Fourteenth-Century Relic Pouch

Ursula Georges

This pouch is a present for Alaric le Fevre and Noelle la Chauciere, King and Queen of the Midrealm. I modeled it after the knitted silk relic pouches in a collection of medieval artifacts found in Swiss cathedrals, which have been dated to the fourteenth century. (Rutt, p. 50.)

The relic pouch before tassels and cord were added. Click for a larger version.

Materials

I used silk yarn in red, green, white, and blue. The colors of the Midrealm device are red, green, and white, and the colors of the Cleftlands device (Alaric and Noelle's barony) are white and blue. The Swiss relic pouches use red, green, blue, purple, white, and beige silk. (Rutt, p. 50.)

I knitted the pouch in the round on five double-pointed size 00 metal needles. Surviving paintings show that Europeans knitted in the round on straight double-pointed needles in the fourteenth century. (Rutt, p. 44.)

Size and Gauge

My gauge was 7 stitches to the centimeter, which matches the gauge of the medieval pouches. The Swiss relic pouches range between 16 and 26 centimeters in width and 20.5 and 34 centimeters in length. (Rutt, p. 50.) My pouch is slightly smaller, only 12 centimeters in width and 15 in length. However, a thirteenth-century knitted pouch from a French cathedral is 14.5 centimeters wide and 12.5 centimeters high, so my pouch is clearly within the possible range of sizes for medieval knitted relic pouches. (Rutt, p. 52.)

Pattern

I based the pattern on the design of one of the Swiss pouches, which Rutt charts. (Rutt, p. 51.) I did alter the pattern slightly so that not all of the rosettes contain a cross. I wanted to create a mixed crosses-and-roses effect which would allude to the crosses on Alaric's device and Noelle's status as Queen.

Finishing

Like the Swiss pouches, the bottom of my pouch has a row of multi-colored tassels. (Rutt, p. 50.)

Most of the Swiss pouches are closed with a drawstring, also finished with a tassel, and have a cord attached to the upper corners as a handle. The cords were constructed by loop-braiding or by twining four strands of silk together. (Boutrup.) I used a one-person, five-loop finger-looped braid for both the drawstring and the handle.

Bibliography

Boutrup, Joy. "Braids on Relic Purses in Sion, Switzerland," L-M Bric News, vol. 7, March 2004. http://www.lmbric.org/n7/sion/LM_NEWS2.html

Goslee, Sarah. "Fingerloop Braiding," Phiala's String Page, 1996, 2005. http://www.stringpage.com/braid/fl/fingerloop.html

Priest-Dorman, Carolyn. "Sample Fingerlooped Braids from a Fifteenth-Century Manuscript," 1997-2000. http://www.cs.vassar.edu/~capriest/fingerloop.html

Rutt, Richard. A History of Hand Knitting, London: B.T. Batsford, 1987, reprinted by Interweave Press.

Schmedding, Brigitta. Mittelalterliche Textilien in Kirchen und Klöstern der Schweiz, Bern: Abegg-Stiftung, 1978.