Date: Sunday f 20, 2012
Embroidery Bed Hangings
Embroidered bed hangings were very much in order in mediaeval times in England. In the eleventh century there lived a woman who had emigrated from the Hebrides, and who had the reputation for witchcraft, chiefly based upon the unusually exquisite needlework on her bed curtains! The name of this reputed sorceress was Thergunna.
Bequests in important wills indicate the sumptuous styles which were usual among people of position. The Fair Maid of Kent left to her son her "new bed curtains of red velvet, embroidered with ostrich feathers of silver, and heads of leopards of gold," while in 1380 the Earl of March bequeathed his "large bed of black satin embroidered with white lions and gold roses, and the escutcheons of the arms of Mortimer and Ulster." This outfit must have resembled a Parisian "first class" funeral! The widow of Henry II. slept in a sort of mourning couch of black velvet, which must have made her feel as if she too were laid out for her own burial!
A child's bedquilt was found mentioned in an inventory of furniture at the Priory of Durham, in 1446, which was embroidered in the four corners with the Evangelistic symbols. In the "Squier of Lowe Degree," a fifteenth century romance, there is allusion to a bed, of which the head sheet is described "with diamonds set and rubies bright." The king of England, in 1388, refers, in a letter, to "a bed of gold cloth." Wall hangings in bedrooms were also most elaborate, and the effect of a chamber adorned with gold and needlework must have been fairly regal. An embroiderer named Delobel made a set of furnishings for the bedroom of Louis XIV. the work upon which occupied three years. The subject was the Triumph of Venus.
In South Kensington Museum there is a fourteenth century linen cloth of German workmanship, upon which occurs the legend of the unicorn, running for protection to a maiden. An old Bestiary describes how the unicorn, or as it is there called, the "monocerus," "is an animal which has one horn on its head, it is caught by means of a virgin." The unicorn and virgin, with a hunter in pursuit, is quite a favourite bit of symbolism in the middle ages.
Another interesting piece of German embroidery in South Kensington is a table cloth, worked on heavy canvas, in heraldic style, long decorative inscriptions embellish the corners. A liberal translation of these verses is given by Dr. Rock, some of the sentences being quaint and interesting to quote. Evidently the embroideress indulged in autobiography in the following, And she, to honour the esquire her husband, wished to adorn and increase his house furniture, and there has worked, with her own hand, this and still many other pretty cloths, to her memory.
And in another corner, "Now follows here my own birthday. When one wrote 1565 my mother's heart was gladdened by my first cry. In the year 1585 I gave birth my self to a daughter. Her name is Emilia Catharina, and she has been a proper and praiseworthy child." Then, to her children the following address is directed, "Do not forget your prayers in the morning. And be temperate in your pleasures. And make yourselves acquainted with the Word of God.... I beseech you to be sincere in all matters.
That will make you great and glorious. Honour everybody according to his station, it will make you honourably known. You, my truly beloved sons, beware of fiery wines... you, my truly beloved daughters, preserve and guard your honour, and reflect before you do anything, many have been led into evil by acting first and thinking afterwards." In another compartment, a lament goes up in which she deplores the death of her husband. "His age was sixty and eight years," she says. "The dropsy has killed him. I, his afflicted Anna Blickin von Liechtenperg who was left behind, have related it with my hand in this cloth, that might be known to my children this greater sorrow which God has sent me." The cloth is a naive and unusual record of German home life.
Ecclesiastical embroidery began in the fourth century. In earliest days the work was enhanced with quantities of gold thread. The shroud in which St. Cuthbert's body was wrapped is a mass of gold, a Latin inscription on the vestments in which the body was clad may be thus translated, "Queen to Alfred's son and successor, Edward the Elder, was one Aelflaed, who caused this stole and maniple to be made for a gift to Fridestan consecrated Bishop of Winchester, A. D. 905."
The maniple is of "woven gold, with spaces left vacant for needlework embroidery." Such garments for burial were not uncommon, but they have as a rule perished from their long residence underground. St. Cuthbert's vestments are splendid examples of tenth century work in England.
After the death of King Edward II., and his wife Aelflaed, Bishop Frithestan also having passed away, Athelstan, as King, made a pilgrimage to the shrine of St. Cuthbert and bestowed these valuable embroideries there. They were removed from the body of the saint in 1827. The style of the work inclines to Byzantine. The Saxon embroideries must have been very decorative, a robe is described by Aldhelme in 709, as "of a most delicate thread of purple, adorned with Page 200 black circles and peacocks." At the church at Croyland some vestments were decorated with birds of gold cut out and applique and at Exeter they had "nothing about them but true needlework."
In the "Liber Eliensis," in the Muniment room at Ely, is an account of a gift to the church by Queen Emma, the wife of King Knut, who "on a certain day came to Ely in a boat, accompanied by his wife the Queen Emma, and the chief nobles of his kingdom." This royal present was "a purple cloth worked with gold and set with jewels for St. Awdry's shrine," and the Monk Thomas assures us that "none other could be found in the kingdom of the English of such richness and beauty of workmanship."
The various stitches in English work had their several names, the opus plumarium, or straight overlapping stitches, resembling the feathers of a bird, the opus pluvarium, or cross stitch, and many others. A great deal of work was accomplished by means of applique in satin and silk, and sometimes the ground was painted, as has already been described in Italian work.
In the year 1246 Matthew Paris writes, "About this time the Lord Pope, Innocent IV., having observed that the ecclesiastical ornaments of some Englishmen, such as choristers' copes and mitres, were embroidered in gold thread, after a very desirable fashion, asked where these works were made, and received in answer, 'England.' Then," said the Pope, "England is surely a garden of delight for us, it is truly a never failing Spring, and there where many things abound much may be extorted." This far sighted Pope, with his semi-commercial views, availed himself of his discovery.
In the days of Anastatius, ecclesiastical garments were spoken of by name according to the motive of their designs, for instance, the "peacock garment," the "elephant chasuble," and the "lion cope." Fuller tells of the use of a pall as an ecclesiastical vestment, remarking tersely, "It is made up of lamb's wool and superstition."
Mediaeval embroiderers in England got into certain habits of work, so that there are some designs which are almost as hall-marks to English work, the Cherubim over the wheel is especially characteristic, as is also the vase of lilies, and various heraldic devices which are less frequently found in the embroidered work of European peoples.
The Syon Cope is perhaps the most conspicuous example of the mediaeval embroiderer's art. It was made by nuns about the end of the thirteenth century, in a convent near Coventry. It is solid stitchery on a canvas ground, "wrought about with divers colours" on green. The design is laid out in a series of interlacing square forms, with rounded and barbed sides and corners. In each of these is a figure or a scriptural scene. The orphreys, or straight borders which go down both fronts of the cope, are decorated with heraldic charges.
Much of the embroidery is raised, and wrought in the stitch known as Opus Anglicanum. The effect was produced by pressing a heated metal knob into the work at such points as were to be raised. The real embroidery was executed on a flat surface, and then bossed up by this means until it looked like bas-relief.
The stitches in every part run in zig-zags, the vestments, and even the nimbi about the heads, are all executed with the stitches slanting in one direction, from the centre of the cope outward, without consideration of the positions of the figures. Each face is worked in circular progression outward from the centre, as well. The interlaces are of crimson, and look well on the green ground. The wheeled Cherubim is well developed in the design of this famous cope, and is a pleasing decorative bit of archaic ecclesiasticism.
In the central design of the Crucifixion, the figure of the Lord is rendered in silver on a gold ground. The anatomy is according to the rules laid down by an old sermonizer, in a book entitled "The Festival," wherein it is stated that the body of Christ was "drawn on the cross as a skin of parchment on a harrow, so that all his bones might be told." With such instruction, there was nothing left for the mediaeval embroiderers but to render the figure with as much realistic emaciation as possible.
The heraldic ornaments on the Syon Cope are especially interesting to all students of this graceful art. It is not our purpose here to make much allusion to this aspect of the work, but it is of general interest to know that on the orphreys, the devices of most of the noble families of that day appear.
Embroidered bed hangings
Related Products And Free Videos
Hobbies Crafts Articles
Embroidery Interlacings Surface Stitches And Diapers
... laced together by lines looped round them. The band at L is begun by making horizontal bar stitches. A row of crewel-stitch and one of outline-stitch, worked on to the bars, and not into the stuff, makes the central chain. The band at K is merely surface buttonholing over a series of slanting stitches. ...
Embroidery Tools A Word To The Worker
... then only a portion of your work at a time, and cannot so well judge its effect. STARTING AND FINISHING. In starting work, do not begin by making a knot in your thread, run a few stitches (presently to be worked over) on the right side of the stuff. In finishing, you run them at the back of the stuff, ...
... technical information, and been always at hand to keep me from technical error. With reference to design and art I speak for myself. My thanks are due to the authorities at South Kensington for allowing us to handle the treasures of the national collection, and to photograph them for illustration, to ...
Embroidery Buttonhole Stitches
...
The working of H on buttonhole sampler. In order to make your ladder stitch (G) square at the end, you begin by making a bar of the width the stitch is to be. Then, holding the thread under your thumb to the right, you put the needle in at ...
... There is literally no end to the variety of stitches, as they are called, belonging to this group, and their names are a babel of confusion. Florentine, Parisian, Hungarian, Spanish, Moorish, Cashmere, Milanese, Gobelin, are only a few of them, but they stand, as a rule, rather for stitch arrangements ...
...
16. CHAIN-STITCH AND KNOTS. To work chain-stitch (A on the sampler, Illustration 17) bring the needle out, hold the thread down with the left thumb, put the needle in again at the hole through which you brought it out, take up of an ...
... right to left, or, in outlining, from outside the forms inwards, and a waxed thread is often used for the purpose. Naturally the cord to be sewn down should be held fairly tightly in place to keep the line even. It is usual in couching to sew down the silk or cord with stitches crossing it at right angles, ...
... crewel-stitch, but after the first half-stitch you take up eighth of an inch of the material in advance of the last stitch, and bring out your needle at the point where the first half-stitch began. You proceed, always putting your needle in eighth of an inch in front of, and bringing it out eighth of ...
... very simple. The flower is darned in stitches of fairly equal length, taking up one thread of the material, and covering a space of almost a quarter of an inch before taking up the next thread. The outline of a petal is first worked, and successive rows of darning follow the lines of the flower, expressing ...
Embroidery Direction Of The Stitch Stitches
... but it has very much the effect of weaving. The embroiderer of the 13th century was not afraid of that (aimed at it, perhaps?), and was, apparently, afraid of letting go the leading strings of warp and weft. When stitches follow the direction of the form embroidered, accommodating themselves to it, all ...
... she is on the right road. Measure yourself with the best, not with the common run of work, and if that should put you out of conceit with your own work, no great harm is done, sooner or later you have got to come to a modest opinion of yourself, if ever you are to do even moderate things.
...
Embroidery Embroidery In Relief Stitching Stitch
... satin-stitch. The stalks are not padded with cotton wool, but first worked with crewel wool, which, being soft and elastic, forms an excellent ground for working over in floss silk. In working a stalk like that at E, you first lay down a double layer of soft, thick cotton, and then work over it with flatter ...
Embroidery Embroidery Materials
... in certain old-fashioned water-colour paintings gum was used with the paint, or over it, to deepen the shadows. The material is used again in the wreath. It is worked there in chain-stitch with the tambour needle, it may also be worked in satin-stitch, but the more obvious way of using it is to couch ...
Embroidery Feather And Oriental Stitches
... slanting ones. Stitch E differs from D in that the side strokes slant both in the same direction. It is worked from right to left instead of from left to right. Stitch F is a combination of buttonhole and Oriental stitches. Between two rows of buttonholing (dark on sampler) a single row of Oriental-stitch ...
Embroidery Figure Embroidery Stitches
... it is a poor-spirited embroidress who will thus confess her weakness and call on painting to help her out. It does not even do that, it fails absolutely to produce the desired effect. The painting quarrels with the stitching, and there is after all no semblance of that unity which is the very essence ...
Embroidery Herring Bone Stitches
... advance of where it came out on the lower edge of it before, and bring it out on the lower edge of this spine immediately below where it entered.
The working of F on herring-bone sampler. In close herring-bone (F on the sampler, ...
... use coral in embroideries as well as pearls. Coral work is usually called Sicilian work, though it was also sometimes executed in Spain. The garments worn by the Byzantines were very ornate, they were made of woven silk and covered with elaborate devices. In the fourth century the Bishop of Amasia ridiculed ...
Embroidery Inlay Mosaic Cut Work Pattern Patternwork
...
64. INLAY IN COLOURED CLOTHS. In India they still inlay in cloth most marvellously, not only counterchanging the pattern, but inlaying the inlays with smaller patternwork, thus combining great simplicity of effect with wonderful minuteness ...
... "laid" only for stitches (floss) first loosely laid upon the surface of the stuff and then sewn down by cross lines of stitching of whatever kind, and "couched" for the sewing down of cords, (silk or gold), thread by thread or in pairs. Laid floss is sewn down en masse, couched silk in single or double ...
Embroidery One Stitch Or Many Stitches
... of stitch, in which lurks that other danger of losing simplicity and breadth. The lace-like appearance of the needlework upon fine linen in Illustration 73, results chiefly from the extraordinary delicacy with which it is done, but it owes something also to the variety of stitch and of stitch-pattern ...
Embroidery Plea For Simplicity
... be a thing altogether of the past now that we have Art Needlework. Art needlework! It has helped put an end to the patience of the modern worker, and to inspire her too often with ambitions quite beyond her powers of fulfilment. What one misses in the work of the present day is that reticent and unpretending ...
Embroidery Quilting Stitches Stitching
... which they sew with yellow silk, but the pattern is stuffed with cords of blue cotton, the colour of which just grins through the white sufficiently to cool it, and to distinguish it from the creamy white ground made warmer by the yellow stitching. Quilting is most often done in white upon colour, or ...
Embroidery Rope And Knot Stitches
... bring it out where the next knot is to be. For large knots use two or more threads of silk, and do not twist them more than once. With a single thread you may twist twice, but the result of twisting three or four times is never happy.
...
Embroidery Satin Stitch And Its Offshoots
... work to be done, directing it also according to the form to be expressed, and so arrives, almost before he is aware of it, by way of satin-stitch, at what is called plumage-stitch.
41. OFFSHOOTS FROM SATIN AND CREWEL STITCHES. ...
... of shading. Embroidery ought, for the most part, to do very well without it. The point to insist upon is that, if shading is employed at all, it should mean something, and not be mere fumbling after form. The charm of shading in embroidery is not the roundness of form which you get, but the gradation ...
... machines were made about 1360 in Germany, they were not used in England until about 1560. Theophilus, however, in the eleventh century, tells "Of the instruments through which wires are drawn," saying that they consist of "two irons, three fingers in breadth, narrow above and below, everywhere thin, and ...
Embroidery Stitch Groups Stitches
... themselves should be brought down to a minimum. Reduce them to the fewest any needlewoman will allow, and they are still, if not too many, more than are logically required. Some of them, too, describe not stitches, but ways of using a stitch. The term long-and-short, it has already been explained, has ...
... couple of matched animals strutting up to each other on either side, this pattern owes its origin to the old tradition of the decorative motive usual in Persia and in Byzantium, the Tree of Life, or Horn. The origin of patterns does not come within our scope, and has been excellently treated in the various ...
... palls, the Earls and Dukes came in procession, from the Vestry, with "certain palls, which everie of them did bring solemnly between their hands and coming in order one before another as they were in degree, unto the said herse, they kissed their said palls... and laid them upon the King's corpse." At ...
... mentions that the Jews were living in great numbers in Thebes, and that they made silks there at that time. There is record that in the late eleventh century a Norman Abbot brought home from Apulia a quantity of heavy and fine silk, from which four copes were made. French silks were not remarkable until ...