Iris for pigment References

These are the references I used during my iris experiments.  I tried to recreate medieval paint an pigment recipes using the iris from my garden.  Those experiments can be found here and the paint results with them here.

You may note that they call them 'blue lilies' with astonishing regularity.  This will make noticing other references easier.

 A 14th century anonymous treaty De Arte Illuminandi pg 6-7

"(Green) may be seen... in blue lilies, which are called iris, and yet are changed into a very pure green color by treatment.
The color is made from these lilies as follows.  Take these fresh flowers in the springtime when they are blooming and pound them in a marble or bronze mortar and squeeze the juice with a cloth into a glazed porringer.  And in this juice soak other linen cloths, clean and soaked, once or twice, in a solution of rock alum and dried.  And when the cloths are thoroughly saturated with the juice of the lilies in this way, let them dry in the shade, and keep them between the leaves of books; for a very lovely green, suitable on parchment is made out of this juice, made in this way by combining it with gallarino.  And note that after the cloths are dry, if they are again soaked in this juice and dried, they will be better." pg. 6-7


Daniel V. Thompson's  The Materials and Techniques of Medieval Painting

"The chief rival of sap green in late medieval manuscript pianting was iris green. This was made from the juice of iris flowers, sometimes mixed with alum and thickened, like sap green, but more often prepared as a clothlet. Bits of cloth were dipped into the juice of iris flowers and dried, again and again, until they contained a sufficient quantity of the color." pg. 171

Mary Merrifield's Medieval and Renaissance Treatises on the Arts of Painting 

"Lily or Iris green (verde giglio). --This pigment was sometimes prepared for use by dipping piece os linen (pezzette) into the juice and then preserving them dry." pg. ccxix

Mary Merrifield's Original Treatises pg. 422

Mary Merrifield's Original Treatises pg.504

Mary Merrifield's Original Treatises pg. 658 Paduan Manuscript De' Colori In General

Mary Merrifield pg 678  Paduan Manuscript Colori Diversi

Mary Merrifield pg 684 Paduan Manuscript Colori Diversi

And Mappae Clavicula has a recipe for blue from iris: 

Illustrating that there are iris all over the world, some of them in different habitats than wet ones, is a handout by the U.S.D.A. called Garden Irises.

Lady Brynhildr Ansvarsdottir's AoA

Assignment: Award of Arms for Brynhildr Arnsvarsdottr
Words: Mistress Aneleda Falconbridge
Calligraphy: Lord Alexandre Saint Pierre
Illumination: Lady Adrienne dEvreus

Scroll Story:

I received the proposed assignment for one of my fellow queen's guards from the EK signet.  The write-up was brief and the contact for more info was the king himself, Brennan Ri.
When I reached out to him he told me great tales of this fearsome, fearless yet gentle woman warrior who was his man-at-arms.

The weekend after speaking with him Alexandre and I went camping at Endewearde's Hunt.  I spoke of the assignment to the breath of fresh air and silver-tongued inspiration that is Aneleda Falconbridge, asking if she knew of Brynhildr.

"I know her well," said Aneleda, "She enjoys it when I sing to inspire her passion for battle and she has told me so."

At least it was something like that. ;)  I am not a bard!  I was excited that Aneleda had had contact with Brynhildr and asked if she would help me write the letters that would honor her with an Award of Arms.  Aneleda said yes!  She wrote these beautiful words for Alexandre Saint Pierre to pen:

In the Eastern land ruled great King called Brennan with his wife Queen Caoilfhionn  Brynhildr Ansvarsdottir was fostering there and was sent to guard the land's most precious treasure, the Queen. Brynhildr was called to the Crown Tournament in the holdings of the Hersir of Bergental. Because she had served with joy and abundance, she was given the right to bear arms, ____________________________________ and take the title Hefdharkona. It was the fiftieth year, on the seventh day of nóvember, after Gormánuður but before Ýlir. The King had his poet and scribe make word-gold for her to be read and seen that day.

The linden of the battle-wall 
lifted her slender hands
to join the Njords of swords.
Shield-bearer now arms-bearer
Silver-dressed goddess of the raven-field
You are worthy to hear an ode*
war-valiant one, wrought for you*

 King Brennan and Queen Caoilfhionn made their names on it.

*these two lines are from the saga of Hallfred Troublesome-Poet (trans. Diana Whaley)

While waiting for words I decided on inspiration.  I don't yet know the full meaning and significance of long ships in Viking art but they seem abundant and striking.    

This one is from an Anglo-Saxon Chronicle in a section about stars.  I had help figuring this out and more explanations about it from Michael Rupert and Sari Csollany who shared this blog on the Book of Faces.

In closing it was inspiring working for Brennan Ri more directly than usual and I am grateful for the contributions of all of the scribes and researchers who helped me pull this one together!  Special thanks to my wordsmith, Mistress Aneleda, just before her elevation, and to my beloved beau and calligrapher, Lord Alexandre.

medieval shell and other palettes

Inspired by my laurel, Isabel Chamberlaine, and medieval painters, I've been collecting shells to prepare paint in (to use like a palette) and with (as a calcium source).

This website has many links to resources about medieval painting and painters including palettes, brushes and grounds:

http://www.larsdatter.com/painting.htm

Real oyster shells found in excavations around London:

http://www.museumoflondonprints.com/image/59557/three-oyster-shells-with-traces-of-pigment-13th-century

Shells as paint holders and palettes in medieval illuminations:

De mulieribus claris (BNF Fr. 598), beginning of the 15th century
http://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/btv1b84521932/f210.item.zoom

Possible painting from oyster shell: 1420, St. Luke
http://www.themorgan.org/collection/medieval-and-renaissance/manuscript/145545#overlay-context=collection/medieval-and-renaissance/manuscript/145545%3Fid%3D87

St. Luke 1425-30
http://corsair.themorgan.org/cgi-bin/Pwebrecon.cgi?BBID=255341
detail of that page: http://corsair.morganlibrary.org/icaimages/4/m453.014va.jpg

Giovanni Colonna, Mare historiarum, ouest de la France 15th century
http://expositions.bnf.fr/fouquet/grand/f116.htm
Discussion about that page: http://expositions.bnf.fr/fouquet/pedago/dossiers/62/3/index.htm
Hopefully I will be able to read it some day! :)

1450-1460 St. Luke
http://resources42.kb.nl/MIMI/MIMI_76F2/MIMI_76F2_255R_MIN.JPG

1470-80 St. Luke, possible shells?
http://visualiseur.bnf.fr/ConsulterElementNum?O=IFN-8100206&E=JPEG&Deb=44&Fin=44&Param=C

The wise man and the fool in a book of love poetry
http://www.bl.uk/manuscripts/Viewer.aspx?ref=stowe_ms_955_f009~r


Brush tray
http://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/btv1b84521932/f181.item.zoom


Using pen knife to hold parchment 1480-1490 St. Luke
http://visualiseur.bnf.fr/ConsulterElementNum?O=IFN-8100141&E=JPEG&Deb=32&Fin=32&Param=C


Cutting the pen:
1500 Portrait of a young artist
http://www.artic.edu/aic/collections/artwork/59891


Hand held wooden (?) palettes

De mulieribus claris (BNF Fr. 598), beginning of the 15th century
http://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/btv1b84521932/f193.item.zoom
http://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/btv1b84521932/f181.item.zoom

1420 St. Luke
http://corsair.themorgan.org/cgi-bin/Pwebrecon.cgi?BBID=260674

1450-1460 St. Luke
http://resources42.kb.nl/MIMI/MIMI_76F2/MIMI_76F2_255R_MIN.JPG

c. 1460 St. Luke hand held palette and easel
http://www.bl.uk/catalogues/illuminatedmanuscripts/ILLUMIN.ASP?Size=mid&IllID=5740

2nd half 15th c.
http://visualiseur.bnf.fr/ConsulterElementNum?O=IFN-8100206&E=JPEG&Deb=44&Fin=44&Param=C

Mercury's children
http://tarvos.imareal.oeaw.ac.at/server/images/7008627.JPG

1475-1485
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Hausbuch_Wolfegg_16r_Merkur.jpg

1490-1500 Zeuxis
http://www.bl.uk/catalogues/illuminatedmanuscripts/ILLUMIN.ASP?Size=mid&IllID=38631

1495 St.Luke
http://resources42.kb.nl/MIMI/MIMI_135G19/MIMI_135G19_027V.JPG

15-16th century Timarete
http://visualiseur.bnf.fr/ConsulterElementNum?O=IFN-7904118&E=JPEG&Deb=1&Fin=1&Param=C

1500 St. Luke
http://www.bl.uk/manuscripts/Viewer.aspx?ref=add_ms_35313_f012v

1505 Niklaß Kerner
http://www.nuernberger-hausbuecher.de/75-Amb-2-317-123-v

c. 1500-1525 St. Luke in a book of hours (MMW 10 E 3, fol. 19v),
http://resources42.kb.nl/MIMI/MIMI_MMW_10E3/MIMI_MMW_10E3_019V_MIN.JPG

1510 St. Luke
corsair.themorgan.org/cgi-bin/Pwebrecon.cgi?BBID=260606

The Miracle of St. Francis of Paola, 16th century
http://balat.kikirpa.be/photo.php?objnr=40001697

St. Luke by Niklaus Manuel
http://www.wga.hu/art/m/manuel/lukepain.jpg

1520 St. Luke
http://corsair.themorgan.org/cgi-bin/Pwebrecon.cgi?BBID=253264

1524. St. Luke in a book of hours (MMW 10 F 33, fol. 15v) by Jehan de Luc
http://resources42.kb.nl/MIMI/MIMI_MMW_10F33/MIMI_MMW_10F33_015V_MIN.JPG

1532 St. Luke
http://www.wga.hu/frames-e.html?/html/h/heemsker/1/lukepain.html

1530-60 St. Luke
http://www.wga.hu/frames-e.html?/html/h/heemsker/2/luke_pai.html

1548 Self-portrait of Caterina van Hemessen
http://www.wga.hu/frames-e.html?/html/h/hemessen/caterina/selfport.html

c. 1556 Self-portrait of Sofonisba Anguissola
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:SofonisbaAuto.jpg

1558 Self-portrait of Anthonis Mor
http://balat.kikirpa.be/photo.php?objnr=40002685

after 1565 St. Luke painting the Virgin.
http://www.wga.hu/html_m/v/vasari/2/11annunz.html

c. 1575-1609 A young painter seen from behind by Annibale Caracci
http://www.britishmuseum.org/research/collection_online/collection_object_details/collection_image_gallery.aspx?assetId=63109001&objectId=714719&partId=1 

16th century http://www.photo.rmn.fr/archive/12-505617-2C6NU0WKA1MQ.html

1580s by Annibale Caracci
http://posner.library.cmu.edu/Posner/books/pages.cgi?call=390_S89N&layout=vol0/part0/copy0&file=0031

1584 Otto Venius painting, surrounded by his family
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Otto_van_Veen_-_The_Artist_Painting,_Surrounded_by_his_Family_-_WGA24343.jpg

1590 by Jacob Willemsz Delff
http://www.wga.hu/art/d/delff/jacob1/a_family.jpg

16th century self portrait Cornelis Cornelisz van Haarlem
http://balat.kikirpa.be/photo.php?objnr=20022289

16th century
http://www.photo.rmn.fr/archive/10-512024-2C6NU0QZOQYF.html

16th century, a young man seated with his palette

1602 Marten Vos, St Luke painting the virgin
http://www.wga.hu/html_m/v/vos_m/lukepain.html

1603? Portrait of the Artist's Son Jorge Manuel Theotokopoulos by El Greco
http://www.wga.hu/frames-e.html?/html/g/greco_el/15/1511grec.html

Fine Cakes

I have made these little gems for years!  They make good gifts for friends, visiting royalty and relatives alike.

Medieval Recipe from The Widowes Treasury by John Partridge, 1585 and redacted by
Cindy M. Renfrow, author of Take a Thousand Eggs or More and A Sip Through Time as found here

To make fine Cakes. Take a quantity of fine wheate Flower, and put it in an earthen pot. Stop it close and set it in an Oven, and bake it as long as you would a Pasty of Venison, and when it is baked it will be full of clods. Then searce your flower through a fine sercer. Then take clouted Creame or sweet butter, but Creame is best: then take sugar, cloves, Mace, saffron and yolks of eggs, so much as wil seeme to season your flower. Then put these things into the Creame, temper all together. Then put thereto your flower. So make your cakes. The paste will be very short; therefore make them very little. Lay paper under them.

Baked flour: Take some flour (4 cups, unsifted, made enough) and bake, covered, at 350F for about 1hr 15min, until slight color change and a nutty smell.

To every 3 cups of sifted baked flour, take the following:
1 1/2 cups butter
1 cup sugar
1/4 teaspoon clove powder
1/4 teaspoon mace powder
1/2 pinch saffron, crumbled
3 egg yolks

Preheat oven to 350 F.
In a large mixing bowl, cream the butter and sugar. Add the spices and egg yolks, and beat to mix thoroughly. Add the flour, and beat until smooth. Use a non-stick cookie sheet, or line a cookie sheet with baking parchment. Take the dough, 1 level teaspoonful at a time, and roll into small balls with your hands. (Resist the temptation to make them larger -- they won't cook in the middle if they're too big.) Flatten the balls slightly, and place them 2 inches apart on the cookie sheet. Bake for 9-12 minutes, or until the cookies are puffed and golden around the edges. Remove from oven and cool on wire racks.

Urchins recipe

 

Quick little queen of the East

Known in song as the quick little queen of the east, Alexandre Saint Pierre and I wrote these words for Duchess Anna's scroll:

An Eastern Tiger in Truth

All hear tell of Anna Ophelia
Halloway Tarragon.
Mother, duchess, equestrian.
She is a shining beacon,
a paragon of virtue,
an example for us all
in either peace or war.
Thus we, Brennan & Coailfhionn
swiftly name her a Tyger of the East
on this xxx of January, a.s. l.



Which were quickly and deftly translated into Latin by Steffan ap Kennydd

Tigris Orientalis Vero

Omnes cognoscant Annam Opheliam Holloviam Tarragon.
Matrem, ducissam, caballariam.
Haec est ignis nitidus, specimen virtutis
Exemplar pro nobis omnibus
Et in pace et in bello
Itaque Nos Brennan et Caolfhionn
Eam dicimus velociter
Tigrem Orientis
Hoc die XXX [tricesimo] Januaris anno Societatis L [quinquagesimo].

Phrase of the Month

alenda lux ubi orta libertas

Light [is] to be nourished where liberty [has] arisen. Or "let learning be cherished..."