It was in the Middle Ages, however, after a period of comparative mediocrity, that the greatest degree of perfection in goldsmiths’ work, and especially in rings, began to display itself. In the reign of Edward III. (1363), so great was the extravagance in dress and decoration that an Act was passed to repress the evil. All persons under the rank of Knighthood, or of less property than two hundred pounds in land and tenements, were forbidden to wear rings, and other articles of jewellery.
Gold ‘Middle Age’ ring,
from the Louvre.
In the ‘Vision of Pierce Ploughman,’ written, it is supposed, about this date, the poet speaks of a richly-adorned lady, whose fingers were all embellished with rings of gold, set with diamonds, rubies, and sapphires.
In a parchment roll of Prayers to the Virgin in the Library of Jesus College, Oxford, which formerly belonged to Margaret of Anjou, there is a portrait of that queen who is represented wearing two rings on each finger except the least, placed on the middle as well as the third joint of the fingers—a fashion probably introduced by her, and shown in the curious portrait of this queen on the tapestry at Coventry.
In later ages we find the same practice of ornamenting the fingers with several rings. In the description of a Scottish woman of the middle of the sixteenth century, attributed to Dunbar, we find:—
On ilkune fyngar scho weirit ringis tuo
Scho was als proud an ony papingo.
Queen Elizabeth had an immoderate love for jewellery; and the description given of her dresses covered with gems of the greatest rarity and beauty reads like a romance. For finger-rings she had a remarkable fondness. Paul Hentzner, in his ‘Journey into England,’ 1598, relates that a Bohemian baron having letters to present to her at the palace of Greenwich, the queen, after pulling off her glove, ‘gave him her right hand to kiss, sparkling with rings and jewels—a mark of particular favour.’
Rings on the effigy of Lady Stafford.