alt Hacker NewsAgree with the other commenter - this is very charming! I find it a wonderfully romantic idea to contemplate that, at some point in human past, studying and developing new knots (or even stumbling upon new knots and sharing that idea) would have been a realistic endeavour that expanded the boundary of human knowledge and gave us newer or safer ways of building and achieving things.
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You would be surprised. New useful knots are still being found. E.g. The Zeppelin bend is exceptionally good and was invented in the 60s. The icicle hitch is from the 90s. Some fishing knots are less than 20 years old.
It isn't a hobby of the past. Arborists are professionals still using knots and studying them (especially with the modern rope materials changing the old knowledge around knots). Rock climbing is a hobby but knots are life-or-death for them.
Knots are still being invented nowadays. Or variants of existing knots.
Here are PACI's systematic studies on a few vital knots:
https://www.paci.com.au/knots.php
Here is a recent (2025) paper on the stability of the bowline:
https://www.epfl.ch/labs/flexlab/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/...
NASA uses knots instead of cable ties, for example on the Mars rovers [1] so they remain with us (I use a half dozen regularly myself)
1: https://www.planetary.org/articles/20120905-knots-on-mars