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

8644.

Portion of an Orphrey; ground, gold; pattern, a shield of arms, and an inscription in purple letters, repeated. German, 15th century. 1 foot 9 inches by 2¼ inches.

This specimen of the German loom may have been woven at Cologne, probably for the narrow orphreys of a whole set of vestments given to the church by some Duchess of Cleves, of the name of Elizabeth Vancleve, since, to such a lady, the blazon and the inscription point. The shield is party per pale gules, an escarbuncle or; and purpure, a lion rampant argent, barred gules, ducally crowned and armed or.