Cuthbert embrodery-detail

Anglo-Saxon Women as Patrons of Art

In 918 Ælfflæd, wife of King Edward the Elder, donated her royal headband to bishop Frithestan in Durham in order for it to be placed in the coffin of St. Cuthbert. It seems as if such donations of art were meant to bring Anglo-Saxon women closer to the sanctum – the altar, the priest or the saint.

The occluded role of royal women and lost works of pre-Norman English and Irish art (tenth to twelfth centuries)
By: Jenifer Ní Ghrádaigha
Journal of Medieval History
Published online: 13 Nov 2015
DOI:10.1080/03044181.2015.1107750

Judith of Flanders 1033 -1094 is one the few women whose active role as patron of the art of churches and religious institutions can be followed in detail. Not only do we know of her active role as patron, which was described by contemporary chroniclers. We also know of some of the books, which she gifted. Two of those still have their original splendid covers, with reliefs in gilded silver and embellished with jewels.

However, “the very fragmentary nature of the sources means that it is well nigh impossible to connect extant works of art with any historically attested women other than royal wives or daughters, enforcing a narrow perspective, writes Jenifer Ní Ghrádaigha in a new article about women as patrons. But even such a narrow perspective can yield new and substantial information, “about the art and architecture that they patronised, owned or even simply used or gazed upon.” But it may also yield information about “devotion, politics, family and power”.

More specifically, she outlines how these women as patronesses used their gifts to “place” themselves at or near the altar; as is demonstrated by a number of specific cases:

  • Land of Osraige and her church for St. Brigit at Kildare, 868
  • Æthelflæd (d. 918) and the church of St Oswald’s in Gloucester
  • Edith as the Magdalen (d. c.984/7) and her embroidered alb
  • Derbforgaill as the Virgin? Donation of nine altar cloths and a chalice of gold
  • Ælfflæd, Frithestan, Æthelstan and Cuthbert – her gift of vestments to St. Cuthbert in AD 918

The history of women and art in late Anglo-Saxon England is difficult to write, concludes Ní Ghrádaigha and continues: “There is no doubt that art was produced for, and sometimes by, women. But the paucity of extant remains along with the elliptical quality of evidence from written sources combine to frustrate any easy delineation of the relationship between elite women and the art and architecture that they patronised, owned or even simply used or gazed upon.”

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

JeniferNí Ghrádaigha is from the Department of History of Art, Trinity College Dublin, Ireland

READ MORE:

JeniferNí Ghrádaigha has been a member of the research group, which form 2010 – 15 has been working to reassess the roles of women as ‘makers’ of medieval art. The project has been founded by a grant from the European Research Council. In 1015 Madrid hosted the final workshop, which will result in special issue of Journal of Medieval History (March 2016). Last week the two first articles appeared as pre-issued web-publications. The article by JeniferNí Ghrádaigha is the first of these. Interested may read more about the project at the dedicated website Reassessing the Roles of Women as ‘Makers’ of Medieval Art and Architecture

The main result has been a book published by Brill:

Reassessing the Roles of Women as 'Makers' of Medieval Art and Architecture CoverReassessing the Roles of Women as ‘Makers’ of Medieval Art and Architecture (2 vol. set)
Ed. by Therese Martin
Series: Visualising the Middle Ages
Brill 2012 (Pb: 2015)

ABSTRACT:

These volumes propose a renewed way of framing the debate around the history of medieval art and architecture to highlight the multiple roles played by women. Today’s standard division of artist from patron is not seen in medieval inscriptions—on paintings, metalwork, embroideries, or buildings—where the most common verb is ‘made’ (fecit). At times this denotes the individual whose hands produced the work, but it can equally refer to the person whose donation made the undertaking possible. Here twenty-four scholars examine secular and religious art from across medieval Europe to demonstrate that a range of studies is of interest not just for a particular time and place but because, from this range, overall conclusions can be drawn for the question of medieval art history as a whole.
Contributors are Mickey Abel, Glaire D. Anderson, Jane L. Carroll, Nicola Coldstream, María Elena Díez Jorge, Jaroslav Folda, Alexandra Gajewski, Loveday Lewes Gee, Melissa R. Katz, Katrin Kogman-Appel, Pierre Alain Mariaux, Therese Martin, Eileen McKiernan González, Rachel Moss, Jenifer Ní Ghrádaigh, Felipe Pereda, Annie Renoux, Ana Maria S. A. Rodrigues, Jane Tibbetts Schulenburg, Stefanie Seeberg, Miriam Shadis, Ellen Shortell, Loretta Vandi, and Nancy L. Wicker.

FEATURED PHOTO:

Detail of the Maniple of St. Cuthbert. It may have been presented to the church in AD 918 when Ælfflæd might have taken the veil. Source: Pinterest

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