An English orphrey cross

Last quarter of the 15th century

Embroidered in coloured silks in split stitch, satin stitch and laid silk with trellis couching, and gilt metal threads in brick stitch and underside couching, on a linen ground. At the centre, Christ as judge is depicted as shown in many Gothic representations of chapter 4 of the Book of Revelations, seated on a rainbow arc with his wounds displayed and a crossed halo, and here surrounded by three saints flanked by pillars beneath vaulted canopies - to the right, Mary, and to the left either John the Evangelist or John the Baptist holding an illegible scroll, with St Peter below and, above, the Holy Ghost as a dove and the inscription ‘INRI’. With some losses to the silk, and some later adaptations. This is a late example of opus anglicanum, the exquisitely worked English embroidery much prized throughout mediaeval Europe, and would have adorned the back of a chasuble. A chasuble of Italian velvet in the collection of the V & A, accession no. 839-1901, is decorated with similar orphreys.

71.4cm (28⅛”) high and 54.5cm (21½”) wide.