It appears somehow funny and also really amazing to me how Fortuna works from time to time… *lol*

Yesterday I was talking about a very special scroll commission for a SCA peerage scroll. About a 10th century SCA knighting scroll for the upcoming knighting ceremony of a friend – btw. my very first peerage scroll! 🙂

…and today I already run into an inspiration for it, awesome coincidence, isn’t it… *lol*

Well, I don’t worry much about the fact that I have never done a peerage scroll till now. I already made so many scrolls that even a peerage scroll is also “just” another scroll for me. Like always I hope that the final result will please the recipient. This is finally the only thing that really matters and counts. Regardless if it is an Award of Arms scroll, a Meridian Cross scroll,… or whatever name the award has for which I make a scroll… Not the award matters, the person who gets it is important.

The only thing that made me worry concerning this commission is that the requested time frame for the scroll is 9th to 10th century. Even for me that is very early because I am normally doing a 14th century hand. Nevertheless I think that I will take this commission as a personal challenge for myself – I really love such personal challenges. 😀

You can surely imagine that I already wondered on which period example I could base this SCA Knighting scroll. Especially because all my wonderful books about Calligraphy and Illumination are packed in moving boxes. Omg, I thought, where else could I find inspiration for such an early scroll? In my mind’s eye I already saw myself searching the internet for many many hours for a nice inspiration… *sigh*

…and then I saw a picture and a link to a great page about a bible of the 10th century. What an awesome coincidence, isn’t it. 😀

– 10th century inspiration –

Première Bible de l’abbaye de Saint-Martial de Limoges du Xème

I really like the A-Initial at the left in the second row of pictures, but also the O-Initial with the dogs inside is cute… and have you seen the peacocks? They are all lovely! 🙂

I didn’t have much time to check out all pages of the above mentioned website but this lovely page and information also caught my attention:

– 12th & 13th century “Châsses” –

The page “Limousin medieval” gives following information concerning the word “Châsses”:

In English the word may or may not be italicised, and if it is may use the French circumflex: châsse. Regardless of the form used, the term in English is normally only used of “house”-shaped boxes, usually enamelled ones, whereas in French it is a general term for reliquaries with a box, “shrine” or casket form, of any shape, and tends to be used especially for larger examples… read more: <here>

The page Châsses reliquaires émaillées at the website “Limousin medieval“ shows the most beautiful collection of (mostly) 12th & 13th century “Châsses” I have seen till now. Normally just single pictures with not much further information appear at the internet or one runs into nice examples on display in museums – for example at the Kopenhagen National museum or the Treasury in Vienna. Yes, I think this collection is really beautiful and interesting. …and definitely worth a visit at the website. 🙂

I especially liked the photos of “LA CHASSE SAINT ETIENNE A GIMEL LES CASCADES” – you can find them underneath the first picture gallery, when you scroll down a little bit. I think that the pictures of the “LA CHASSE DE BELLAC” provide beautiful inspiration for small embroidered roundels.

– 14th century inspiration –

For all of you who are not on facebook – my friend Genovefa recently visited the Marco Polo exhibition and posted a beautiful picture of a 14th century embroidery – if you are interested into 14th century, you really need to see it – it is beautiful! 🙂 

She also gave some additional information about the 14th century embroidery shown on the picture she took and shared:

“14th embroidery silk raised arms and the Falcon (above the left hand) it was worn out by the time” …

“It is couched gold on velvet.” …

“The embroidery is raised and the areas that are padded is used up . Over her left hand area is supposed to be a falcon. The bird would be standing on her hand I think that influences the posture of the Lady.”

I hope you enjoyed my “short” summery of inspiring links I recently run into and that you find them as inspiring as I do.

I really like the period inspiration for my 10th century SCA knighting scroll commission I run into today. Maybe I have some 9th or 10th century documents somewhere on my hard disc too… 🙂