A HISTORY OF DURHAM 



that it was filled up with a bunch of oranges, with foliage above, and an 

 ornamented belt of embroidery running from one side to the other and ending 

 in tasselled flowing folds gathered together on the outside. If it is a vase, 

 the base of it is easy to make out, though there seems to be no top to it. 

 The colours of this piece have been most brilliant. 



2. This is the most curious piece. It covers a large surface and the 

 subject is repeated. There is in the middle a large circular plate with eight 

 lobes, and between the outer and inner borders a pattern which looks at first 

 sight rather like an oriental inscription, though it is nothing but ornament. 

 Inside this border is a horse and his rider. The horse is unconventional, but 

 drawn naturally ; it has trappings and hanging bells, its tail is tied up, and on a 

 saddle with stirrups the rider sits holding the reins in his right hand ; both reins 

 are on the right side of the horse's neck ; the bit is a kind of muzzle, on, not in, 

 the mouth. On the rider's left wrist a hawk is perched with wings extended 

 and a long, broad tail. The bird's head is distinctly hawk-shaped. Under the 

 horse is a very well-designed dog of the greyhound or ' whippet ' type. The 

 man wears no armour nor any sword ; he sits looking out full face, with a 

 peaked beard. 1 The ground of the silk is parseme with conventional oriental 

 flowers and cypress trees such as one sees on a Persian carpet to this day. 

 The whole piece has a double border composed of two lines of rope or chain 

 with a succession of identical stiff ornaments ; beyond this border comes a 

 row of well-drawn rabbits, and beyond this a fringe or braid of the same 

 colour fastened to the silk by the needle. This striking pattern of man, 

 horse, falcon, and dog, in a circular lobed cartouche, is twice repeated. 



3. A piece of silk, still of most brilliant colouring, mostly crimson 

 and purple. Above these seems to have been an urn, now only indicated, 

 supported by two face to face winged beasts, lions or griffins, whose heads 

 are gone. In this piece the main figure, repeated thrice on the portion of stuff 

 preserved, is a two-headed peacock, standing in front of the spectator, with the 

 eyes and brilliant colours of his tail filling up all the space behind him. 



4. The next fragment is a piece of silk, with a cruciform pattern often 

 repeated, in the same purple and crimson colours. 



5. And lastly a silk piece of little ornament ; it is amber coloured and so 

 arranged that the threads of it appear to give alternately a light and a dark tint, 

 so creating a kind of wavy look on the surface. This piece was bordered by 

 a ribbon of thick lace rather more than an inch in breadth with a pattern 

 woven on it, very like, as Mr. Raine says, the * Coach-lace ' of his time. 2 



Of these coverings of the saint's body some were certainly added in the 

 days of Reginald of Durham. He minutely describes the robes which were 

 then taken away and replaced by choicer work in still finer silk. It is these 

 substituted pieces that are preserved and carefully treasured in the Library of 



Durham Cathedral. 



' 



1 In the church of St. Pol de Bate (an island off the north-west coast of Brittany) the writer discovered : 

 fragment of very ancient needlework with this same subject treated in a similar way. It is said to be a 

 part of the famous stole of St. Pol, with which the saint led a wicked and hungry dragon to its death. Be this 

 as it may, the work is very ancient and curious ; the cure of the parish said that the embroidery was oriental. 

 The St. Pol horseman rides a horse with hardly any trappings ; the bridle is treated in the same way, without 

 a bit ; but the dog, instead of being a tiny ' whippet,' is a huge boar-hound. The most remarkable point 

 about the Batz figure is the fact that the feet of the horse are toed very distinctly ; the horse itself is better 

 drawn than ours ; otherwise, the subjects are identical. St. Pol was a Celtic priest who had crossed over from 

 western England to Brittany in the sixth century. * Raine, St. Cuthbert, 1 96. 





