ELIZABETHAN EMBROIDERY by George Wingfield Digby; GOSPEL STORIES IN ENGLISHEMBROIDERY by Donald KingReview by: ENID MARXJournal of the Royal Society of Arts, Vol. 112, No. 5098 (SEPTEMBER 1964), pp. 787-788Published by: Royal Society for the Encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and CommerceStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/41369423 .

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SEPTEMBER 1964 NOTES ON BOOKS

A poignant contrast is provided by Marshall's frontispiece to Eikon Basilike (plate 73). The catalogue entry evokes the famous picture of Royal Martyrdom:

The King kneeling in prayer, head turned } г.; in his hand a crown of thorns : at his foot the crown of his earthly kingdom: in the heavens, the heavenly crown. He is within a vaulted room and in front of him is a table bearing a book open and inscribed with the words, IN VERBO TUO SPES MEA . . . The passionate religious and political controversies of the period are vividly

illustrated by engraved 'Broadsides'. Some of these took the form of group portraits, such as the ten parliamentary commanders (with Lieut. -General Cromwell in the bottom row) shown in 'A Perfect list of all the victories obtained (through the blessing of God) by the Parliaments forces . . .', 1646 (plate 209). Other broadsides were allegorical. 'A Cloak for Knavery', 1648 (plate 210), showed Time tearing the cloak of Religion from a villainous Scot. Underneath some lines of verse began :

Religion is made a covering For every wicked and Rebelious thing.

Should a further volume of this splendid series ever be undertaken it will no doubt extend to the happy Restoration of King Charles II.

D. G. c. A.

Elizabethan embroidery. By George Wingfield Digby. London , F ab er, 1963. 52s 6 d net gospel stories in English embroidery. Introduction by Donald King. London,

Her Majesty's Stationery Office, 1963. 6s 6 d net These books are not only essential to all who are interested in embroidery, but

important to anyone making a study of Shakespeare's England because of the visual evidence they offer as to the way of life of the times.

Mr. Digby 's book is moderately priced considering that it contains eighty- four illustrations, four in colour. The text contains many unusual sidelights into the domestic interests and occupations of some notable Elizabethan ladies. There is a chapter on the inspiration of gardens and flowers which will no doubt be of much interest to gardeners for its information on planning and for the names of flowers, fruit and vegetables grown at the time. Cooks too may be surprised to learn of the great variety of herbs used for flavouring fish and meat dishes as well as for salads.

But the real importance, to my mind, of Mr. Digby 's book lies in the fact that he sets out to relate Elizabethan embroideries to their environment. He shows them, not as isolated artefacts, but as part of domestic life. The most important section of this book is the one which deals with embroidery for furnishing.

In this section Mr. Digby describes the purposes to which embroideries were put. He has already stressed in the general introduction that 'it is necessary to know how a given article was used and to be in a position to visualize it in the context in which it was intended to be seen'. The living rooms, Mr. Digby tells us, were sparsely furnished by modern standards. There were splendid tapestries on the walls, fine ornamental plaster work on the ceilings, a few large pieces of furniture, such as cupboards, coffers, or boxes and chests for storing valuables. The tables, often on trestles, were sometimes covered with rich carpets. Carpets, then, were seldom placed on the floor : occasionally they were hung on walls, but more often served to cover tables or cupboards. Benches, the main form of seating, were made soft and gay with cushions, both long and square. These cushions have an immense variety of design, from allegorical scenes, in some of which the characters are dressed in con- temporary clothing, or emblematic designs so dear to the Elizabethan mind, to simple decoration with flowers, some stylized and some naturalistic.

The table carpets also have as wide a range of subjects in their design. Many contain heraldic references, and some architectural details, such as the long cushion

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JOURNAL OF THE ROYAL SOCIETY OF ARTS SEPTEMBER 1 964

depicting old Chatsworth (Plate 61). From the border of the table carpet (Plates 46, 47) one gets a vivid impression of country life at the time - the large house in enclosed grounds, with orchards and farms, hunting, shooting and fishing; farmers and shepherds rearing sheep, goats and hens; milk-maids with cattle; whilst the Lord and Lady and their dog, and the wayfarer with his pack-horse, wander through the varied landscape.

It is a pity that Mr. Wingfield Digby has not chosen more examples of what life was like inside the houses. For this one may turn to the illustration of the Gospel Stories : for instance, Plate 7, which depicts the birth of the Virgin, shows a bed with a heavy coverlet having an embroidered border, white bed linen and a long embroidered cushion. Similar coverlets and cushions can be seen in some of the other illustrations.

Mr. Wingfield Digby's valuable colour illustrations (especially the glowing yellow velvet cushion, facing page 58) give a new idea of the Elizabethan palette. One has become accustomed to think of the period in monochrome. So often one sees the rooms without their complement of textiles, and even when these have survived, time and use have left the colours sad. What is wanted now is a really large book from Mr. Wingfield Digby, with many coloured illustrations of Elizabethan interiors.

ENID MARX

ENGLISH BLUE AND WHITE PORCELAIN OF THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY. By Bernard Watney. London , Faber , 1963. 70 s net

british pottery and porcelain 1780-1850. By Geoffrey A. Godden. London , Arthur Barker , 1963. 555 net

T о the collector of modest means the blue and white porcelain produced in England by some twenty factories during the eighteenth century presents the most fruitful field for his activities. Modest but charming things painted, or more rarely, printed in underglaze cobalt blue are still available at reasonable prices but, as with most eighteenth-century wares, they are increasingly difficult to find. The growing number of blue and white enthusiasts - Saturday collectors in the main - will welcome this work by one who has already given us an authoritative book on Longton Hall in the invaluable series of Faber monographs. It is possible, one might say almost certain, that owners of collections of some age will be led to study afresh their problematical pieces in the light of much new information which Dr. Watney provides. Pieces which háve masqueraded as 'perhaps Lowestoft * or 'probably Longton Hair may now find their correct factory in this typically English class of porcelain. For English it certainly is, despite the painted decoration translated from the Chinese which is often applied to shapes borrowed from the silversmith.

Whistler is supposed to have led the cult for K'ang Hsi vases and this, inevitably, broadened in the hands of less sensitive souls into miscellaneous collections of pottery and porcelain with blue decoration on 3 white body. Some of these collections still exist in old country houses and provide the modern collector with interesting finds when they appear in the local auction room. In one of our older ecclesiastical palaces there was, until recently, a vast collection which cheerfully mingled fine Chinese porcelain with eighteenth-century blue and white, Delft, blue transfer-printed pottery and grand vulgarian nondescripts of the mid nineteenth century. It may be said in defence of these earlier collectors that very little guidance from books, apart from local histories, was available before Jewitt and Nightingale, and few critical works on English ceramics appeared before 1890. Practically all the literature on the subject is of this century, and much of it by professional and amateur alike is of high quality. Dr. Watney's book is no exception.

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