitches of garments that were passed along to allies who decrypted the strands and then planned their responses accordingly.

The practice, which is technically called stegography, has actually been around for thousands of years.

It refers to the act of hiding secret messages in ordinary items

so as not to arouse suspicion.

With enough expertise and calm nerves,

a clever person could pass along detailed messages right

under the noses of even the most intelligent adversary.

To understand how codes are crafted into knitting, you need a bit of handicraft background.

We spoke with Melissa Kemmer, co-creator of Nomadic Nits, a knitting and culture magazine.

She said,

Knitting is made up of different stitches, the most common

of which are the knit and pearl, at its simplest, relatable to binary code.

Knit stitches are flat and resemble the letter V, while purl stitches are horizontal bumps.

In essence, that means anyone with the right skills and knitting prowess could learn to hide messages in fabric, and there are infinite ways to do so.

For example, you could conceal numbers or text as Morse code, which uses a series of basic dashes

and dots to relay information.

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