FASHIONING DEATH: THE CHOICE AND REPRESENTATION OF FEMALE CLOTHING ON ENGLISH MEDIEVAL FUNERAL MONUMENTS 1250-1450 A thesis submitted to The University of Manchester for the degree of PhD in the Faculty of Humanities 2012 PAMELA ANNE WALKER SCHOOL OF ARTS, HISTORIES AND CULTURES 214 Contents List of figures, tables and charts 1 Introduction 10 1.1 Research Outline 11 1.2 Survey of Literature 17 1.3 New Scholarship 27 2 Methodology 31 2.1 Funeral Monuments as Sources 31 2.2 Evidence: Sample Size, Dating and Identification 35 2.3 Data Collection 42 2.4 Data Analysis 47 3 Analysis 54 3.1 Categories 54 3.2 Main Garment 57 3.3 Dress Analysis 63 3.4 Headdress 65 3.5 Jewellery 75 4 Cleavages and Horns: The Paradox of Immoral Dress on Funeral Monuments 85 4.1 Literary Evidence 94 4.2 What was Fashionable? 103 4.3 The Role of the Parish Church and Preaching from 107 the Pulpit 4.4 Mixed Messages, Reactions and Religious Justification 115 4.5 Time Delays and Shifting Erogenous Zones 127 4.6 Conclusion 129 5 The Influence of the Black Death on the Representation of Late Fourteenth Century Clothing 133 5.1 Changing Styles 137 5.2 The Black Death and Religious Attitudes 143 5.3 Purgatory, Resurrection and Memorials 147 2 5.4 Memory, Location and Clothing hoices 151 5.5 Last Judgment and Resurrection 157 6 An Analysis of Jewellery on Funeral Monuments 162 6.1 Evidence for Jewellery on Monuments 162 6.2 Brooches 171 6.3 Rings 190 6.4 Necklaces 200 7 Conclusion Appendices Bibliography Appendix 1 Data 3 List of Figures, Tables and Charts Tables 2.1 Region and county divisions for data collection 3.1 Summary of dress terminology Charts 4.1 Neckline styles on funeral monuments 4.2 Neckline styles on funeral monuments 4.3 Headdresses on funeral monuments 4.4 Garment style of funeral monuments 5.1 Garment styles on funeral monuments 5.2 Headdresses on funeral monuments 6.1 Jewellery on funeral monuments 6.2 Brooches on funeral monuments 6.3 Necklines on funeral monuments 6.4 Rings on funeral monuments 6.5 Multiple rings on funeral monuments 6.6 Necklaces on funeral monuments 6.7 Neckline styles on funeral monuments Figures 3.1 Example of dress layering 3.2 Example of dress layering 3.3 Example of loose garment 3.4 Example of fitted garment 3.5 Example of fitted sideless garment 3.6 Example of a pleated gown 3.7 Example of a veil and wimple 3.8 Example of a veil with barbe 3.9 Example of a veil and coronet 3.10 Example of veil, fillet and chinband 3.11 Example of frilled veil 3.12 Example of structured cauled headdress 3.13 Example of horned headdress 3.14 Example of cap or cauled headdress 4.1 Pride at Raunds Church, Northamptonshire 4.2 Roofboss at East Budleigh Church, Devon 4.3 Horned headdress, Philippa Pollard 4.4 Horned headdress, Lady Grey 4 4.5 Horned headdress, Isabel de la Pole 4.6 Low cut neckline, Lady Marmion 4.7 The Coventry Doom 5.1 Emmeline Courtney, an example of square buttons 5.2 Emmeline Courtney, large square headdress 5.3 Wife of John Hawley, example of large round buttons 5.4 Beatrix Fitzalan, large oversized headdress 5.5 Joan de Thorp, large oversized headdress 5.6 The tomb of Agnes Ridley 5.7 The tomb of Henry Rousseau, Paris 6.1 Constantina de Frecheville 6.2 Ring brooch depicted on Constantina de Frecheville 6.3 Lady Margaret de Bois 6.4 Tau cross depicted on Lady Margaret de Bois 6.5 Philippa Roet Chaucer 6.6 Brooch depicted on Philippa Roet Chaucer 6.7 Joan Perient 6.8 Swan brooch depicted on Joan Perient 6.9 Somerset lady 6.10 Brooch depicted on Somerset lady 6.11 Small brooch from the Portable Antiquities Scheme database 6.12 The Dunstable Swan 6.13 Brass of Agnes Adynet 6.14 Ring of Agnes Adynet 5 Abstract The University of Manchester Pamela Anne Walker Degree of PhD 2012 This interdisciplinary thesis reassesses the use of funeral monuments for the study of medieval clothing. By using an object-centred quantitative approach, a chronological database of changes depicted on English funeral monuments of the thirteenth, fourteenth and fifteenth centuries has been developed. The analysis of the clothing represented on the monuments has then been used to inform qualitative analysis which looks at the monument in context. For example, the disjunction between depictions of ‘immoral’ clothing on effigies and brasses and the criticism of this type of clothing has been analysed by using literary sources to show both sides of the contemporary debate on fashionable clothing and its relation to identity . A further study was done on the depiction of jewellery on monuments which found that perceived notions of jewellery being popular with medieval women did not concur with the evidence from the funeral monuments. Analysis of literary, documentary and archaeological sources showed that visual sources must not be taken at face value to illustrate discussions because they need to be seen in context as a funeral monument with its own function, which is the key argument of the thesis. 6 DECLARATION No portion of the work referred to in the thesis has been submitted in support of an application for another degree or qualification of this or any other university or other institute of learning; 7 COPYRIGHT STATEMENT The following four notes on copyright and the ownership of intellectual property rights must be included as written below: i. The author of this thesis (including any appendices and/or schedules to this thesis) owns certain copyright or related rights in it (the “Copyright”) and s/he has given The University of Manchester certain rights to use such Copyright, including for administrative purposes. ii. Copies of this thesis, either in full or in extracts and whether in hard or electronic copy, may be made only in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 (as amended) and regulations issued under it or, where appropriate, in accordance with licensing agreements which the University has from time to time. This page must form part of any such copies made. iii. The ownership of certain Copyright, patents, designs, trade marks and other intellectual property (the “Intellectual Property”) and any reproductions of copyright works in the thesis, for example graphs and tables (“Reproductions”), which may be described in this thesis, may not be owned by the author and may be owned by third parties. Such Intellectual Property and Reproductions cannot and must not be made available for use without the prior written permission of the owner(s) of the relevant Intellectual Property and/or Reproductions. iv. Further information on the conditions under which disclosure, publication and commercialisation of this thesis, the Copyright and any Intellectual Property and/or Reproductions described in it may take place is available in the University IP Policy (see http://www.campus.manchester.ac.uk/medialibrary/policies/intellectual- property.pdf), in any relevant Thesis restriction declarations deposited in the University Library, The University Library’s regulations (see http://www.manchester.ac.uk/library/aboutus/regulations) and in The University’s policy on presentation of Theses 8 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to thank my supervisor, Dr Cordelia Warr, without whose support and encouragement I would not have been able to complete this PhD. I would also like to thank Professor Gale Owen-Crocker and Frances Pritchard for their help and advice over the years and although we occasionally had our differences, it is down to them that I was determined to finish this PhD. On a more personal note, I would like to thank my partner Michael Jolly for all the support he has given me and just for being there through all the ups and downs of the PhD journey. Thanks also to my peers at the University of Manchester – Chris, Linda, Kate, Hannah, Daisy, Kathy. Their friendship and support is immeasurable and continues. Finally I would like to dedicate this work to my mum, Kathleen Walker, who was so proud to see me start this doctorate but who didn’t get to see me finish. 9 1. Introduction Material evidence for clothing from the Middle Ages is scarce, although excavations over the past twenty-five years have increased the amount of textiles and clothing- related artefacts available to the dress historian.1 Generally scholars have to rely more heavily on other sources in order to build up a picture of what the medieval man or woman might have worn. These sources include documentary evidence such as wills and household accounts; literary evidence; and art forms such as monumental effigies, monumental brasses, manuscript illustrations, stained glass, and wall paintings. These sources continue to be used by dress historians and can be valuable pieces of evidence in the study of medieval costume although their limitations have to be addressed. For this research I focus on the role of funeral monuments as a visual source for the study of clothing in the Middle Ages. The key argument in this thesis is that funeral monuments cannot be drawn on in isolation to illustrate or explain the development of medieval fashion and it is not realistic to separate the source from the costume depicted on it. The clothing on funeral monuments is tied in intrinsically with the medium and the context of production and therefore I suggest the monument cannot be ‘undressed’ as many clothing historians seem to do. For example, writing in 1986, dress historian Margaret Scott states that she is examining effigies, not as pieces of sculpture but as sources of information on dress.2 This is problematic, in that any piece of visual evidence provides certain information but also has its own context and the two cannot be divorced, thus an effigy has to be examined as a piece of sculpture.