Stole of Gold Tissue, figured with small beasts, birds, and floriated ornaments, bordered on one side by a blue stripe edged with white and charged with ornamentation in gold, on the other, by a green one of a like character, as well as by two Latin inscriptions. The ends, four inches long, are of crimson silk, ornamented with seed-pearls, small red, blue, gold, yellow, and green beads, pieces of gilt-silver, and have a fringe three inches long, red and green. Sicilian, 13th century. 6 feet by 3¼ inches.
As a piece of textile showing how the weavers of the middle ages could, when they needed, gear the loom for an intricacy of pattern in animals as well as inscriptions, this rich cloth of gold is a valuable specimen. Among the ornaments on the middle band we find doves, harts, the letter M floriated, winged lions, crosses floriated, crosses sprouting out on two sides with fleurs-de-lis, four-legged monsters, some like winged lions, some biting their tails, doves in pairs upholding a cross, &c.; and above and below these, divided from them by gracefully ornamented bars, one blue the other green, may be read this inscription,—“O spes divina, via tuta, potens medicina ☩ Porrige subsidium, O Sancta Maria, corp. (sic) consortem sancte sortis patrone ministram. ☩ Effice Corneli meeritis (sic) prece regna meri. ☩ O celi porta, nova spes mor. (sic) protege, salva, benedic, sanctifica famulum tuum Alebertum crucis per sinnaculum (sic) morbos averte corporis et anime. Hoc contra signum nullum stet periculum. ☩ O clemen. (sic) Domina spes dese’erantibus una.”
The ends of this stole, German work of the 14th century, widen like most others of the period, and in their original state seem to have been studded with small precious stones, the sockets for which are very discernible amid the beads; and in each centre must have been let in a tiny illumination, as one still is there showing the Blessed Virgin Mary with our Lord, as a child, in her arms; and this appears to have been covered with glass. Amid the beads are yet a few thick silver-gilt spangles wrought like six-petaled flowers. As a stole, the present one is very short, owing, no doubt, to a scanty length of the gold tissue; in fact, it might easily be taken for a long maniple. When it is remembered that the Suabian house of Hohenstaufen reigned in Sicily for many years, till overthrown in the person of the young Conradin, at the battle of Tagliacozzo, by the French Charles of Anjou, A.D. 1268, we can easily account for Sicilian textiles of all sorts finding their way, during the period, into Germany. In his “Geschichte der Liturgischen Gewänder des Mittelalters,” 4 Lieferung, pt. xviii. fig. 3, Dr. Bock has given a figure of this stole.
8589.
Piece of Silk and Linen Tissue; ground, yellow, with a band of crimson; pattern, crowned kings on horseback amid foliage, each holding on his wrist a hawk, and having a small dog on the crupper of his saddle. Sicilian, early 13th century. 1 foot 4½ inches by 7 inches.
From a small piece to the left, figured with what looks like an English bloodhound or talbot, it would seem that we have not the full design in the pattern of this curious stuff, which speaks so loudly of the feudalism of mediæval Italy and other continental countries. Seldom was a king then figured without his crown, besides carrying his hawk on hand and being followed by his dogs, like any other lord of the land. The little hound behind him is somewhat singular. To us it appears curious that such an elaborate and princely design, meant evidently for the hangings of some palace, should have been done in the rather mean materials which we find. Parts seem to have been woven in gold thread; but so thin and debased was the metal that it is now quite black, and the linen warp far outweighs the thin silken woof.
8590.