For the purpose, the finer sort of parchment was sought out, sometimes as thin as that now rare kind of vellum called, among manuscript collectors, “uterine.” Such skins were well gilt and then cut into very narrow shreds, which were afterwards, instead of gold, woven, as the woof to the silken warp, to show those portions of the pattern which should be wrought in golden thread. But as these strips of gilded parchment were flat, they necessarily gave the stuffs in which they came all the look of being that costly and much used web called by us in the fifteenth century “tyssewys,” as we have before noticed, p. [xxxi]. Specimens of such a fraudulent textile are to be seen here, Nos. [7067], p. 132; [7095], p. 140; [8590], p. 224; [8601], p. 229; [8639], p. 243, &c.
Section VII.—SYMBOLISM.
A metaphor or figurative speech is the utterance to the understanding through the ear of words which have other and further meanings in them than their first one. Symbolism is the bringing to our thoughts, through the eye, some natural object, some human personage, some art-wrought figure, which is meant to set forth a some one, or a something else besides itself.
The use of both arose among men when they first began to dwell on earth and live together. Through symbolism, and the phonetic system, Egypt struck out for herself her three alphabets—the hieroglyphic or picture writing; the hieratic or priestly characters, or shortened form of the hieroglyphics; and the enchorial or people’s alphabet, a further abridgment still. The Hebrew letters are the conventional symbols of things in nature or art; and even yet, each keeps the name of the object which at first it represented; as “aleph” or “ox,” “beth” or “house,” “gimel” or “camel,” &c.
Holy Writ is full of symbolism; and from the moment that we begin to read those words—“I will set my bow in the clouds, and it shall be the sign of a covenant,”[409] till we reach the last chapter in the New Testament, we shall, all throughout, come upon many most beautiful and appropriate examples. The blood sprinkled upon the door-posts of the Israelites; the brazen serpent in the wilderness; that sign—that mystic and saving sign (Tau) of Ezekiel, were, each and every one of them symbols.
[409] Gen. ix. 13.
Being given to understand that things which happened to the Jews were so many symbols for us, the early Christian Church figured on the walls of the catacombs many passages from ancient Jewish history as applicable to itself, while its writers bestowed much attention on the study of symbolism. S. Melito, bishop of Sardes, A.D. 170, drew out of scripture a great many texts which would bear a symbolical meaning, and gave to his work the name of “The Key.” Almost quite forgotten, and well nigh lost, this valuable book, after long and unwearied labour, was at last found and printed by Dom (now Cardinal) Pitra in his Spicilegium Solesmense, t. ii. Among other works from the pen of St. Epiphanius, born A.D. 310, we have his annotations on a book, then old, and called “The Physiologist,” and a work of his own—a treatise on the twelve stones worn by Aaron,[410] in both of which, the Saint speaks much about symbolism. But the fourth century witnessed the production of the two great works on Scriptural Symbolism; that of St. Basil in his homilies on the six days’ creation;[411] which sermons in Greek were styled by their writer “Hexæmeron;” and the other by St. Ambrose, in Latin, longer and more elaborated, on the same subject and bearing the same title. A love for such a study grew up with the church’s growth everywhere, from the far east to the utmost west, amid Greeks as well as Latins, all of whom beheld, in their several liturgies, many illustrations of the system. It was not confined to clerics, but laymen warmly followed it. The artist, whether he had to set forth his work in painting or mosaic; the architects, whether they were entrusted with the raising of a church, or building a royal palace, nay a dwelling-house, were, each of them, but too glad to avail themselves, under clerical guidance, of such a powerful help for beautiful variety and happy illustration as was afforded them by Christian Symbolism. So systematized at last became this subject that by the eleventh century we find it separated into three branches—beasts, birds, and stones—and works were written upon each. Those upon beasts were, as they still are, known by the title of “Bestiaria,” or books on beasts; “Volucraria,” on birds, and “Lapideria,” on stones. About the same period, as an offset from symbolism, heraldry sprang up; whether the crusaders were the first to bethink themselves of such a method for personal recognition and distinction; or whether they borrowed the idea from the peoples in the east, and while adopting, much improved upon it, matters not; heraldry grew out of symbolism. Very soon it was made to tell about secular as well as sacred things; and poets, nay political partizans were quick in their learning of its language. The weaver too of silken webs was often bade, while gearing his loom, to be directed by its teaching, as several specimens in this collection will testify. That some of the patterns, made up of beasts and birds, upon silken stuffs from Sicilian, or Italian looms and here before us, were sketched by a partizan pencil and advisedly meant to carry about them an historic, if not political signification, we do not for a moment doubt. Several instances of sacred symbolism here, have been specified, and some explanation of it given.
[410] Exod. xxviii.
[411] Gen. i.