8652.
Linen Towel, with thread embroidery; pattern, lozenges, some enclosing flowers, others, lozenges. German, 15th century. 3 feet 11 inches by 1 foot 6½ inches.
Most likely this small piece of linen was meant to be a covering for a table, or may be the chest of drawers in the vestry, and upon which the vestments for the day were laid out for the celebrating priest to put on. In the pattern there is evidently a strong liking for the gammadion—a kind of figuration constructed out of modifications of the Greek letter gamma. In England the gammadion became known as the “filfot,” and seems to have been looked upon as a symbol for the name Francis or Frances, and is of frequent occurrence in our national monuments—especially in needlework—belonging to the 14th and 15th centuries. From the presence of that large eight-petaled flower in this cloth we are somewhat warranted in thinking that the same hand that wrought the fine and curious frontal, [No. 8709], worked this, and that her baptismal name was Frances.