Wednesday, July 4, 2007

Whitework tablecloths in Swiss Landesmuseum, Zurich

The online picture database of the Swiss Landesmuseum in Zurich contains 4 pictures of tablecloths from the period 1200-1600.

According to Jenny Schneider, this is the oldest known whitework tablecloth, dating from 1200-1250.

Tablecloth 1200-1250

This is a very elegant tablecloth from the first half of the 15th century:

Tablecloth 1400-1450

This one is very funny: an early 16th century tablecloth embroidered with food and cutlery:

Tablecloth 1527


And one from 1561 embroidered with biblical scenes:

Tablecloth 1561

If for some reasons the links don't work, go to the homepage of the online catalogue and insert "tischdecke", German for tablecloth. (the site is in German, French and Italian, but unfortunately not in English):

http://www.musee-suisse.ch:16080/webcollection/

These books include more detailed pictures and descriptions of these tablecloths:

Schneider, J. (1972), Schweizerische Leinenstickereien, Bern: Verlag Paul Haubt
Trudel, V. (1954), Schweizerische Leinenstickereien des Mittelalters und der Renaissance. Bern: Paul Haubt Verlag

3 comments:

Jerusha said...

Hi. Those are just awesome.

Got a question for you ... Have you ever come across table-runners or place-mats in your searches? I've been finishing up a dissertation, and haven't had a chance to do the research on that. I know that they were Victorian, but I'd like to know if they were SCA period. I'd like to make some for my household, but I'd prefer them to be a period item.

Thanks!

Racaire said...

Thanks for sharing the links to this beautiful pieces of embroidery :)

Machteld said...

I'm glad you liked it!!

Jerusha, I'm not sure about tablerunners, placemats or napkins. I do have some ideas about it, and I will try to write something about it in next post