Flemish Brasses of the Fourteenth Century in Northern Germany and their use by Merchants of the Hanse

Abstract

The largest and finest products of the Tournai school of brass engravers in the fourteenth century commemorate ecclesiastics and are to be found in northern Germany, to where it seems likely they were transported by the merchants of the important Hanse port of Lübeck. One of these, perhaps the finest brass ever produced by the school, commemorated two bishops of that city and lies in the cathedral. Two others, each to two bishops with the name of Bülow, are in the not very distant cathedral of Schwerin. We know of at least two others, formerly in cathedral churches at Schleswig and at Roskilde in Denmark.

The greatest use of these memorials was undoubtedly made however by the richer members of the merchant class themselves, made possible by their trade with Flanders through the major Kontor at Bruges. Although the number of these brasses surviving in the Baltic ports is disappointingly few there is record that considerable numbers were once there.