In the previous episode, I talked about places in London – mostly the V&A museum.

The next day started our touring of the countryside in the rental car. Luckily the fuel blockades had ended a few days before and most petrol stations had something to sell again. We tried to reach Hardwick Hall before it closed, but we discovered one of the special things about English roads and got stuck in traffic for two hours after an accident had closed the M1 motorway.

Hardwick Hall was built by Bess of Hardwick, Countess of Shrewsbury, one of the embroidery icons of the 16th Century, so I just had to visit her house. Thus the itinary was quickly shuffled to allow us to catch Hardwick on the way back from Scotland.

The next needlework stop was in Edinburgh, at Holyrood House Palace, home to the Scots royal family, including Mary, Queen of Scots. One thing you discover in places that are still functional homes, is that history doesn't stop when you want it to. The people living in the house continue to modify the buildings and furnishings until it no longer resembles the place when it was first built. So to with Holyrood. Most of the palace was full of big rooms with Victorian or some other style of furnishings. If that was all, I would have been very disappointed. But luckily two little rooms saved the journey. Up some little spiral stairs, you do get to see Mary's rooms. Sadly, there's not much embroidery to be seen. You only see three of Mary's slips from the Oxburgh Hangings. You do get to see a fabulous bed, painted ceilings, a bloodstain where Mary's advisor David Riccio was killed, and many nick-nacks and some good portraits.

Still following Mary, we visited Stirling Castle, where her son, James (I of England, IV of Scotland) was born, and Loch Leven Castle where she was imprisoned by the Scots parliament. Loch Leven was very funky, since it is built on an island in Loch Leven. You have to get on the boat out to the island. It is a beautiful little island in what we would consider a large lake (very small for a loch though). The castle isn't big and would have been a horrible place to live, considering in Mary's day, the Loch was higher, and the island was only slightly larger than the castle - only a few metres in each direction before you hit water.

We also stopped at Scone Palace (were we had a scone…). This is the place were the kings of Scotland was traditionally crowned, on the Stone of Destiny (the Stone of Destiny was stolen by the English and has lived in the coronation chair in Westminster Abbey until a few years ago, when the Queen gave it back to Scotland and it now lives in Edinburgh Castle…). Scone was built in the 15^th Century but the outside has been completely rebuilt so it doesn’t look anything like it might have. In Scone were some bed embroidered hangings owned by Mary. But enough of Mary for the moment…

Glasgow is the home to the Burrell Collection. Burrell was a rich collector who gave his stuff to the city, with enough money to build a gallery to put it all in. The result is a fabulous building incorporating the stone arches and stained glass of the collection into the structure of the building. The collection contains a huge range of stuff, including ancient Egyptian and Greek stuff, sculpture, paintings, tapestries, furniture and armour. On the needlework front. there was a room filled with beautiful pieces that were just post-1600. There was a coif embroidered with brilliantly coloured stems and animals. There was embroidered hawking gear owned by James I. There were also a few pouches, caps, cushions and an embroidered jacket. There was also a roll of decorated fabric which was an underskirt owned by the wife of James I. All were in fabulous condition, unlike some of the pieces in elsewhere. I suppose a collector would only bother with the best examples.

Then Hardwick Hall which was the best house we visited. The problem with houses is that people live in them. And when people live in them, they constantly make changes to the furnishing and rooms and generally alter the place until it no longer looks like the original dwelling. Hardwick Hall was different.

Before we got to Hardwick Hall, we went to Chatsworth, which is a place Bess of Hardwick lived before she built Hardwick. However, Chatsworth is still owned and used by a family and they put on display all their current treasures, like dinner services, statues, painting and rich furniture, all built in the last 200 years. It was all beautiful, but certainly not by timeframe of interest and I was sadly not as impressed as some of the other visitors. Chatsworth did have fabulous painted ceilings though. Also at Chatsworth, was an embroidery showing the front of Chatsworth by Bess of Hardwick.

Now back to Hardwick. Bess built it around 1600 and lived there till she died. After she died, it appears that the rest of the family preferred Chatsworth, or any of the other houses she left them (she had four rich husbands and they left her quite a lot of money...). As a result, Hardwick was mostly unchanged from the time that Bess had lived in it. The furniture, tapestries, embroidery and portraits were all from the 1600s. Also the rooms were lefts very open and uncluttered so you could appreciate these things.

Bess' second husband helped Henry VIII to close down many monasteries, and confiscated the ecclesiastical robes. Bess recycled many of these into wall hangings and other furnishings. She also saved the embroidery on these robes, and there were a large number of orphreys and hoods on display at Hardwick.

Hardwick is definitely worth the pilgrimage for the embroidery obsessed. It was annoying, but understandable, that photography wasn't allowed in the house.

The next stop was Bath to the Costume Museum to visit my shirt. It's not actually my shirt, but it is the shirt I patterned my best blackworked shirt from. I have been told by friends visiting the museum that they have exclaimed "that looks just like Mouse's", when they went there. Sadly, apart from 'my' shirt, there was only one other item in the museum, another shirt, that was pre-1600. We did have an amusing time looking at the great number of costumes on display, but it was a little lost on me since I'm not really into clothes.

The last needlework associated thing I saw was at the Globe Theatre (I told you I'd get back to it). At the exhibition, I found out that the Globe was an exercise in re-creation in all aspects. When it was built, they used Elizabethan materials and techniques. They perform only Elizabethan plays. But also the costumes are built using Elizabethan techniques. Apparently they now handsew all the garments and use natural dyes of the time. Plus they mentioned that they were always on the lookout for handwoven cloth. The costumes on show had much handsewn embroidery and lace. I was horribly jealous that people got to do that for a living. It was impressive.

And that's about it. You might think that it's not much for a month of touring Britain. We also went to a whole bunch of castles, armouries, megaliths, roman ruins and museums, but since they didn't have any embroidery in them, I haven't mentioned them here. Britain was full of amazing stuff. Literally layer upon layer of history. There was no way that I could have seen it all, but I'm satisfied that I saw enough... for this time. I have to go back when my bank balance recovers.

From the Guildmaster of the Worshipful Company of Broiderers

I have to start this missive with an apology to the members of the Worshipful Company of Broderers. You may have been wondering why you had not received your Mid-winter newsletter before now, or any of the usual reminders about upcoming competitions. Unfortunately, I came down with whooping cough at the end of June, and was away from work until mid-September. A couple of weeks after getting back to work, I overdid it and had a relapse, and was sick for a few more weeks. I am mostly well again now, but still having to be careful, particularly as I have a large backlog of work to deal with. So, the Company has not had the attention it deserves from me for a while. Don’t get whooping cough, it’s very boring (and yes, I had been vaccinated).

The good news is that things are now back on track, and you will be getting a late Mid-winter newsletter together with your Spring Coronet one, thanks again to the hard work of our chronicler and patron. Because of the lack of notice, we have decided to extend the deadline for our Spring Coronet competition until 12^th Night - see the notice elsewhere in this issue.

Thanks are due to Mistress Madelaine de Bourgogne, who ran the competition for the Company at Midwinter in Ynys Fawr, when I couldn’t make it. She was able to do this on very short notice, and add it to an already hectic schedule, so I’m very grateful. The competition was Elizabethan embroidery, and was won by Mistress Alarice Beatrix von Thal, our current champion, with a very beautiful child’s blackwork cap. Congratulations, Alarice.

Mistress Madelaine also presented the gifts on behalf of the Company to Prince Cornelius and Princess Morwenna. These were two embroidered linen hand towels, one made by Mistress Miriam Galbraith, and one made by myself, using pattern darning techniques. So, thanks to Mistress Miriam, and again to Mistress Madelaine, and also to Lord Drake Morgan, who collected my towel and took it to Ynys Fawr with the judging forms.

The Twelfth Night Presentations are well in hand (thankyou Ladies Acacia and Madilayn), but it’s not too early to think about the next set of gifts. By the time you get your newsletter we will probably know the winners of Spring Coronet Tourney, and it would be nice to be able to present them with gifts appropriate to their personas. We have been presenting gifts to the Prince and Princess at the ends of their reigns, but since part of the idea behind the gift is to bring the skills of the Company to Their Highnesses attention, to win us (in entirely period fashion) Their grace and favour, it would be nice if we could make a presentation at the beginning of the reign. So, if anyone has any ideas for relatively small projects for this purpose, let me know.

You will also find the new competitions for the upcoming year in the Spring Coronet issue. One of these is ‘something new’ - your chance to try your hand at a technique or style that you haven’t tried before. I hope you find this and the other competitions inspiring, and, remember, we are always open to suggestions for competition topics. Also, I’d like to take the opportunity to encourage you all to enter your work in the competitions. It doesn’t have to be perfect, and it doesn’t have to be finished. Nor does it have to have documentation (although you will get a higher score if it does). The aim of the exercise is to display your work, so other people can see what you’re up to, and so you can discuss ideas with other members of the Company. Our patron has also been giving some lovely prizes to the winners of the individual competitions, and to the Company Champion.

From the Guild Patron of the Worshipful Company of Broiderers

e are coming to the end of our second championship year, and Alarice, our current champion is once again leading the field. However, it is by no means a forgone conclusion with two more competitions being finalised at 12^th night. I encourage everyone to enter the competitions, even with work in progress, and make the Company more visible in our work.

Needlework so often gets missed, and all your hard work doesn’t get the attention and praise it deserves. Come out of the needleworking closet and show yourselves. (add in your own rousing bit of speech here).

Sadly many of the Company officers haven’t been able to get to coronet events this year, and I think we haven’t had the visibility of last year at coronets. I’m hoping that next year will be bigger and better. More members, more participation, more enthusiasm, more stitching.

From the Chronicler of the Worshipful Company of Broiderers

Well, I’m pleased to report that a general lack of illness in the lead up to this issue has meant that you are receiving the Spring Coronet issue pretty much on time. Bess and I promise to be better at the health thing, honestly!

The important question is: Why are you wasting time reading my drivel? Go immediately to mouse’s article and get reading. It’s fantastic! Unfortunately the pictures do suffer a little in the process of being converted to black and white and being printed. When I saw the originals of mouse’s pictures the colours were still amazingly rich and lovely.

Buratto by Mouse

Griffons – a piece of Buratto stitched by Mistress Keridwen the Mouse. Pattern from the reproduction pattern book: Vinciolo, Federico, (1971), Renaissance Patterns for Lace, Embroidery and Needlepoint (An Unabridged Facsimile of the ‘Singuliers et Nouveaux Pourtraicts’ of 1587, Dover, New York.

Pre 1000AD Embroidery

This is a difficult category to research. Due to the non-lasting nature of textiles, there are very few examples of embroidery in this time frame. Just as creating costume from this time involves a lot of guesswork, so to the needlework requires some imagination to fill in the gaps in the information.

In some cases, the embroidery has disappeared from the ground, so that the design must be traced from the stitching holes. In some cases, only the metal threads remain and the ground and other threads have disappeared. Many embroideries have been destroyed when rich garments were burned to recover the gold sewn onto them.

There is no way of knowing what did exist, but there are some clues to embroidery and decoration in stone or manuscript or written descriptions. Therefore you have to put a bit of effort into finding out what we do know for sure, so that you have a firm foundation of which to base your guesses.

Really Early Embroidery

It is believed that people were decorating textiles since antiquity, through weaving or needlework. Wool garments with simple embroidered designs have been found in Scandinavia dating from the Bronze age. There are needlemade fabrics (needlebinding, nalbinding or knotless netting) dating from 5200-4000BC.

By 2000BC embroidery was an established craft in China. Chain stitch embroidery was found on a fragment dated 481-221BC. Chinese embroidered clothes and bedding decorated in chain stitch survive from 4^th-3th Centuries BC.

In 900BC Homer wrote of embroideresses brought from Sidon to Troy. He also wrote of a picture of the Trojan Wars was embroidered by Helen of Troy and a mantle embroidered with a hunting scene worn by Ulysses.

South American Indian embroidery has been found in funerary bundles from 5^th century BC. There are also Greek, Siberian and Mongolian wool embroideries from 4^th – 1^st centuries BC using stem and chain stitch, counted thread work and laid and couched work

In 62 AD Boadica led her rebellion against the Romans. It is said that she was a fur-lined mantle of embroidered skins when she was captured.

This is just to show that embroidery, and a lot of the techniques and stitches we know today, were in full use before 600 AD, all over the world, the beginning of the timeframe that the SCA covers.

After 600 AD

Silk, linen and wool were known to be used for embroidery during this time, as well as gilt thread, beaten strips of gold wrapped around a core of silk or horse hair. Woven silks with repeating patterns were made in Italy, Spain and Byzantium. Tapestries were made in Flanders and France.

In Britain, the forms of patterned textiles produced in the middle ages were tablet woven bands and embroideries. It is said that the Anglo Saxon needlework was as good as illumination and miniatures of the time. English embroidery of this time was apparently held in high esteem abroad. However, very little of this work has survived.

When St Augustine set about converting the Britons to Christianity in 7^th C he carried a banner embroidered with the image of Christ. A 7^th century poem by St Aldhelm mentions tapestry weaving and embroidery of the Anglo Saxon women. St Etheldreda (died 679) gave St Cuthbert a stole and maniple which she embroidered, worked in gold and precious stones.

Wiklaf, King of Mercia, in 833, gave a clock embroidered with the battle of Troy, to the abbey of Croyland. The earliest existing sampler found in Central Asia, dated 850. In the 10^th Century, St Dunstan, Archbishop of Canturbury was noted for designing embroideries.

There are other pieces that could be included here, being pieces made by the Queen Emma, Queen Elgifa and Queen Edith of England who all worked embroideries and gave them to the church in the very early part of the 11^th Century. It could be argued that the styles they would have used in the embroideries would have been traditional depictions of religious scenes, which would not have changed much over time.

The earliest pieces of embroidery seem to all be for church use. However, there was a lot of secular embroidery described in documents, such as inventories, including court costumes and bed hangings. Little has survived because it wore out or went out of fashion and was reused, or remade. Church embroideries did not go out of fashion, did not get used often and was carefully stored.

Stuff I saw

As some may know, I was lucky enough to visit the Victoria and Albert Museum recently and see some pre-1000 AD in person. Please forgive my poor photography skills.

The Annunciation and Visitation

Coptic roundel. Egyptian. 7^th-8^th Centuries. Linen ground with silk in satin stitch, stem stitch,long and short stitch, cross stitch and couched stitches in shaded tones of green blue red yellow and flesh colour. (Right)

Apostles

Linen embroidered in silk. Egyptian. 7^th-8^th Centuries. Split stitch or chain stitch in red, yellow, green, white and blue. (Left)

The Visitation

Tapestry in wool and linen. Red, blue, yellow, green, black and white. Egyptian. 6^th-8^th centuries. Even though this piece is woven and not embroidered, it is the same style as the other two, and thus the design elements would be valid for an embroidered version. Often the woven sections were made using a needle to weave. (Below)

Tunic

With applied tapestry woven ornaments in wool and linen Egyptian. 6^th-8^th centuries.

Again, these decorations are woven, but it shows you how the roundels and bands would have been used. The decoration indicated the status of the wearer. The embroideries often outlasted the tunics and would have been re-applied to other tunics. This decoration was also woven, , but the designs would have been the same. Some examples date from 4^thC

Other Examples

Egyptian 4^th-7^th C alter cover or wall hanging. Linen embroidered in wool using chain and stem stitch in green, dark blue, yellow, pink and violet. Tree motifs, 18cm tall, in rows. [Warner 1991]

6^th – 7^th C fragment from Persia. Linen with white, red, green and black woollen thread, in chain stitch depicting a mounted prince accompanied by archers and a man bearing a symbol of his rank. [Schuette 1964]

Flight of Alexander the Great , 10^th century hanging. White linen, silk in blue red yellow. The ground embroidered with interlace patterns, chain, stem and gobelin. stitch. Border contains Latin inscription. The design shows Alexander with two eagles and scrolling zoomorphic figures in border. [Schuette 1964]

The oldest English embroidered pieces are in Maeseyck, Belgium. These fragments date from 850AD. The design consists of arches and interlaced rondels containing birds, animals and monograms(alpha and omega) in coloured silks gilt thread and seed pearls. It has surface couched gold threads and split, stem and satin stitches in red, beige green, yellow, light blue, dark blue untwisted silk. The designs closely resemble the art in sculpture and manuscripts. [Schuette 1964, Warner 1991]

In fact, many pieces of embroidery seem to be dated by comparing it to art in manuscript. This would suggest that it is a ‘safe’ practice to look for design ideas for embroidery in other forms of art contemporary with the piece you are trying to create. Fashionable designs were used in all form of decoration, only limited by a given medium. The same patterns appeared in sculpture, art, illumination and architecture in the same period.

Another early English piece is an embroidered stole and maniple of St Cuthbert at Durham Cathedral. These pieces were commissioned by Queen Aelfflaed for the Bishop of Winchester between 909 and 916. The design is a vertical band with figures of saints and prophets shown one above each other. Originally it had 16 figures (3 are now lost), with ½ figures on terminal panels. There are inscriptions embroidered into the work that date it and identify the figures.

This style come from late classical textiles and continued to be used throughout the middle ages. Background shows Byzantine influence. The embroidery is surface couched gold thread on a silk background. The figures are silk worked in split and stem stitch in two thicknesses of thread. Halos in gold thread couched with red silk. The silk ground is gone now. [Schuette 1964, King/Levey1993]

The accompanying girdle has a foliage design. Three tablet woven fragments associated have silk warp and weft of gold.

The Bayeaux Tapestry - Too Late.

The Bayeaux Tapestry (which all know is an embroidery, not a tapestry) was created about 1080 AD. I think I’m safe in saying that it is the best known piece of embroidery ever. One could be forgiven by thinking near enough in time is good enough.

However, what I’ve read about it would suggest that the designs depicted in the tapestry were very new and innovative for their time. The tapestry contains a narrative style and spatial relationships that are unique. It possibly could be argued that the stitching techniques could have been used pre 1000, but the designs could not.

The ‘tapestry’ is worked in wool on an undyed linen background, in stem stitch (and outline stitch) and in couching.

Conclusion

Well there is more pre-1000 AD extant embroidery out there than I had thought when I started this article. Embroidery was being done almost since people discovered how to sew. The earliest styles seem to be less structured, and people would use whatever stitches would cover the area easiest. Most stitches we know today were known then.

What I haven’t covered in this article is research into early clothing styles, to try to identify where embroidery may have be used to decorate them. There are many pictures in illumination and stonework, for example, which indicate styles of clothing and mark areas of decoration. And as I’ve said, the design for that decoration could be found from the same manuscripts and carvings.

It shouldn’t be hard to create pre1000AD embroideries, it just requires a little more searching in places you normally wouldn’t associate with embroidery.

Bibliography

Grape, Wolfgang, (2000), The Bayeux Tapestry: Monument to a Norman Triumph, Prestel, USA.

King, D, Levey, S, (1993), The Victoria and Albert Museum’s Textile Collection, Embroidery in Britain from 1200 to 1750, Canopy Books, New York.

Maclagan, E (1911), Victoria and Albert Catalogues, English Ecclesiatical Embroideries of the XIII to XVI Centuries, His Majesties Stationery Office, London.

Schuette, M, Muller-Christensen, S (1964), The Art of Embroidery, Thames and Hudson, London.

Forthcoming Competitions

Underwear – an item of embroidered or beaded underwear (chemise, petticoat, coif etc), technique open.

Headwear – an embroidered or beaded item to be worn on the head (hat, headcloth, coif etc), technique open.

Worshipful Company of Broiderers of Lochac

Guild Newsletter, Issue 8 – Spring Coronet, AS XXXV (November 2001)

What I Did on My Holidays (Part 2)

by Keridwen the Mouse does Britain - Sept/Oct 2000