Over the years, I have come across the names of hundreds of medieval embroiderers. A couple of names can often be found in papers on medieval embroidered textiles. Sometimes, a whole list is provided, for instance, of those people who worked on embroidered textiles for Duke Philip the Good in AD 1425. Or we have a nice paper on a particular embroiderer and his conduct. Analysing the development of the embroidery trade through surviving guild regulations is also a good source of names. Each of these instances is anecdotal. As far as I know, there isn't a central database which lists the personal details of medieval embroiderers from Europe. That can be easily changed! From now on, I will maintain an Excel list. The list will be accessible through this blog (easily found through the blog index under 'medieval embroiderers`). Although I have gathered an impressive 294 names, my list is far from complete. Please contact me if you want to see names added to the list. My cut-off point is AD 1550-ish. Curious if someone with your (sur) name is on the list? Let's find out!

So far, I have been able to find embroiderers from as early as the 9th century and for each subsequent century right up to the mid-16th century, which is where my cut-off point is. They come from sources in Austria, Belgium, England, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland and Sweden. The further back in time we go, the less information we have. As you probably feared, most of the embroiderers who made it into the written record were male. Of only 45 embroiderers, I can be certain they worked with gold threads. Interestingly, the male:female ratio still holds. This does not mean that women did not embroider professionally. It does mean that they were not as often in a position that needed for their names to be written down as embroidering men were.

As soon as we split the available data into the appropriate centuries, a slightly different picture emerges. Although based on very small numbers, the data probably hints at a change in society. Professional embroidery was probably done predominantly by women in the early Middle Ages before men entered the field in the high Middle Ages. However, the data for the early Middle Ages comes predominantly from England. Thus, what we see might result from geographical differences and not applicable to all of medieval Europe.

Those who would like to investigate and/or play with the raw data can download my Excel file by clicking on the above link. Enjoy!

Please note: I am off to attend the International Istanbul-Büyükcekmece Culture and Art Festival tomorrow. After that, I'll take my summer break to work on the program for the rest of the year. Blogging will resume on the 2nd of September!

Before we dive into this week's tutorial, I want to remind you to sign up for my upcoming in-person embroidery workshop at the Cathedral Treasury in Halberstadt. This is your unique opportunity to stitch in the grounds of a medieval Cathedral with its beautiful cloisters, a location steeped in history and beauty. Enjoy in-depth discussions of the embroidered pieces on display with the curator, myself, and your fellow students. Getting to the beautiful historic town of Halberstadt is easy as it has its own train station. Internet platforms such as Booking.com provide booking travel arrangements and lodging in your own language. The past 14 years have shown me that organizing financially successful embroidery workshops in Germany or the Netherlands is almost impossible. Yes, the Halberstadt workshop has four attendants, which means that it does not cost me anything to teach. However, I am not earning anything either. As I am a business and not a charity, I do need to draw an income from my work. Therefore, I will not organize further in-person workshops if the count remains at four. Instead, I will concentrate on my partnership with Creative Experiences and my own online classes.

Now, on to this week's tutorial: beaded needle minders with historical motifs. I have always been fascinated by historical samplers! When I lived near Rotterdam many years ago, I became a textile volunteer at a local museum in Maasland. They had a stunning collection of beautiful historical samplers. I had permission to reproduce them when life took me in a different direction. Since then, I have been captivated by the beauty of these old samplers and often wondered how I could use those motifs that I liked without stitching a whole sampler. Two weeks ago, I had an idea. Why not use individual motifs to decorate a needle minder? This could all have gone by without you knowing about my now somewhat sizeable production of needle minders. Alas, I am Gary and Jennifer's trusted side-kick on the Tour de Broderie, and the needle minders have gained quite some traction. So, let me show you how to construct these beaded beauties!

For my needle minders I used: 40ct natural linen by Zweigart, variegated silks by Caron, Glissen Gloss, Gloriana and Flower Silk, thick template plastic, thin wadding, double-sided tape, polyester sewing thread, round 2 cm nyodem magnet and beads 11/0 and 15/0. However, you can use whatever you like. Solid colours in stranded cotton on aida would work just as nice. As I don't have a stack of reproduction sampler patterns at home, I did the next best thing: visit the Antique Pattern Library. Scroll down a little for 'Kreuzstich und Filetmustern aus Graubünden'. This is a collection of Austrian folk patterns published in 1927. Square patterns of about 30 x 30 stitches seem to work best for a 4 x 4 cm needle minder. But again, anything goes! And, when you are not too precious about your finished masterpiece, you can also use the larger motifs to make coasters. Just saying :).

German medieval embroideries are often characterised by a composite thread not seen elsewhere: gold gimp. This is a relatively thick piece of string wrapped with a thin thread of membrane gold (gilt animal gut wrapped around a linen core). Was this a ready-made thread? Did the embroiderers make the thread themselves? Is it either pre-made or made during the actual embroidery? Let's see if we can find the answers!

Here you see a detail of the Nativity scene from the chasuble kept at the Kulturhistorisches Museum Magdeburg. The nimbus is edged with this composite thread: gold gimp.

Here's a close-up of the gold gimp. The wrapping isn't very neat. But what is more puzzling: there are no couching stitches to attach the gold gimp to the background fabric. The membrane thread isn't used to do this either. Firstly, it would be far too fragile to endure being pulled through the fabric multiple times. I've worked with recreated membrane threads, and they definitely do not hold up to this kind of abuse. Secondly, you can tell from the above picture that the membrane thread is wrapped around the thick string and does not penetrate the fabric.

And what about the 'mess' on either end of the gold gimp? What's that all about? And then I remembered that Alison Cole had written about making silk gimp before it was commercially available. She describes a method whereby you make that composite thread whilst you embroider. Let's see if that works.

The ratio of string to membrane gold is about 5:1. From my experiments with the recreated membrane gold, I know that it is more similar to Japanese thread than to passing thread. But it isn't the same. Its core is made of linen instead of cotton, and the spinning direction is opposite.

Trying to recreate gold gimp wasn't entirely successful. It works, but it isn't very neat. And it is very fiddly to do. Nevertheless, I did learn a few things. Firstly, it is possible to hide the couching thread completely. Especially when you use a very thin linen or silk thread for this (mine was a bit bulky). Secondly, the thick string should be as firm as possible. Cotton string worked less satisfactorily than stiff, non-squidgy linen string. And thrirdly, one should leave a tail of the gold thread at the start. This can be used to wrap the plunged string at the start. Just as I was able to do at the end.

My little experiment also hints at the impossibility of producing a gold gimp as a pre-made thread. The wraps would come undone as soon as you take off tension. You would need to glue them onto the string to prevent this from happening. And I don't think there is glue in these threads. The glue would adhere to the thin membrane and tear the fragile thread apart as soon as you manipulate it to work with it.

Any thoughts?

This blog post is taking way longer to write than I intended. Sorry, I fell down a rabbit hole. And then another one :). I will find myself in both holes in the state library in Munich on Friday. What happened? As always, I think I have seen the same embroidery before, but when I look into it more deeply, things turn out not to be as similar as I thought. When we looked at the chasuble with embroidered scenes of the Life of Mary in the Kulturhistorisches Museum Magdeburg last week, I knew it belonged to a group of similar pieces. Were they all made around the same time in the same place? Or do subtle differences hint at multiple workshops in a much wider production area? Let's have a look.

Vestments with embroidered scenes from the Life of Mary contain different combinations of well-known events in Mary's life. These are usually: Annunciation, Visitation, Nativity, Adoration of the Magi and Circumcision. Other scenes might be the Presentation at the Temple, the Flight into Egypt, or the Dormition. To aid recognition, the scenes have been standardised. These embroideries were made in the 15th century and the early 16th century. Some embroideries are so similar that they hint at the use of block printing to transfer the design onto the embroidery linen. But how similar is similar?

Above, you see three renditions of the Annunciation. In all three cases, Mary is standing behind a reading desk. However, the designs are so different that they do not stem from the same pricking or printing block. Interestingly, the majority of these embroideries omit the reading desk. This means that these three embroideries were using a similar model book that differed from the model book all the other producers of these embroideries used. Desk or no desk is thus probably a characteristic of a particular production area.

But now look more closely. Let's explore the embroidery techniques used. The background consists of a diaper pattern. In all three cases: an open basket weave in red silk (faded to pink in Görlitz). The background pattern also seems to be a defining criterion. Most pieces have these sunny spirals in the background. The difference between stitching a sunny spiral (no counting) and a diaper pattern (counting) is a fundamental one and results in a very different product (taste). Therefore, I think this is region-specific and not workshop-specific (i.e. I don't believe there were 'diapers' and 'spirals' in the same region).

The embroidery materials used are pretty similar for all three pieces: linen fabric, gold threads and untwisted coloured silks. However, there is also gold gimp in two pieces. This is the composite thread that goes around the nimbus and along the edges of the clothing in the above picture. The embroidery from Brixen does not have this particular thread. I think that this was a thread that embroiderers made themselves. The edges in the Brixen piece are marked with embroidery. Maybe this specific workshop did not know how to make the thread or was just not keen on working with it.

Now look at the filling of the nimbus. The pieces from Magdeburg and Görlitz show Italian couching (laid silk with a gold thread on top). A couple of months ago, I wrote a tutorial on this technique. The piece from Brixen shows a very different filling: a sunny spiral. Is this workshop specific due to the preference of the embroiderer, or is this due to local taste?

One thing that I think is workshop-specific is the border between the orphreys. This would be a perfect way for an embroiderer or an embroidery workshop to put their stamp onto their work. The borders consist of simple basket weave over string padding in all three cases. The border from Görlitz shows these very fancy triangles in silk and gold thread. If you would like to recreate it, have a look at the tutorial I made.

I am collating all related pieces on a Padlet. With a bit of luck, groups will begin to form, and two or more pieces might come from the same workshop. In the future, art historians might be able to locate these groups in a specific region. My Journeyman and Master Patrons have access to this fascinating ongoing research.