(F) WOOLLEN TAPESTRY, "A TREE AND TWO BIRDS"; 5TH C.; 9 × II CM. (H) AN ARABIC INSCRIPTION, WOVEN IN SILK ON LINEN 10TH-IITH C.; (A PORTION) WHOLE FRAGMENT 4 × 14 CM. VICTORIA AND ALBERT MUSEUM WOVEN FABRICS FROM EGYPT PLATE II in 1886. With further purchases from time to time, and through the generosity of donors," it has grown to a fine collection, much used by students of decorative art. The recent appearance in the market of a small private collection gave a few friends of the museum the opportunity of securing some more examples. These were selected not for their early date but because of some other point of interest. Of the eight pieces, five are woven in wool or silk on linen by the tapestry process, two are woven with a looped surface in coloured wools and linen, and one is woven entirely in silk. The last, given by Sir Henry Howorth, has a design which the museum has long desired to possess. Unfortunately it is fragmentary, the stuff having been mutilated during transference from an older tunic to that of the individual with whom it was buried. It is therefore reproduced here from a drawing [PLATE I A].15 The subject is S. Michael and the Dragon. The saint stands on the dragon's back, and thrusts a long staff or lance into its jaws; the head of the staff is cross-shaped. He also holds a small handcross. The representation above this figure, of a bird of prey pouncing on a hare, belongs to the stock of pre-Christian motives. The panel adorned the sleeve of a linen tunic, near the wrist, and after the fashion of such ornaments, it shewed the design four times, first reversed from right to left, and then from top to bottom, It is in a drabcolour, probably undyed, on the usual purple ground. The scarcity of Christian subjects on early weavings need hardly be commented on. It has been argued that the woven silk panels found in Egypt were of local origin. It is true that to some extent the patterns may be grouped according to the principal sites from which they come; but similar examples are to be found in some of the older treasuries of Western Europe, and it seems hardly probable that stuffs showing Persian influence at Sens and Aix-la-Chapelle, for example, were brought from a small town nearly 300 miles up the Nile. A far more satisfactory theory is that a common origin should be sought among the well-known centres of silkweaving. The interconnection of these silk stuffs may be inferred from details which can be traced from one design to another. The paramount influence is that of Hither Asia. They may have been woven in Syria or Mesopotamia, or perhaps at Alexandria, where an Asiatic tradition would be followed. Of the three centuries-the 5th to the 7th-within the limits of which the St. Michael 16 14 Prof. F. Petrie, Messrs. H. M. Kennard and P. E. Newberry, the Rev. G. J. Chester and the Egypt Exploration Fund should be particularly mentioned. 15 A smaller but better preserved specimen was found by Forrer at Akhmîm (Röm," und Byz. Seiden-Textilien (1891), Pl. III, 2. 16 16 O von Falke. Seidenweberei, I, p. 37. Coarse imitations of these silk stuffs in tapestry and rough woollen weaving are not uncommon. Woven Fabrics from Egypt silk was woven, the balance of probability lies with the 6th. The panel [PLATE I, D] given by Sir William Lawrence is woven in thick woollen loops in bright colours (red, blue, green and yellow), the ground being covered with loops of plain linen. Garments woven thus were much used in Egypt, apparently for warmth in winter." The panel is complete in the width, and may have formed the end of a scarf. The use of the ankh, repeated as a kind of frieze above the arches, is peculiar. The adoption of this hieroglyph, standing as the symbol of life, by the Egyptian Christians, was of course due to its meaning and to its resemblance to a cross (crux ansata); but here symbolism gives way to a decorative purpose. The panel belongs to the 4th or 5th century, when Christian emblems came to be prominently displayed on Egyptian garments. The other example woven by the same method in purple, orange, yellow, red and green is the gift of Mr. P. G. Trendell [PLATE 1, C]. It may perhaps have decorated a tunic, but more probably it came from an oblong outer garment or mantle with one such ornament in each corner and a larger one in the middle. The parrot [PLATE I, B] is woven by the tapestry process in wool on the warp threads of a piece of linen. The bird is green, with yellow markings, eyes, beak and legs in red, and a purple and yellow collar. It probably formed part of a large mantle of the 5th century. Another example [PLATE II, E] Woven by the same process in dark purple wool, is of the previous century. It is one of two parallel bands of the same pattern which ran close together across the lower part of the sleeve of a linen tunic. The pattern of fishes swimming about among lotuses and a waterfowl points to local inspiration. It is one of the comparatively rare examples of the Graeco-Roman period where indications of an Egyptian origin are to be traced.18 Among the papyri at Berlin there are a few fragments with designs evidently intended for reproducing in tapestry, as tunic-ornaments. One of these, representing two parallel bands, apparently for a sleeve, has a design of lotuses, fish, and birds showing a remarkable resemblance to this panel.19 Two other tapestry weavings break away further from the Graeco-Roman tradition, and they may be assigned to the 5th or 6th century. The motive of each is two birds with a conventional tree between, tapestry-woven in wool on the warps of a yellow woollen material, One [PLATE II, G) the gift of 17 They were also worn in Italy (Pliny, Book viii, ch. 73). 18 There is a private collection in Russia a tapestry roundel from Egypt in which is a bust inscribed NEIAOE; a companion roundel, in the Hermitage, represents г H, with the asp on a solar disk above the forehead (Wladimir Bock. Coptic figured Textiles. Transactions of the 8th Archæological Congress, vol. III of the Imperial Archæological Society (Moscow, 1897), Pl. XVI. 19 Amtliche Berichte xxx (1908-9), fig. 179. Woven Fabrics from Egypt Mr. Perceval Griffiths, is in colours on a purple ground, and has a square border imitating a frame set with gems. The other [PLATE II, F], given by Mr. Talbot Hughes, is entirely in purple. The latest of the stuffs here illustrated [PLATE II, H], given by Mr. I. Sassoon, belongs to the period after the Arab conquest. It is part of a linen garment with an Arabic inscription (not yet deciphered) tapestry-woven in white silk. The simplicity of the characters points to an early date, probably the beginning of the Fatimite period (A.D. 969 to 1171). The later Fatimite inscriptions, as may be seen from the dated examples in the museum, are generally smaller in size and more. decorative in form, and are usually placed on a diaper or scroll background. A word may be added as to the designation Coptic", usually given to the stuffs from the burying-grounds. No more satisfactory collective name can be suggested, but it can hardly be regarded as strictly applicable either to the weavers or the wearers. It is to be hoped that some day an Egyptologist will enlighten us on the problem of the nationalities of the crafts- THE SHRINE OF S. HADELIN, VISË HE little town of Visé, on the Meuse, was one of the first to suffer from the German invasion of August 1914. Its fine church and Hotel de Ville were completely destroyed. In the church. was kept the shrine of S. Hadelin, a precious work of the 12th century, presumably enclosed in a modern shrine constructed for the purpose, in pseudo-Gothic style of the renaissance period. The 12th century shrine was made in the shape of a sarcophagus, 211⁄2 inches high and 59 inches long, of silver, partly gilt. It contained the relics of S. Hadelin, a saint of local renown, who founded the monastery of Celles near Liége, in the 7th century. Some members of this religious community, in order to escape persecution, removed the shrine to Visé in 1336 and established themselves in that locality. During the revolution of 1794 the silver plates which formed the roof of the shrine disappeared. On each of the long sides are represented four scenes from the life of S. Hadelin PLATE I, C, D], this work has been attributed by Otto von Falke and Frauberger to the celebrated 12th century artificer and goldsmith: Godefroi de Claire.1 The two end-pieces of the shrine are probably of earlier date, viz. late 11th century. On one is depicted the crowning by Christ of two saints: Hadelin and 1 La sculpture et les arts plastiques au pays de Liége (Desclée De Brouwer & Cie), Bruges. The Rémacle [PLATE I, A]. On the other is a subject rare in mediæval art: Christ triumphant over the powers of evil, clad as a warrior knight of the period, in a hauberk, with cloak fastened on the shoulder, and a staff or lance in his right hand, in the left an open book, bearing the letters Alpha and Omega. He stands with the head of the dragon and of the basilisk under his feet [PLATE I, A]. The representation of Christ, trampling on the powers of evil, was a subject not unknown in the Meuse district. The earliest example, the leaf of an ivory diptych from Geoenolds-Elderen, attributed to the 8th century, is, or was, in the Brussels museum [PLATE II, E]. In the porch of the church. of "Our Lady", at Maestricht, placed high up in the wall, is a sculptured slab, showing the same subject [PLATE II, G]. This may date from the 11th century, it has a certain resemblance to the leaf of an ivory diptych, now in the Museo Nazionale, in the Bargello, Florence [PLATE II, f], which is assigned to the 11th, and to the lower Rhine district. 2 Auct. cit. L'Art Mosan (G. van Oest & Cie), Bruxelles. 3 As the only photograph available is indistinct, a reproduction is added from a drawing by the late Monsieur A. Schaepkens of Maestricht, to help to interpret the subject, though that draughtsman seems to have drawn on his own imagination in his copy. The two entablatures seem to have been built quite late into the wall, and may have come originally from different buildings. The ornament on either side and below the figure has nothing to do with either entablature. |