Textile Fabrics / A Descriptive Catalogue of the Collection of Church-vestments, Dresses, Silk Stuffs, Needlework and Tapestries, forming that Section of the Museum

by Daniel Rock

8227.

Piece of Crimson Silk, with pattern woven in gold thread. Sicilian, early 13th century. 10½ inches by 7 inches.

This rich sample of the looms of Palermo betrays the architectural influences, which acted upon the designers of such stuffs, by the introduction of that ramified ornamentation with its graceful bendings, that is so marked a character in the buildings of England and France at the close of the 12th and opening of the 13th century. The fleur-de-lis is rather an accidental than intentional adaptation, years before the French occupation of Sicily.