Medieval Textiles in the Bock Collection at the Whitworth Art Gallery

References

• A. Sumner, ‘Sir John Charles Robinson: Victorian Collector and Connoisseur’, Apollo, cxxx, no. 332 (October 1989), pp. 226–27.
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• J. Allgrove McDowell, ‘Embroidered vestments in the Robinson Collection, Whitworth Art Gallery, Manchester’, Embroidery, XXXIV, No. 2 (Summer 1983), pp. 48–49; L. von Wilckens, ‘Über ein gewirktes Kölner Antependium im Manchester’, Kunst & Antiquitäten, IV, 78 (August 1978), pp. 34–39.
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• K. Otavsky, ‘Franz Bock: known or unknown?’, Bulletin de Liaison du Centre International d’Etude des Textiles Anciens, LXI–LXII (1985 ), p. 15. By contrast, the Exhibition of Antient (sic) and Medieval Art held at the Royal Society of Arts, London, in 1850 showed only a few textiles, J. Cherry, ‘Franks and the Medieval Collections’, in M. Caygill and J. Cherry eds, A. W. Franks: Nineteenth century collecting and the British Museum (London, 1997), p. 186.
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• B. Borkopp, ‘Franz Bock and his influence on 19th century textile production’, Bulletin de Liaison du Centre International d’Etude des Textiles Anciens, LXI–LXII (1985 ), p. 15; F. Valantin, ‘Le mouvement néo-gothique et la soierie lyonnaise’, Bulletin de Liaison du Centre International d’Etude des Textiles Anciens, CXXIV (1997), pp. 171–75.
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• Birgitt Borkopp pers. comm.
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• For example, he removed, and later sold to the South Kensington Museum, a piece of an eleventh- century Islamic silk from ‘the relic of the dalmatics of St. Ambrose’ in the church of Sant’ Ambrogio, Milan, H. Granger Taylor, ‘The Two Dalmatics of Saint Ambrose’, Bulletin de Liaison du Centre International d’Etude des Textiles Anciens, LVII–LVIII (1983 ), p. 129.
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• Sophie Desrosiers pers. comm. Some of the textiles have since been transferred to the Museé national de la Renaissance, Château d’Ecouen, Val d’Oise.
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• A. Somers-Cocks, The Victoria and Albert Musuem. The Making of the Collection (Leicester, 1980), p. 961.
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• A. Völker, ‘Historistische Dekorstoffe und ihre mittelalterlichen Vorbilder’, Alte und moderne Kunst (1983 ), pp. 2–3.
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• P. Arrizoli-Clémentel, The Textile Museum, Lyons (Paris, 1990), p. 11.
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• Information contained in a file on the Rev. Dr. Franz Bock, Victoria and Albert Museum. I am grateful to Linda Woolley for enabling me to read the file.
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• Bock Collection papers, The Whitworth Art Gallery. John Davis, former research assistant, Manchester Metropolitan University, also kindly supplied me with copies of documents relating to the Bock collection.
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• The present whereabouts of the woollen hanging has not been discovered.
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• J. Davis, ‘ “A most important and necessary thing” an Arts and Crafts Collection in Manchester’, Decorative Arts Society Journal, 5(1994 ), p. 17. 115 Op. cit. In n. 12.
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• J. Davis, ‘An Arts and Crafts Education’, in R. Shrigley ed., Inspired by Design: The Arts and Crafts Collection of the Manchester Metropolitan University (Manchester, 1994), p. 18.
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• In November 1939 Miss Elisabeth Howroyd, an assistant at the City Art Gallery, wrote on behalf of the Curator, Mr Haward, to Miss Muriel Clayton, Keeper of Textiles at the Victoria and Albert Museum, seeking advice about the glue and whether it could be removed without causing damage to the textiles. In reply Miss Clayton advised Miss Howroyd to leave well alone.
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• Accession number WAG T. 13722. For an illustration of the silk in Cologne Cathedral see Leonie von Wilckens, Die textilen Künste von der Spätantike bis um 1500 (Munich, 1991), pl. 2. The cloth is currently being studied by Sabine Schrenck, see S. Schrenk, ‘Die spätantiken Seiden in der Schatzkammer des Kölner Doms’, in Kölner Domblatt (2000).
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• J. P. Wild, ‘The textile term scutulatus’, The Classical Quarterly, New Series XIV (1964 ), pp. 263–66; J. P. Wild, ‘Roman silk and the horizontal loom in the Maas-Rhine Region’, Medieval Textiles, particularly in the Meuse-Rhine Area Textile Museum (Provinciaal Museum voor Religieuze Kunst, Sint- Truiden, 1989), p. 211. On the Manchester fragment, the check pattern is formed by the twill reversing after 20 warp ends and after 21 to 30 picks. The weaving technique is discussed in D. De Jonghe and M. Tavernier, ‘Les Damasses de Palmyre’, Bulletin de Liaison du Centre International d’Etude des Textiles Anciens, LIV (1981), pp. 33–34.
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• Accession number WAGT. 13756.
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• F. Bock and M. Willemsen, Die mittelalterlichen Kunst- und Reliquienschätze zu Maastricht (Cologne, 1872).
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• M. Martiniani-Reber, Soieries, sassanides, coptes et byzantines V–XI siecles (Paris, 1986), pp. 98–99, no. 84; Annemarie Stauffer, Die mittelalterlichen Textilien von St. Servatius in Maastricht, Schriften der Abegg-Stiftung Riggisberg, Band VIII (Bern, 1991), pp. 47–51, no. 1; Anna Muthesius, Byzantine Silk Weaving AD 400 to AD 1200 (Vienna, 1997), p. 73.
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• The ‘Hunter’ silks belong to a group of cloths discussed in D. King, ‘Patterned silks in the Carolingian Empire’, Bulletin de Liaison du Centre International d’Etude des Textiles Anciens, XXIII (1966 ), p. 48.
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• Accession number WAG T.13772. The strip measures 47 mm × 350 mm.
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• Muthesius, op. cit. in n. 22, p. 68, pl. 25B.
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• Accession number WAG T.13786.
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• For similar types of design and use of colour see Stauffer, op. cit. in n. 22, pp. 128–29, no. 59, and G. Robinson and H. Urquhart, ‘Seal bags in the treasury of the cathedral church of Canterbury’, Archaeologia, LXXXIV (1934 ), pp. 171–74, nos. 1 and 2, pl. XLIX.
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• Accession number WAG T. 13738a. The fragment in Manchester includes only part of a roundel with griffons. It appears to adjoin the fragment in the Victoria and Albert Museum, see A. F. Kendrick, Catalogue of Early Medieval Woven Fabrics (London, 1925), p. 53, no. 1025. The most recent discussion of the silk is R. Schorta, ‘Seidenstoffe von der Bamberger Tunika (sogenannter Kunigundenrock)’, in Reinhold Baumstark ed., Rom und Byzanz. Schatzkammerstücke aus bayerischen Sammlungen (Munich, 1998), pp. 226–28, no. 71.1.
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• Accession number WAG T. 13728.
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• A larger piece of this silk is in the Victoria and Albert Museum, Kendrick, op. cit. in n. 28, pp. 54–55, no. 1029. For further discussion of the cloth and related fabrics, see L. von Wilckens, ‘Sog. Wolfgangskasel’, in Achim Hubel, Der Regensburger Domschatz (Munich and Zurich, 1976), pp. 242–43, no. 116; Mechtild Flury-Lemberg, Textile Conservation and Research (Bern, 1988), p. 117; Stauffer, op. cit in n. 22, pp. 112–13, no. 47.
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• Accession number WAG T. 13720. The fragment in Manchester, which measures only 70 mm x 77 mm, is woven throughout in 1.2 weft-faced compound twill, whereas longer strips of the same silk in London, Berlin, Lyons, and Vienna show the switch in binding, see A. F. Kendrick, Catalogue of Muhammadan Textiles of the Medieval Period (London, 1924), p. 44, no. 966, and Leonie von Wilckens, Mittelalterliche Seidenstoffe (Berlin, 1992), pp. 39–40, no. 58.
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• Wilckens, op. cit. In n. 31, p. 40.
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• See D. Jacoby, ‘Silk in Western Byzantium before the fourth crusade’, Byzantinische Zeitschrift, LXXXIV/LXXXV (1991 /1992), pp. 453–500; D. Jacoby, ‘Silk crosses the Mediterranean’, in Gabriella Airaldi, Le Vie del Mediterraneo. Idee UominiiOggetti (secoli XI–XVI) (Genoa, 1977), pp. 55–79; Florence Lewis May, Silk Textiles of Spain, eighth to fifteenth century (New York, 1957); S. Desrosiers, ‘Draps d’areste (II). Extension de la classification, comparaisons et lieux fabrication’, Soieries médiévales, Techniques & Culture, XXXIV (July–December 1999), pp. 112–17.
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• Accession number WAG T. 13754.
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• Accession number WAG. T. 13759. The cloth has a single main warp. The use of alternating blue and lime green pattern wefts in an incomplete broad band suggests that the cloth may have had more complex patterning on another part of it.
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• Accession number WAGT. 13781.
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• Desrosiers, op. cit. in n. 33; D. King, ‘Two medieval textile terms: “draps d’ache”, “draps de l’arrest” ‘, Bulletin de Liaison du Centre International d’Etude des Textiles Anciens, XXVIL (1968 ), pp. 26–29.
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• S. Desrosiers, G. Vial and D. De Jonghe, ‘Cloth of Aresta. A Preliminary Study of its Definition, Classification and Method of Weaving’, Textile History, xx (2) (1989 ), pp. 119–223.
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• Desrosiers, op. cit. in n. 33.
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• Accession number WAGT. 13769.
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• I. Petraschek-Heim, ‘Die Leopoldstoffe und verwandte Gewebe’, Jahrbuch des Stiftes Klosterneuburg, N.F. XIII (1985 ), pp. 95–142; R. Schorta, ‘Deux fragments de tissu de soie’, in L’Art au temps des rois maudits Philippe le Bel et ses fils 1285–1328 (Paris, 1998), p. 250, no. 164.
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• Accession number WAG T. 13752.
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• Accession number WAG T. 12629. The fragment measures 100 mm x 42 mm and is, therefore, similar in height, as well as in design and weave structure, to an incomplete wrapper in Maastricht, see Stauffer op. cit. in n. 22, p. 182, no. 108. It is possible that two fragments in the Victoria & Albert Museum which were acquired from Dr. Bock in 1860 may also come from the same treasury, see D. De Jonghe and M. Tavernier, ‘Textile fragments in tomb 6’, in Maria van Bourgondië (Bruges, 1982), p. 218, fig. 19 and p. 231, table 3.
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• These silks are discussed in De Jonghe and Tavernier, op. cit. in n. 43, pp. 219–25 and E. Crowfoot, F. Pritchard and K. Staniland, Medieval Finds from Excavations in London: 4. Textiles and Clothing c. 1150–1450 (London, 1992), pp. 98–100.
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• King, op. cit. in n. 37, p. 26; D. King, ‘Some unrecognised Venetian woven fabrics’, Victoria & Albert Museum Yearbook 1969, No. 1 (London, 1969), p. 55.
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• Accession number WAG T. 13782. Other pieces of this textile are in Berlin and Düsseldorf, Wilckens, op. cit. in n. 31, pp. 101–02, no. 208. This was one of the figure subjects that enabled Donald King to identify certain half-silks as Venetian, op. cit. in n. 45, pp. 54–56.
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• D. and M. King, ‘Silk weaves of Lucca in 1376’, in Inger Estham and Margareta Nockert eds, Opera Textilia Variorum Temporum, The Museum of National Antiquities, Stockholm Studies, VIII (Stockholm, 1988), pp. 67–76.
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• Accession number WAG T. 13787. Further fragments of this silk are in Berlin and Chicago, see Wilckens, op. cit. in n. 31, p. 113, no. 230, and C. C. Mayer Thurman, ‘Recent Acquisitions: A Collection of Thirteenth and Fourteenth Century Woven Fabrics in Chicago’, Textile History, XX (2) (1989 ), p. 260, fig. 11.
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• D. and M. King, op. cit. in n. 47, pp. 68–70.
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• Accession number WAG T. 13775. The cloth has three main ends to one binding end. Other pieces of this cloth are in Berlin and Nuremburg, see Wilckens, op. cit. in n. 31, p. 114, no. 232.
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• Accession number WAG T.13763. The fragment measures 95 mm × 120 mm.
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• Accession number WAG T. 13765. The fragment measures 337 mm × 460 mm and has a pattern repeat of 335 mm in height and 197 mm in breadth. There are other fragments of this silk in Boston, Brussels and Krefeld, see Isabelle Errera, Catalogue d’Étoffes Anciennes et Modernes (Brussels, 1927), p. 102, no. 88, and Brigitte Tietzel, Italienische Seidengewebe des 13., 14. und 15. Jahrhunderts, Deutsches Textilmuseum Krefeld (Cologne, 1984), pp. 256–57, no. 71.
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• On the depiction of silk textiles in fourteenth-century Florentine paintings see B. Klesse, Seidenstoffe in der italienischen Malerei des vierzehnten Jahrhunderts (Bern, 1967), especially pp. 358–59, no. 308; pl. vi; A. E. Wardwell, ‘The stylistic development of 14th- and 15th-century Italian silk design’, Aachener Kunstblätter, XLVI (1976–77), pp. 184–85; L. Monnas, ‘Silk textiles in the paintings of Bernado Daddi, Andrea di Cione and their followers’, Zeitschrift für Kunstgeschichte, LUI (1990), pp. 39–58.
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• The most recent discussion of this subject is A. E. Wardwell, ‘Indigenous elements in Central Asian silk designs of the Mongol period, and their impact on Italian Gothic silks’, Bulletin de Liaison du Centre International d’Etude des Textiles Anciens, LXXVII (2000 ), pp. 86–98.
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• Accession number WAG T. 13766.
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• Tietzel, op. cit. in n. 52, pp. 350–52, no. III; Leonie von Wilckens, Die mittelalterlichen Textilien: Katalog der Sammlung, Herzog Anton Ulrich-Museum Braunschweig (Brunswick, 1994), p. 103, no. 52.
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• Accession number WAG T. 13784. There are other pieces of this silk in Krefield, Boston, and New York, see Tietzel, op. cit. in n. 52, pp. 340–41, no. 106.
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• Accession number WAG T. 13774.
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• M. and D. King, European Textiles in the Keir Collection 400 BC to 1800 AD (London, 1990), pp. 50–51, no. 29; Errera, op. cit. in n. 52, p. 75, no. 61A; Musée du Petit Palais Avignon, Histoires tissées: Brocarts célestes, p. 67, no. 6.
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• Accession number WAG T.1992. 30. The lampas weave has a 2.1 twill ground and tabby pattern with three pairs of main ends to one binding end. The gilt membrane brocading weft is bound in 1.2 twill. Part of a white silk selvedge in 2.1 twill is also preserved.
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• Accession numbers WAG T. 13767 and T. 13755. The starting border is on the latter textile. Other pieces of this satin damask are in Berlin, Cleveland, Paris, London, and Lyons see Wilckens, op. cit. in n. 31, p. 58, no. 95. Part of a blue selvedge is also preserved on the silk in Paris, Sophie Desrosiers pers. comm.
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• The inscription translated by Rhovon Guest is included in Kendrick, op. cit. in n. 31, p. 46, no. 972.
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• F. Bock, Geschichte der liturgischen Gewänder des Mittelalters, Vol. 1 (Bonn, 1859), pl. VI.
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