TAP 



45 



TAP 



painting on the walls themselves, or the wainscot of the 

 chamber, the same historical or fabulous subjects which 

 hail hitherto been displayed in threads of colours and 

 gold.' Many instances might be enumerated of this kind 

 of decoration, but it is sufficient to refer to the directions 

 given by Henry III. early in his reign, for the painting of 

 his wainscoted chamber in Winchester castle with the 

 same pictures with which it had been previously adorned; 

 a circumstance presumed by Walpole to indicate the very 

 early existence of historical painting in England. The 

 practice alluded to appears to have extended considerably 

 during the reigns of Henry III. and his immediate succes- 

 sors ; and, according to the same authority (vol. i., p. 

 804), the paintings were, in several instances, directed to 

 be made in imitation of needle-work tapestries. Lady Wil- 

 ton states that tapestry of needle-work, like the Bayeux 

 tapestry of Matilda, which 'had been used solely for the 

 decoration of altars, or the embellishment of other portions 

 of sacred edifices, on occasions of festival or the] per- 

 formance of solemn rites, had been of much more general 

 application amongst the luxurious inhabitants of the 

 South, and was introduced into England as furniture hang- 

 ing by Eleanor of Castile.' That tapestry was not origi- 

 nally introduced by that queen will be seen by the facts 

 staled above; and we know not whether there is any 

 further authority for the statement than the mention, by 

 Matthew Paris, of her having used tapestry for covering 

 floors, the word being apparently used in the sense of carpet. 

 (Pict. Hint, 'if En iii a ml. vol. i., p. 865, note.) Chaucer 

 mentions a ' tapiser,' in company with a ' webbe' and a 

 ' dyer,' among his Canterbury pilgrims ; from which cir- 

 cumstance it may be presumed that the business was not 

 a very uncommon one towards the close of the fourteenth 

 century. In the fifteenth century the use of tapestry 

 greatly extended in England ; but then, and for long after, 

 the principal supply appears to have been from the Con- 

 tinent. In the sixteenth century a kind of hanging was 

 introduced which holds a place intermediate between 

 painted walls and woven or embroidered tapestry. Shak- 

 spere alludes to these hangings under the name of 

 ' painted cloths.'* 



The appearance of the rich tapestry common in the 

 Elizabethan period is admirably described by Spenser, in 

 his Faerie Queene,' book iii., canto ix., in the account of 

 tlic tapestry seen by Britomart in the apartments of the 

 house of Busirane, m the following lines : 



* For round about the walls yelothed were 

 With iMoflly arms of great nuijesty, 

 Woven with -"M .'mit MlUeso close and nere, 

 That the rich metall lurked privily, 

 As fainii: t ' In 1 hid from envious eye; 

 Yet iiere, and there, and everywhere, unwares 

 It shewd ilfielfe. and shone unwillingly; 

 Like a iliscolourd snake, whose hidden snares 

 Through the greene gras his long bright-heruUht back declares. 



The poet described what he was in the habit of seeing, 

 and sufficient remains yet exist to attest the accuracy of 

 his description ; although in most cases the brilliancy of 

 the metallic threads and the beauty of the colours are 

 greatly impaired, and in some instances the gold and silver 

 threads have been artfully withdrawn, their intrinsic value 

 proving too strong a temptation for cupidity to resist. 



The introduction of tapestry-weaving into England is 

 usually attributed to a gentleman named Sheldon, late in 

 the reign of Hemy VIII. Lady Wilton mentions indeed 

 an intimation by Walpole of its origin as early as the 

 time of Edward III. ; but if any attempt was made to in- 

 troduce the art at that time, it does not appear to have 

 produced any important result. According to her ' Art 

 itf Needlework,' Sheldon allowed an artist, named Robert 

 links, to use his manor-house at Burcheston, in Warwick- 

 shire, for the practice of the art; and mentioned him in 

 his will, which was dated 1570, as ' the only auter and 

 beginner of tapistry and arras within this realme.' At 

 Burcheston were worked in tapestry, 1 on a large scale, 

 maps of Oxfordshire, Worcestershire, Warwickshire, and 

 Gloucestershire, some fragments of which were, it is 

 [, in Wai pole's collection at Strawberry Hill. Little 

 mon- U known of this establishment. James I. endea- 

 t lie manufacture of tapestry by encourag- 

 ing and !t-,<i--tiiig in the formation of an establishment at 



Iu Malone'i edition (1821) many references to this kind of substitute f,.r 



woven 1 tapestry, by various authors, are ejven. See notes on 



ni., pp. 4*1-6), and 'Henry IV.,' Part i, 



. i <v I \\,, ,.,, n,,. latter passage it would appear that 



the hangings alluded to were sometimes painted in witer colours. 



Mortlake, about 1619, under the management of Sir 

 Francis Crane. James I. gave 2000/. towards the forma- 

 tion of this establishment, which appears to have been 

 originally supplied with designs from abroad, but subse- 

 quently by an artist named Francis Cleyne, or Klein, a 

 native of Rostock, in the duchy of Mecklenburg, who was 

 engaged for the purpose. This undertaking was a favorite 

 hobby both with James and his successor, who regarded 

 Cleyne so favourably that he bestowed upon him, in 1625, 

 an annuity of 100/. (Rymer's Fa>dera, vol. xviii., p. 112), 

 which he enjoyed until the civil war. In the same year 

 Charles I. granted 2000/. a year for ten years to Sir Francis 

 Crane, in lieu of an annual payment of 1000/. which he 

 had previously covenanted to pay for that term, as the 

 grant recites, ' towards the furtherance, upholding, and 

 maintenance of the worke of tapestries, latelie brought 

 into this our kingdome by the said Sir Francis Crane, and 

 now by him and his workmen practised and put in use at 

 Mortlake, in our countie of Surrey ;' and of a further sum 

 of 6000/. due to the establishment for three suits of gold 

 tapestries. (Foedera, vol. xviii., p. CO.) After the death 

 of Sir Francis Crane, his brother, Sir Richard, sold the 

 premises to the king, and during the civil war they were 

 seized as royal property. After the Restoration, Charles II. 

 endeavoured to revive the manufacture, and employed 

 Verrio to make designs for it, but the attempt was unsuc- 

 cessful. Lady Wilton however conceives that, although 

 languishing, the work was not altogether extinct, ' for,' 

 she observes, ' in Mr. Evelyn's very scarce tract entitled 

 " Mundus Muliebris," printed in 1690, some of this manu- 

 facture is amongst the articles to be furnished by a gallant 

 to his mistress.' During its period of prosperity, this 

 manufacture produced the most superb hangings, after 

 the designs of celebrated painters, with which the palaces 

 of Windsor Castle, Hampton Court, Whitehall, St. James's, 

 Nonsuch, Greenwich, &c., and many of the mansions of 

 the nobility, were adorned. Five, at least, of the cartoons 

 of Raphael, which appear to have been bought by 

 Charles I. for that purpose, were worked in tapestry at 

 Mortlake. These celebrated works were designed for the 

 purpose of being copied in tapestry, and were originally 

 worked in Flanders. [CARTOON, vol. vi., p. 330.] An 

 act of parliament was passed in 1663 to encourage the 

 linen and tapestry manufactures of England, and to re- 

 strain the great importation of foreign linen and tapestry. 



The use of the word ' hangings,' as applied to tapestry, 

 as well as to other kinds of lining for rooms, perhaps suf- 

 ficiently indicates the manner in which such decorations 

 were formerly put up. ' The tapestries,' observes the 

 Countess of Wilton, ' whether wrought or woven, did not. 

 remain on the walls as do the hangings of modern days : 

 it was the primitive office of grooms of the chamber to 

 hang up the tapestry, which, in a royal progress, was sent 

 forward with the purveyor and grooms of the chamber.' 

 She relates a curious anecdote in illustration of this prac- 

 tice. Henry IV. of France, wishing to do honour to the 

 pope's legate, the cardinal of Florence, when visiting St. 

 Germain-en-Laye, sent orders to hang up the finest tapes- 

 try ; but, by an awkward blunder, the suit selected for 

 the cardinal's chamber was embellished with satirical em- 

 blems of the pope and the Roman court. The mistake 

 was discovered by the Due de Sully, on whose authority 

 the anecdote is given, and another suit was substituted for 

 that with the offensive devices. In a subsequent chapter, 

 on ' The days of good Queen Bess,' after showing the uni- 

 versality of tapestry and similar decorations in the houses 

 of the nobility and gentry of England, it is stated that 

 tapestry was at that time suspended upon frames, which 

 were probably, in many cases, at a considerable distance 

 from the walls, as we frequently read of persons conceal- 

 ing themselves, like Falstaff (Merry Wives of Windsor, 

 act iii., scene 3), 'behind the arras.' 



The interest attached to antient tapestries as historical 

 monuments, as well as in the character of works of art, is 

 of no mean order. The most important work on this de- 

 partment of archaeology is that of M. Jubinal, the author 

 of the historical treatise quoted in the former part of this 

 article, entitled ' Les Anciennes Tapisseries Historiees,' in 

 which are given minute descriptions, illustrated by many 

 large folio plates, of the most remarkable tapestries made 

 from the eleventh to the sixteenth century, and preserved 

 to the present time. Such monuments, as he observes in his 

 preface, sometimes represent to us, with a charming and 



