Misericord
1350-1400 (made)
| Artist/Maker | |
| Place of origin |
Misericord, six-sided and bordered with a sunk moulding carved at intervals with quatrefoil rosettes. The carving below consists of foliage in high relief. The moulded edge of the seat is continued as a stalk on either side and terminates in a carved leaf
Object details
| Category | |
| Object type | |
| Materials and techniques | |
| Brief description | Misericord, English, 1350-1400 |
| Physical description | Misericord, six-sided and bordered with a sunk moulding carved at intervals with quatrefoil rosettes. The carving below consists of foliage in high relief. The moulded edge of the seat is continued as a stalk on either side and terminates in a carved leaf |
| Dimensions |
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| Bibliographic reference | Charles Tracy, English Medieval Furniture and Woodwork (London, 1988), cat. no. 67.
Misericord, the projecting seat, which is six-sided with a slightly projecting point in front, is bordered with a sunk moulding carved at intervals with quatrefoil rosettes (PL.19). The carving below consists of foliage in high relief. The moulded edge of the seat is continued as a stalk on either side and terminates in a carved leaf. Said to have come from Lincoln Cathedral
Oak. About 1370
29.2x67.5x 15.2 cm
Mus. no. W.104-1924
The date of the erection of the stalls at Lincoln is fixed within a fifteen-year period (1361-76) by the occurrence on the base of the dean’s stall of the shields of Dean Stretchley and Bishop Buckingham. The date assigned to the furniture by Bond of about 1370 is quite acceptable (Francis Bond, Wood Carvings in English Churches: I.Stalls and Tahernacle Work and II. Bishops’ Thrones and Chancel Chairs,London,1910.p.53). The voluted ‘trefoil’ leaf seen on the museum’s misericord has a pedigree in the foliage repertory of fourteenth-century English decorative carving going back to the early years of the century. Proto types of the motif can be seen on the St Alban’s shrine (probably (c.1302-08) and the bishop’s throne at Exeter Cathedral (1312-17). Early examples of the canonical form in stone can be seen in the north porch of St Mary Redcliffe, Bristol (c.1320) and on a roof boss in the crypt of St Stephen’s Chapel, Westminster (probably c.1320). Of special interest is that an identical treatment of this sort of leaf occurs on the slightly earlier choir-stalls made for St Katherine's Hospital-by-the-Tower (W.21-1921). It has been a matter of controversy as to whether the Lincoln choir-stalls, and, indeed, those at Chester Cathedral, which must have been made by the same workshop, were made by carpenters from London or the north of England. The close stylistic correspondences between the carving in both cathedrals and that at St Katherine’s strongly suggests that the cathedral furniture was the work of metropolitan craftsmen. We are probably dealing with the workshop formed to make the final set of choir furniture for St Stephen's Chapel, Westminster (now destroyed), one of the most important ecclesiastical furniture commissions of the fourteenth century. If this is the case, we should acknowledge that the master-carver concerned, Master Edward of St Andrew, came, originally, from Nottinghamshire and most of his assistants from south Yorkshire (Charles Tracy, English Gothic Choir-Stalls. 1200-1400, Woodbridge, 1987, p. 49-55). |
| Collection | |
| Accession number | W.104-1924 |
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| Record created | June 24, 2009 |
| Record URL |
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