Bringing the Holy Land Home: The Crusades, Chertsey Abbey, and the Reconstruction of a Medieval Masterpiece

How was this made?

One can consider this piece to be made in two parts: The construction of the head of the miter and the construction of the lappets. Detailing around the head of the miter can be attributed to tablet weaving along with the lappets. Tablet weaving has origins in both Austria and Germany, two locations where many of the miters in the Abbey Church were created. The process of tablet weaving uses warp and weft threads, where warp threads are straight and the weft threads go in between the warp pieces. Tablet weaving uses a card to then combine the warp and weft threads to spead up the process of combining the two threads to then create a finished textile.
This tablet weaving was most likely used around the lappets and edges of the Miter. Looking at the detailing and specific of the Miter head, it is continuously mentioned that the head had heraldic eagles detailed in the silk. This detail is not seen today and would have been difficult even when the Miter was still in its prime of decoration. However, this detailing indicates that much of the design on the head was hand woven. The use of jewels and eight pointed stars indicate that due to the technology from this time, most the head of this textile would have been decorated by hand and woven with other silk and assorted colors to assist with the visual detail.

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