The life of Mary in embroidery

Before we dive into a new medieval embroidery topic, I must let you know that I had to postpone the sign-up date for the Medieval Goldwork Course. The production of the real gold threads has been delayed, and they won't be here on time. Due to various teaching commitments and the required travelling, the new sign-up date will be September 3rd 2024. I apologise for the delay! In the meantime, I am updating the course contents with lots of additional pieces, pictures, downloadable literature, and whatnot. This version will be the most comprehensive so far, offering even more in-depth knowledge. And as always, past students will have access to the updated course contents!

Last week, Sabine Ullrich, curator of the Kulturhistorisches Museum Magdeburg, invited me to view a chasuble cross in storage. To my delight, Sabine came up with a few additional pieces for me to study. While there are currently no medieval embroideries on display in the museum, textile enthusiasts should visit as there are beautiful late-medieval and 16th-century tapestries on permanent display. The original chasuble cross I came for belongs to a group of German goldwork embroideries that depict the life of Mary. The scenes are standardised, not unlike the Virgo inter Virgines embroideries I told you about in an earlier blog post. The chasuble cross was made somewhere in the middle of the 15th century. Let's explore!

Chasuble cross Te 154, Kulturhistorisches Museum Magdeburg.

Here you see the chasuble cross in question. It is kept under glass in a frame and thus difficult to photograph. Getting it out there requires a textile conservator and might damage the embroidery. It is not worth the risk and is unnecessary for my research. From the top, the cross shows the Nativity in the centre (according to the Revelation of St Bridget), with the Adoration of the Magi on the left and the donkey and the oxen on the right. Below is the Annunciation, followed by the Visitation at the bottom. The chasuble cross had been mounted onto a chasuble (also kept in the museum), and there is no corresponding column for the front with possible additional scenes.

Detail of the Visitation, Chasuble cross Te 154, Kulturhistorisches Museum Magdeburg.

When you look at the damaged areas in the faces and the mantles of Mary and Elisabeth, you see that the whole embroidery is executed on two layers of linen. A course linen on the back and a fine linen on which the design was drawn or block printed. The gold threads are of the membrane type (probably with a linen core) and have completely oxidised to black. This embroidery once looked very different! Whilst the blues and the greens are still quite vivid, the orange has probably faded a lot. The silk embroidery on the clothing is of the very regular encroaching gobelin stitch type. The faces were originally stitched in tiny split stitches that followed the flow of the facial features. Just like in Opus anglicanum. Mary's long, flowing hair is a much messier affair. I think these are longer split stitches mixed with straight stitches.

Visitation, Chasuble cross Te 154, Kulturhistorisches Museum Magdeburg.

Parts of the clothing of Mary and Elisabeth are worked in pairs of couched gold thread. The couching pattern is a simple bricking pattern with a light-coloured silken thread. The folds are accentuated by string padding. The string padding is made of linen threads twisted together. The edges are embellished with a gold gimp. A gold gimp is in this case a linen thread wrapped with a thin gold thread (membrane gold). This gold thread is thinner than the gold thread used for the rest of the gold embroidery. To create the edge of the halos, two gold gimps have been twisted together and couched in place.

The filling of the halos, the bit of blue sky and the grassy area the women are standing on have been embroidered in a technique that's often called Italian couching. The area is first filled with laidwork in coloured silk. The silk is further fixated by couching down a single (or double) gold thread on top. The gold threads are spaced so that the silken laidwork is visible. In order to minimise waste, the gold threads are not ended/plunged at the end of a row. They are just hidden close to the edge of the design element. I have written a tutorial about this trick.

The architectural background is rather sparse. There's a simple vault over the women with keystones shaped like flowers. Again, padding has been achieved with those linen strings. The diaper pattern in the background is an open basket weave made with red silk. It is one of the most popular diaper patterns ever used. The borders between the different orphreys have been embellished with simple basket weave over string padding. Either with gold threads only or with a combination of gold threads and coloured silks.

Next week, I will show you further examples of this iconography. Let's see if we can find clusters within the larger group. Further down the road, we will also see if the gold gimp can be recreated with modern materials. My Journeyman and Master Patreons can find more detailed pictures of the chasuble cross on my Patreon page. Their generous monthly contributions made my travels to Magdeburg possible. Thank you very much!