The Armour Archive

For the 15th century aficionados:

There's an exhibit currently going on in Bern about Charles the Bold. I found a few photos on a Japanese site here. The catalog is available in the US from Michael Shamansky. The exhibit will be in Bruges from March to July next year, and an English edition of the catalog will come out then.

Tracy

The Hardbound catalog is absolutely gorgeous if you haven't already seen it. Those not fluent or who cannot read German might want to wait for the catalog to come out in other languages.

Many of the items appeared in "Die Burgunderbuete" and shown in vibrant color: textiles, vestments, the backgammon board that appeared on a different thread, and the mace with the travel board, and much much more. Many paintings with details by Van Der Weyden and others.

Also pictured are some beautiful military saints. There's a particularly nice one of Charles the Bold and St. George.

Definitely worth the price.

I so want info on that silk gown; been looking at a black and white of it for a long time and thinking of trying to make one.

James, do you mean the red silk satin man's gown? There's some information in it in Textile Conservation and Research by Mechtild Flury-Limburg, 1988. Abegg-Stiftung conserved the gown in 1960 and at that time the seams were opened up and the pieces measured. There's a pattern in the book. The lining is gray linen twill.

Tracy Justus wrote:James, do you mean the red silk satin man's gown? There's some information in it in Textile Conservation and Research by Mechtild Flury-Limburg, 1988. Abegg-Stiftung conserved the gown in 1960 and at that time the seams were opened up and the pieces measured. There's a pattern in the book. The lining is gray linen twill.

I assume you mean there is a pattern in "Conservation and Research". I will have to find this book.

Tracy Justus wrote:James, do you mean the red silk satin man's gown? There's some information in it in Textile Conservation and Research by Mechtild Flury-Limburg, 1988. Abegg-Stiftung conserved the gown in 1960 and at that time the seams were opened up and the pieces measured. There's a pattern in the book. The lining is gray linen twill.

Any chance they talked about the provenance of the garment?

Whoops, I misspelled her name. It's Mechtild Flury-Lemberg. Sorry, Dr. M. F.-L.!

The scanty historical information says that the coat was tailored out of "Burgunderbeute" silk. The two references are Die Burgunderbeute by Florens Deuchler, 1963 and an article by Flury-Lemberg herself: "Der Berner Mannerock" in Jahrbuch des Bernischen Historischen Museums 1959/60.

Textile Conservation and Research is essentially a brag book of different projects Abegg-Stiftung had done over the years and doesn't go into a great deal of detail about any one of them. It does have some useful technical information but not the sort of thing you get from, say, Janet Arnold.

T.

After seeing the price of the book I think I shall get in though the inter library loan

Brent,

I have Die Burgunderbeute and can have Jenn scan the entry for the gown if you like. It has been years since I looked at it, but it was at one time attributed directly to Charles, and as I recollect, it was altered in the early 16th century for one of the Mayors of Bern to wear.

I should point out that the new catalog does not cover all of Deuchler's and the 1968 Bern exhibition catalog entries (I think it would be a third again as big to cover the flag catalogs), but it provides a good cross section of them, alongside a number of associated articles in other museums across Europe and America, that were not covered by Deuchler, at least in photographs.

It is a great addition to your library, and a must have if you have Deuchler and the earlier exhibition catalog. I need to track down the earlier Flag books, and booty books published in the 19th century.

The photograph quality is first rate, although I wish they included some multiple views of some objects.