The Armour Archive

Hi, I am ashamed to say I made a surcoat for Sarnac BEFORE getting as least one concrete source for some of the decoration on it. Can anyone help me? I mostly need something for the white strip with lettering/phrase on the bottom.

(the photo attached isn't the actual one I made, but an example of what I did for him, don't have pics of his surcoat yet)

thanks all

Mottos on banners - not a problem for sources.

Writing on surcoats?

Who's Sarnac?

I've done many mottos on banners (embroidered and painted) but never speicifically on a surcoat and I finally found out that the person wearing the one in the picture got it from "I saw it on the field at Pennsic and thought it looked cool!" as his source, no doc. though.


Sarnac is Count Sarnac Ba'adur (formally Sarnac Kir) (KSCA) King's Champion of Ealdormere (as of Saturday) - otherwise known as my hubby.

Ealdormere has a registered badge for each of the Kingdom Champions so I wanted to make him a surcoat that would fit better than the regelia one does and decorate it with the champ. badge. On the bottom white edge I embroidered (machine) the badge between the words "in word and deed I follow my king" - from a song about 2 previous kings' deeds while sitting the throne. it looks really cool, but being Laureled specifically in Costume and Research, it kinda' frowns on me to not get something concrete before making it

joleicia wrote: it looks really cool, but being Laureled specifically in Costume and Research, it kinda' frowns on me to not get something concrete before making it

And you know someone's going to copy it and start telling everyone its period because "Mistress Joleicia did it"

Juliana
(also a costuming OL)

Your Hubby will look very flash.

The guy in the pic does look very good though. Can I use you as a source?

As a wild ass guess try Italy or Spain around 14 - 1500's on. I don't remember any motto's on surcotes in England/France (but there still may be some out there!) as the examples I have seen tend to have their owners devices or the badge of their lord.

Sorry, not much help there.

I am not sure of the exact time period you are needing to document, but I remember seeing talk of a few different pieces of King Edward's clothing having mottos in Latin embroidered upon it in Dress in the Age of the Black Prince

Hope that helps
Vyvyanne

Vyvyanne Fox wrote:I am not sure of the exact time period you are needing to document, but I remember seeing talk of a few different pieces of King Edward's clothing having mottos in Latin embroidered upon it in Dress in the Age of the Black Prince

Hope that helps
Vyvyanne

ooo!!!
I have that book, I'll check it out - thanks. At this point I'll go for anything pre-1600
(funny enough the King wearing the surcoat in the pics name is Edouard)

joleicia

Jolicia
In one of the wardrobe accounts in the FOTBP there is reference to a garment with embroidered letters with jewels and pearls spelling the motto, "It is as it is." made for a tournament.

I believe there is also a reference to a jupon with a motto as well.


Adrielle

There are also mentions of embroidered words/mottos in Joan Evans's Dress in Medieval France. The two I just glanced at are from 1387 and 1412, I believe. These garments aren't miltary in particular, but there is not much of a leap between mottos and visual heraldry/livery on martial garments when it comes to this time period and the upper classes, IMO. If you don't have that book, it's very, very worth buying. You can find it used for as low as $36 right now at places like addall.com.

-Tasha

total speculation on my part, but you also might try Crusade era surcoats. Especially on the islamic side. Somewhere in the back of my adled brain I remember seeing/reading something about inscriptions embroidered onto clothes in arabic.

InsaneIrish wrote:Somewhere in the back of my adled brain I remember seeing/reading something about inscriptions embroidered onto clothes in arabic.

Maybe you're thinking of tiraz bands?

Tasha McG wrote:There are also mentions of embroidered words/mottos in Joan Evans's Dress in Medieval France. The two I just glanced at are from 1387 and 1412, I believe. These garments aren't miltary in particular, but there is not much of a leap between mottos and visual heraldry/livery on martial garments when it comes to this time period and the upper classes, IMO. If you don't have that book, it's very, very worth buying. You can find it used for as low as $36 right now at places like addall.com.

-Tasha

thanks for the book recomend. Tried to find it on addall and other usual book sites, can't find it anywhere

Joleicia

That's odd... Hhhmmm... let me see....

OH MY.

I see what happened. For some bizarre reason Addall.com has some of the available copies listed under "JOHN" Evans, not "Joan" Evans. It's better if you search under the title of the book, not the author, in this case. Also, make sure you're looking at the Use and Out of Print section, not the new one. I've been confounded more than once by not following those little quirky "rules".

Here's the link to the search I just turned up:

Dress in Mediaeval France

Happy buying!
-Tasha

http://www.bookfinder.com/search/?ac=sl ... 2287_1:1:1

From Bookfinder.com it can be found for $36.28.

Tasha - is this book a bunch of pictures with someone elses description of them? I might have this book, but don't know. Will verify tonight..

Thanks!

Kim

Karen Larsdatter wrote:

InsaneIrish wrote:Somewhere in the back of my adled brain I remember seeing/reading something about inscriptions embroidered onto clothes in arabic.

Maybe you're thinking of tiraz bands?

Yep that would be it! Thanks

Hi Kim,

Probably not the same book. While there are some decent images of French art in the back, the bulk of the book's worth is in the author's compilation of period textual evidence. It's like a much shorter and broader-ranging (time-period-wise) version of FitAotBP.

-Tasha

Thanks Tasha!