Needlework As Art Part 33

[365] Coloured thread and silk laces are still made in Venice.

[366] In the British Museum.

[367] M. Blanc's use of the word "guipure" is different from that found in the notices of the art by other authorities.

[368] The first lace-making machine was contemporary, or nearly so, with the stocking-making frame. About the year 1768 it was altered, and adapted for making open-work patterns. In 1808, the Heathcot machine was started for bobbin net. In 1813, John Leaver improved on this idea, with machine-woven patterns. The Jacquard apparatus achieved the flat patterns, and the new "Dentelliere" has perfected the art. Lace-making by machinery employed by the latest official returns in 1871, 29,370 women in England, and 24,000 in France. See Encyclopaedia Britannica, 9th edition, p. 183-5.

[369] M. Charles Blanc, "Art in Ornament and Dress," p.

211.

[370] The information contained in these volumes is most valuable, for the lace-worker as well as the collector.

[371] Lady Layard suggests that the cut lace work, which was the earliest made in Venice ("punto tagliato,"

"point coupe"), simply consists of b.u.t.ton-hole st.i.tch with purl ornaments. These are varied with geometrical st.i.tches and needle-weaving in those solid laces called "punti tagliati Fogliami," and "Rose point de Venise,"

of the finest kinds.

[372] Urbani de Gheltof, in his book, "Merletti di Venezia," p. 9, says that Venetian laces and fringes were furnished thence for the coronation of Richard III.

(1483). I fancy that gold guimps or braid, rather than netted laces, must be here intended, as we have no other notice of lace so early. See _Ibid._ pp. 10-20.

[373] Henry VIII. had a pair of hose of purple silk, edged and trimmed with a lace of purple silk and gold, of Milanese manufacture. Harl. MSS., 1519.

[374] The manufacture of point d'Alencon was created under the special orders of Louis Quatorze, by Colbert, in 1673. Now more than 200,000 women, besides the machinists, are employed in lace-making in France.

Colbert imported the teachers from Venice.

[375] Yriarte says that Alencon, Argenton, Sedan, Mercourt, Honiton, Bedford, Buckinghamshire, Oxfordshire, Mechlin, Bruges, Brussels, all followed in imitation of Venice. Yriarte's "Venise," p. 250.

[376] t.i.tian drew the designs for one of these books for "punti tagliati." The laces made in the Greek islands probably owe their origin to Venice, showing the same "punti in aria."

[377] I have already spoken of "lacis" as either darned netting or drawn work. Of this there is an English specimen at Prague, said by tradition to be the gift of Queen Anne of Bohemia, wife of Richard II. It originally trimmed or bordered an ecclesiastical garment.

[378] For further information, we refer the reader to M.

Urbani de Gheltof's book on Venice laces already cited (Organia, Venice, 1876), and Lady Layard's translation (1882).

[379] I am a.s.sured on the best authority that this is unknown as yet at Burano; but the workers, as well as the revived industry, are very young. The modern school of Burano has only been established eleven years. It is certainly delightful to see the 320 happy faces, singing, chattering, and smiling over their graceful occupation; and the beauty of the Buranese women, which is celebrated, has not suffered from their occupation.

There is a charming little article of the _Revista di Torino_, 1883, which describes the improvement in the social condition of Burano, morally and physically, and the way it is recognized by the inhabitants. Instead of signs of miserable poverty, the promoters of the lace school are greeted by the women leaning from the windows with, "Siestu benedetta!" ("Be thou blessed!").

[380] The word "tapestry" comes from the Greek _tapes_, which is used equally for hangings or carpets. The Italians call carpets "tapeti" to this day. It is believed to have been originally an Egyptian word for such fabrics.

[381] For instance, the embroidered hangings of the eighth century at Gerona, in Spain, have been more than once quoted as proofs of tapestries having been manufactured there at that period.

[382] The "slay" means the "strike." The word had the same meaning originally: to slay a man was to strike him.

[383] See De Champeaux, South Kensington Museum Art Handbook, 1878.

[384] "Bibliotheque des Merveilles" (sur les Tap.i.s.series), publie sous la direction de M. Edouard Charton, a Paris, 1876.

[385] Martial, xiv. 150.

[386] Minerva accepts the challenge of the Maeonian Arachne, who will not yield to her in the praises of being first in weaving wool. The girls desert the vineyards round the little town of Hypaepa, to look at her admirable workmanship. She boasts that hers is finer than that of Pallas, and, desiring a vain victory, rushes upon her own destruction. "... They stretch out two webs on the loom, with a fine warp. The web is tied to the beam; the slay separates the warp; the woof is inserted in the middle with sharp shuttles, while the fingers hurry along, and being drawn with the warp, the teeth (notched in the moving slay) strike it. Both hasten on their labour, and girding up their garments to their bosoms, they move their skilful arms, their eagerness beguiling their fatigue. There are being woven both the purples, which are subjected to the Tyrian brazen (dyeing) vessel with fine shades of minute difference; as in the rainbow with its mighty rays reflected by the shower, where, though a thousand colours are shining, yet the very transition eludes the eyes that look upon it; to such a degree is that which is adjacent the same, and yet the extremes are different. The pliant gold is mingled with the threads, and ancient subjects are represented on the webs." Then follows the list of the subjects. The web of Pallas had a large central design, and a smaller one on each corner, surrounded with a border of olive leaves.

Arachne's contained nineteen pictures, of two or more figures each, and was surrounded by a border of flowers, interwoven with the twining ivy. Ovid's "Metamorphoses,"

book vi.

Through the kindness of my friend, Lord Houghton, I am enabled to give the sequel of the story--Arachne's transformation into the Spider, as-- A PARAPHRASE AND A PARABLE.

Lo! how Minerva, recklessly defied, Struck down the maiden of artistic pride, Who, all distraught with terror and despair, Suspended her lithe body in mid-air; Deeming, if thus she innocently died, The sacred vengeance would be pacified.

Not so: implacable the G.o.ddess cried-- "Live on! hang on! and from this hour begin Out of thy loathsome self new threads to spin; No splendid tapestries for royal rooms, But sordid webs to clothe the caves and tombs.

Nor blame the Poet's Metamorphoses: Man's Life has Transformations hard as these; Thou shall become, as Ages hand thee down, The drear day-worker of the crowded town, Who, envying the rough tiller of the soil, Plies her monotonous unhealthy toil, Pa.s.sing through joyless day to sleepless night With mind enfeebled and decaying sight, Till some good genius,[437] kindred though apart, Resolves to raise thee from the vulgar mart, And once more links thee to the World of Art."

[387] Appendix 3.

[388] Guicciardini ascribes the invention of woven tapestry to Arras, giving no dates; so we do not know whether he attributes it to the Belgic Atrebates or to their successors, the Franks. In either case the craft was probably imported from the East.

[389] The Atrebates were the inhabitants of that Belgic region till the fifth century; now it is the province of Artois, probably a corruption of the name "Atrebates."

Taylor, "Words and Places" (1865), pp. 229-385.

[390] Castel, "Des Tap.i.s.series," p. 30.

[391] Sidonius Apollinaris, Epist. ix., 13. Cited in Yule's "Marco Polo," p. 68.

[392] Castel, "Des Tap.i.s.series," p. 31.

[393] The commentators of Vasari, MM. Lechanche and Jenron, believe that this art was coeval in the Low Countries with Roman civilization and Christianity; but it would appear that the weavers had fled to Britain to escape from the Romans. Ibid. p. 52. Traces of the name Arras have been found by Bochart and Frahn in Ar-ras, the Arabian name for the river Araxes and the people who inhabit its sh.o.r.es; but this may be accidental, and is at best an uncertain derivation.

[394] Rock, Introduction, p. cxii. This "Saracenic work"

is really so like what is called by the Germans "Gobelins" when found in Egyptian tombs that one can hardly doubt whence the Moors brought their art. There are several Egyptian specimens in the British Museum.

See also the catalogue of Herr Graf'schen's collection of Egyptian textiles, from the first to the eighth century. "Katalog der Teodor Graf'schen Funde in aegypten, von Dr. Karabacek. Wien, 1883."

[395] Viollet-le-Duc, "Dictionnaire du Mobilier Francais, Tapis," p. cxii; also M. Jubinal, "Tap.i.s.serie Historique." It is difficult absolutely to a.s.sign to any known specimens a date anterior to the fifteenth century; although M. de Champeaux thinks that the "Sarazinois" were mostly or entirely carpet-weavers about the eleventh century. He says there is doc.u.mentary authority to prove that these were woven with flowers and animals. There is a very deep-piled velvety carpet at Gorhambury (the Earl of Verulam's place). Here Queen Elizabeth's arms and cypher appear on a Persian or Moresque ground pattern surrounded with a wreath of oak leaves. It may have been a gift from Spain,--left after one of her visits to her Chancellor.

[396] "Tap.i.s.series des Gobelins," A. L. Lacordaire, p.

10 (1853). He considers that the Sarazinois were embroiderers as well as weavers--and this theory is supported by extracts from an inventory of Charles VI.'s hangings of 1421.

Every detail of the art and its materials was carefully regulated by the French statutes of 1625-27, containing many laws for the perfecting of the manufacture of new as well as the restoration of old tapestries--and fines were imposed for not using materials as nearly as possible matching the original ones; and likewise for any other dereliction from the rules of the craft. Ibid.

pp. 9, 10, 14.

[397] At the Poldi Bezzoli Museum in Milan there are some very fine carpets; one especially, a Persian, is supposed to be of the fifteenth century. This is very finely woven of pure, tender colours, and the whole composition, flowers and animals (most beautifully drawn lions, &c.), is delicately outlined in black on a white ground. The colouring is rich and harmonious, and has the iridescent effect of mother of pearl.

[398] In the San Clemente frescoes at Rome there are hangings which show a semi-Asiatic style.

[399] "Memoires Historiques et Ecclesiastiques d'Auxerre," par M. l'Abbe Lebuf, i. pp. 178, 231.

[400] There are very interesting Norwegian tapestries of the sixteenth century, which show distinctly an Eastern origin.

[401] Jubinal, "Tap.i.s.series," pp. 25, 26; Viollet-le-Duc, "Dic. de Mobilier Francais," p. 269.

[402] There is much splendid tapestry--German, and especially Bavarian,--to be seen at Munich; and, indeed, the more one seeks, the more one finds that private looms were constantly at work in the Middle Ages for votive offerings. There is a tapestry altar-piece at Coire, in the Grisons, of the Crucifixion, which is evidently of the fourteenth century. The colours are still brilliant, and the whole background is beautifully composed of growing flowers. No sky is seen. There is at Munich an altar frontal of tapestry, Gothic of the fifteenth century, exquisitely beautiful. The weaver has introduced a little portrait of herself at her loom, under the folds of the virgin's cloak at her feet.

[403] M. Albert Castel ("Tap.i.s.serie," p. 53) believes that the taking of Constantinople, when Earl Baldwin was elected to the throne of Byzantium, had a great effect on Flemish art, which then received a strong impulse from Oriental designs and traditions. See M. Jubinal's very interesting account of the tap.i.s.serie de Nancy which lined the tents of Charles the Bold at the siege of Nancy (p. 439). These tapestries are an allegory against gluttony. "Tap.i.s.series Hist.," pp. 1-5.