Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Illustrations
- Contributors
- Preface
- Abbreviations
- Royal Mausolea in the Long Fourteenth Century (1272-1422)
- Legal Culture: Medieval Lawyers’ Aspirations and Pretensions
- Thomas of Lancaster’s First Quarrel with Edward II
- Bristol and the Crown, 1326-31: Local and National Politics in the Early Years of Edward III’s Reign
- Mapping Identity in John Trevisa’s English Polychronicon: Chester, Cornwall and the Translation of English National History
- Edward the Black Prince and East Anglia: An Unlikely Association
- William Wykeham and the Management of the Winchester Estate, 1366-1404
- A Lancastrian Polity? John of Gaunt, John Neville and the War with France, 1368-88
- ‘Hearts warped by passion’: The Percy-Gaunt, Dispute of 1381
- The Reasons for the Bishop of Norwich’s Attack of Flanders in 1383
- Loyalty, Honour and the Lancastrian Revolution: Sir Stephen Scrope of Castle Combe and his Kinsmen, c.1389-c.1408
- The Furnishing of Royal Closets and the Use of Small Devotional Images in the Reign of Richard II: The Setting of the Wilton Diptych Reconsidered
- ‘Weep thou for me in France’: French Views of the Deposition of Richard II
The Furnishing of Royal Closets and the Use of Small Devotional Images in the Reign of Richard II: The Setting of the Wilton Diptych Reconsidered
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 21 March 2023
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Illustrations
- Contributors
- Preface
- Abbreviations
- Royal Mausolea in the Long Fourteenth Century (1272-1422)
- Legal Culture: Medieval Lawyers’ Aspirations and Pretensions
- Thomas of Lancaster’s First Quarrel with Edward II
- Bristol and the Crown, 1326-31: Local and National Politics in the Early Years of Edward III’s Reign
- Mapping Identity in John Trevisa’s English Polychronicon: Chester, Cornwall and the Translation of English National History
- Edward the Black Prince and East Anglia: An Unlikely Association
- William Wykeham and the Management of the Winchester Estate, 1366-1404
- A Lancastrian Polity? John of Gaunt, John Neville and the War with France, 1368-88
- ‘Hearts warped by passion’: The Percy-Gaunt, Dispute of 1381
- The Reasons for the Bishop of Norwich’s Attack of Flanders in 1383
- Loyalty, Honour and the Lancastrian Revolution: Sir Stephen Scrope of Castle Combe and his Kinsmen, c.1389-c.1408
- The Furnishing of Royal Closets and the Use of Small Devotional Images in the Reign of Richard II: The Setting of the Wilton Diptych Reconsidered
- ‘Weep thou for me in France’: French Views of the Deposition of Richard II
Summary
Today, the Wilton Diptych (Plates 1, 2) is a lone survivor in England of a class of portable devotional paintings that once formed a normal part of royal worship. During the late fourteenth century, Richard II, like other contemporary rulers, led a peripatetic existence, travelling between his various residences as well as making specific journeys for military campaigns or for pilgrimages. As he progressed, his furnishings would have preceded him, including chapel ornaments, comprising vestments, plate, books and, in all likelihood, some portable devotional images. Theories surrounding the intended purpose and location of theWilton Diptych have in the past included the suggestions that it could have been the focus of a secret brotherhood or even a posthumous image created in the reign of Henry IV. Currently, the most widely accepted view seems to be that this painting was created for Richard II’s personal devotions, for use in his private oratories. This article will explore the importance of the private oratory or ‘closet’ as a setting for small devotional images, and will reconsider the chapel of St Mary of the Pew at Westminster Abbey as one of several possible settings for the Wilton Diptych.
From an entry in Henry III’s accounts published by Colvin, it is evident that the Wilton Diptych was not the first small painted diptych to be owned by an English monarch. In 1235, a painting was purchased for Henry III’s chapel at Guildford at a cost of just under 10s, described as ‘una parva tabula . . . et alia parva tabula eidem respondenti . . . Et eisdem tabulis coniungendis ita quod claudi et aperiri possint’ (‘a small panel, and another small panel corresponding to it, and those panels joined in such a way that they can be closed and opened’). The panels were painted with the Crucifixion with Mary and John on one side and, on the opposite panel, Our Lord in Majesty and the four Evangelists. During his long reign, Henry III commissioned several panel paintings, including, in 1258, another diptych, of unspecified size, for the Lady Chapel in Westminster Abbey.
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- Fourteenth Century England III , pp. 185 - 206Publisher: Boydell & BrewerPrint publication year: 2004