Sep
24
Antique Linen Embroidery
September 24, 2009 |
Linen Embroidery
Sw is linen embroidery was at its height in this century, declining after
6. Most of the work comes from the German-speaking cantons,
Jcularly those where linen was also produced such as St Gall, Con-
ic and Schaffhausen. The linen they used was of blue or brown yarn
because they used only small looms, larger works required the strips
joined. This in itself provided an opportunity for imaginative work
amental overstitching, embroidered braid or lace insertions,
lie Catholic Church had always been the prime inspiration for Swiss
in<£iji embroiderers and during the 16th century when the Swiss, like the
ish embroiderers, were studying books and woodcuts for new
ns, Bible woodcuts took pride of place. Renaissance motifs were
i slowly accepted by the Swiss and certain motifs, such as architec-
scrollwork, were never used.
Spain and Italy
Spanish embroidery, though it owed much to the long Moorish tradi-
tio l, was also influenced by the Incas of South America, for the plunders
of civilization were now reaching Spain. The Incas had achieved
Pair of embroidered gloves given by
Henry VIII to his friend Sir Anthony
Denny.
Embroidery
high artistic standards in their own textile work and their stylized animal-
istic motifs were given a new interpretation in Spain.
The standard of embroidery was high and as well as the previously
mentioned influences, designs were also taken from the Spanish painters
of the day, such as Murillo. Altar cloths, not surprisingly in Catholic
Spain, provide some of the more luxurious examples.
Italian embroiderers were also influenced by the painters of the day
but took greater pains to imitate as closely as possible even the smallest
gradation of shade or colour.
Metal armour has been used by warriors for thousands of years but,
apart from a very occasional excavated piece of Roman or Greek armour,
very few pieces pre-dating the late 16th century are likely to be available.
By this date the wearing of armour was already in decline, for firearms
were changing the face of war and making armour obsolete.
The 16th century had heralded a distinct division of armour into two
types depending on its role. On the one hand there was the late Gothic
style called ‘Maximilian’ armour which was used mainly for pageants
and display and plain, undecorated armour which was used on the battle-
field. The latter is distinguished by the use of chain mail skirts and closed
helmets and by the employment of sabbatons instead of sollerets as foot-
guards. Battle helmets consisted of the crown which had a ridge, usually
roped down the centre and with two cheek-pieces meeting and fastening
at the chin. The visor and bevor were formed of one piece with horizontal
apertures to see through and small holes for ventilation. The chain mail
skirt had been growing in popularity during the second half of the 15th
century and was now in general use. Made of fine mail it usually hung
to about the middle of the thighs, though occasionally it reached below
the knees. Sometimes it had short slits back and front to facilitate riding.
From about 1500 male fashions in general began to change from
close-fitting garments to more ample clothing with slashed doublets.
This interest in new fashions was also reflected in armour design which,
coincidentally, was under review, particularly in Austria by the Emperor
Mi ximilian I, with a view to improving its efficiency. The ‘Maximilian’
sly i lasted, with a few changes, until about 1600 and was characterized
sbveral supplementary fittings for additional protection and the use
decorative fluting. On the helmet, which was of the closed type, the
flu ing usually ran from front to back, while the visor was formed of two
pa ts, the upper, or visor proper, which fell down inside the second section
or bevor which could be raised independently of the visor.
1 rrom about 1545 the fluting on all parts of the armour was discarded
be< ause it had been found that a lance meeting the fluting tended to be
caught and the point directed to vulnerable parts. The fluting was re-
placed by rich engravings and repousse work as well as gold and silver
damascening. As a result, the armour of the aristocracy tended to
be< ome a luxury, lined in velvet or silk, but made of relatively thin metal
an I so useless as a protection.
‘ ‘he armour worn by the lower ranks however tended to be less uniform.
Th b infantry at this time was made up of pikemen, arquebusiers, canoniers
and archers. The pikeman wore a pot-de-fer helmet with a turned down
brin i from about 1530 until later in the century when it changed to a classic
en sted helmet and later still to the cabasset helmet. He wore a breast-
an I packplate but probably only occasionally had arm and thigh armour.
In the early part of the century the arquebusier wore little armour but
about 1550 he was wearing a type of armour called ‘almayne rivets’ a
na ne taken from a German system of metal connected by sliding rivets.
Thsfcavalry wore mainly half-armour consisting of a closed helmet or
cas que and a breastplate and tassets which reached to either the middle
of tie thigh or to below the knee.
During the late 16th century there was an increased use of helmets
without face pieces, and these burgonets were worn by both cavalry and
infantry. Probably the commonest form is that known as the lobster
tai ed burgonet which was popular during the period of the Thirty Years
W; i (1618-48) and the English Civil Wars (1642-8). It had a domed
sku 1 with a peak through which passed a curved bar, the nasal, which
ga 4 some protection to the face. The back of the neck was covered by
a fl ired guard made of several overlapping strips or lames. Two ear flaps
pr< rected the cheeks.
Another light helmet was the morion which had a skull with just a
na rtow brim and perhaps earflaps. Another form had a high central
conb and a very pronounced curve in the brim.
7 till suits of armour are very rare and many of those which do appear
on t ie market are composed of parts from different armours. A number
of Victorian copies also exist and these will seldom deceive the collector
foi t tiey are usually ‘tinny’, light and lack the graceful lines of the original.
Llthough full armours are rare there is a great deal of interest in the
collecting of component parts. Helmets are probably the most desirable
pieiSss. Early 16th century examples of the close helm have a fluted
sui f ice designed to give greater strength. This style is known by collectors
as Maximilian and is very attractive. Some rather crude examples of
clo se helmets may be found and these are usually church helms which
we e hung above the tombs. They were often put together out of odd
piejcjes and many have a crest fitted.
German breastplate decorated with
etching.
Thd word Baroque is thought to have come from the Portuguese word
bartqco meaning an irregularly-shaped pearl. The term did not receive
wid Bjusage as a description of the predominant style of the 17th century
unt 1 the 19th century and, as the translation of the word indicates, it
was originally used disparagingly being applied particularly to post-
Rei a issance architecture. Nevertheless the perjorative use of the word
dis; ppeared and the Baroque style came to be seen as an original style
witl inuch intrinsic merit and beauty.
Whereas the previous two centuries of the Renaissance were an age
of < tcovery, the 17th century was an age of expansion and the art that
it produced, the Baroque, personified this expansive urge. Baroque art
has been described as spacious, dynamic, colourful, sensual, opulent and
exl avagant. It was an age that was to last for over 100 years.
1 He origins of the Baroque have not been well defined but it is clear
tha St began in northern Italy around 1600, the full transition taking
only a quarter of a century before it spread into most of Europe. It is
thought that the Baroque was initially the reaction of papal Rome
agatlst the spread of Protestantism and certainly echoes of this idea can
be :den in the flight of the Huguenots after the Revocation of the Edict
of I lantes in 1685 from France, which by then had become the model of
BaiDque for the rest of Europe. Ironically it was the Huguenots who
wei b among France’s finest craftsmen, and it was they who subsequently
car ied the Baroque to England and other Protestant countries.
I ‘Rome was the birthplace of the Baroque then Michelangelo seems
to 1 ave provided the base on which it was built even though he died in
156|| From Popes Paul III (1534-49) to Sixtus V (1580) a successful
campaign had been led against the rise of Protestantism after which
Six us determined to rebuild Rome more magnificently than before as
an < difice against paganism. For him, the style of the Renaissance carried
elei lents of the paganism he was opposed to. The building of St Peter’s
beg ih by Michelangelo earlier in the 16th century was continued (1606-
12) inderCarlo Moderna and became Rome’s greatest Baroque project.
11 w; s in the amendment of Michelangelo’s basic plans that the Baroque
por entously emerged, but it was left to Gianlorenzo Bernini (1598-1680),
“eatest artist of the Baroque if not the originator of true Baroque,
lplete the design for St Peter’s,
hje desire of the papacy to create a pomp and splendour that would
up the Church and attract more members spread to the nobility
i\y, who had palaces built which reflected the ecclesiastical magni-
ficence.