Bobbin Lacemakers in the Early Modern: images and tools

Figure 1

Bobbin lace is thought to have originated in the first half of the sixteenth century, the first published book giving patterns is thought to have been Le Pompe, published in Venice in 1559 (Anon., 1983). Two years later, when the Nüw Modelbuch was published in Zurich the title page depicted two women working bobbin lace with unshaped bobbins on a plump rectangular pillow placed on a stand. (M., 1561) (Fig 1 right)

The next few depictions of bobbin lacemakers are drawings or prints. 

c.1580-1600, Johannes Stradanus (1523-1605) Cornelia, mother of the Gracchi, with female companions engaged in needlework.  This a drawing, a more defined reversed image is the engraving produced by Theodoor Galle (1571-1633), where the woman behind the lady with the slate frame has a large domed lace pillow. On the table by them is a stand with an oil lamp suspended from it, giving them light from above.

c. 1580-85, Maerten de Vos (c. 1534-1603), in a series of etchings called The Seven Planets and Ages of Man, Mercury is shown with a lacemaker sitting in the bottom right hand corner. She has a rectangular lace pillow on her lap, and six bulb ended lace bobbins are visible.

1597, Johann Sibmacher (1561-1611), Schön Neues Modelbuch. The title page of the book shows the lady on the right with the spectacles has a sewing bolster of the type used for sewing, needle lace and bobbin lace, but no bobbins.  

Figure 2

1600 – 1620, The lacemaker, a drawing in the Rijksmuseum collection. Object number RP-T-1886-A-597. A rectangular lace pillow sits on a stand, while the lace maker sits in a chair. The bobbins are more numerous, and whilst shaped are less bulbous at the end than those in the Maertin de Vos etching. (Figure 2 left)

Circa 1620,  Gervasius Fabricius (1603-1637), Ladies in a garden in his Album Amicorum.  f.50 - BL Add MS 17025. The lady at the bottom left, sitting on a chair, has bolster pillow on a stand. Her bobbins for some reason hang from the middle of the lace, which is a pointed edging style, and they are of the bulbous end style. The parchment upon which the lace is being worked is red. Although there is no pin cushion, several pins can be seen stuck in the bolster, though not in the lace. It maybe that the painter did not understand how the lace was being worked. 

1640 Cornelis de Vos (1584-1651), The charity of Saint Nicholas, at Ons' Lieve Heer op Solder, Amsterdam. Here one lady is sewing on a sewing bolster, while two others make bobbin lace. The lace pillows are supported on a lap stand with a slanted top. The bobbins are shaped like those in the 1600-1620 Lacemaker drawing.

In the 1650s and 1660s a whole raft of paintings of lacemakers were produced by Dutch and Flemish genre painters.

1650s Gabrielle Metsu (1629–1667), The Lacemaker - The State Hermitage Museum, Saint Petersburg – This lacemaker is not working her lace, there is no pillow, but she is holding two bobbins, and the thread running between them can be seen.

1654-1655, Nicolaes Maes (1634 – 1693),  A young woman making lace – drawing of the figure that appears in the National Gallery of Canada painting. In this drawing, the painting that comes from it and the 1656 Maes lacemaker, the squared off, domed pillow appears to have a drawer in the in end, possibly for holding bobbins, pins, etc. 

1655, Nicolaes Maes (1634 – 1693), The lacemaker, National Gallery of Canada. The painting from the drawing.

Figure 3

1656, Nicolaes Maes (1634 – 1693), The Lacemaker, Metropolitan Museum of Art New York. Here we have again the square cut off, domed pillow with a drawer in the end. The bulbous bottomed bobbins and, as well as the pins appearing in the lace she has worked, her scissors can be seen hanging against her apron, a detail from the painting is shown in  Figure 3 left.

1662, Caspar Netscher (1639?-1684),  The Lace Maker, Wallace Collection, London. Again the lace pillow is supported on a lap stand with a slightly slanted top, and again The parchment upon which the lace is being worked is red. The can see the white of the worked lace and the red of the parchment carrying the pattern, she is in the act of placing a pin. The bobbins are again those with a bulbous bottom. 

1665, Bernhard Keil (1624-1687), The Lacemaker. Metropolitan Museum of Art New York. Keil was a Danish painter who studied at Rembrandt’s studio, he painted this when settled in Italy. Here we have a true round bolster pillow, abandoned on a chair. The worked lace is covered with a cloth, something most lace makers do today, the stop the worked lace getting dirty or being damaged. A small forest of pins appears in the area she is working, and the bobbins are of the bulbous bottomed variety. 

Figure 4

1665, Nicolaes Maes (1634 – 1693), The Old Lacemaker, Mauritshuis, The Hague. Apart from this being a much older lacemaker wearing spectacles, the pillow, bobbins and scissors hanging down are the same as in his 1656 painting in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, see detail in Figure 4 Right. 

1669–1670, Johannes Vermeer (1632–1675), The Lacemaker, The Louvre, Paris. A much flatter pillow apparently on an adjustable floor stand, you can see the holes for adjusting the height. Again the maker is in the act of placing a pin. 

Circa 1670, Pieter Cornelisz van Slingelandt (1641-1691) The Lace Maker,  The Royal Collection, London, RCIN 405302. Another truncated domed pillow on a slanted lap stand. 

1672-3  Pieter Cornelisz van Slingelandt (1641-1691),  A Young Lacemaker  Interruptedby a Bird Seller, Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister, Dresden. Again a truncated domed pillow, but the lap stand seems to be integral.

early 18^th century, Jan Josef I Horemans (1682–1759),  Workshop with shoemaker, butcher,   lacemaker. A really weird painting, sold at auction by Hamel Auctions, Munich.

1720s Giacomo Ceruti (1698-1767). Lacemakers. Private Collection. Five women work of round bolster pillows place directly in their laps. Ceruti was an Italian artist and the bobbins here are far less bulbous than those in the paintings from the Low Countries. 

References

 

Anon., 1983. Le pompe, 1559 : patterns for Venetian bobbin lace / facsimile with introduction by Santina M. Levey ; technical section by Patricia C. Payne. Bedford: R. Bean.

M., R., 1561. Nüw Modelbuch allerley gattungen Däntelschnür so diser zyt in hoch Tütschlanden geng und brüchig sind...erstmals in truck verfergket durch R. M.. Zurich: Christoph Froschauer.

 

Sleeves in Tudor and Stuart Wills and Inventories

Princess Elizabeth by William Scrots, 1546.

When sleeves appear as a standalone item in a probate inventory what does it mean? Part of the problem is that today we usually regard sleeves as being always an integral part of a garment, and not as stand-alone items in their own right. Sixteenth and seventeenth century wills and probate inventories often list sleeves as sleeves, so what are these sleeves, and what are they for? 

There are points in fashion when we know that separate fake sleeves appear. In the second quarter of the sixteenth century when the fashion was for huge sleeves with fore sleeves appearing from underneath them, the fore sleeves were often made and listed separately, sometimes with the fabric matching a forepart, as in the painting of the Princess Elizabeth by William Scrots (right). Sometimes the sleeves would have a matching partlet, in 1565 Queen Elizabeth I paid the embroiderer David Smith for, “enbraudering of a gathered partelet and a paire of wide slevis of lawne wrought allover with sondrie sortes of byrdes and floures.” It is difficult to tell in this painting if what can be seen at the neck and undersleeves is an embroidered smock, or a matching partlet and sleeves.

Sleeves and fore sleeves appear listed separately in probates throughout the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries when this fashion is long past. If they are described as fore sleeves then they maybe high status, in 1638 Margaret Giliebrown leaves her “best foresleeves” to her sister in her will, she also leaves her best overbody, so perhaps the sleeves go with the body. In 1625 Katherine Ware, a single woman, has in her probate two pair of fore sleeves and a drawn (drawn thread work?) stomacher, which together are worth only one shilling, do these form a set, are the sleeves also drawn? In 1649 the widow Mary Chapman, who owns silk gowns, also has a pair of fore sleeves in her probate. Are these like the fore sleeves of one hundred years earlier, or perhaps something entirely different, like protective sleeves. 

Sleeves are not necessarily listed as fore sleeves. In 1557 Francis Prince, a yeoman, lists his late wife’s clothes as including “2 pairs of camlet sleeves”. In 1612 Ellen Taylor leaves in her will “to Margery Vaudrey one paire of satin sleeves” While in 1630 Frances Raye leaves to “my sister Callowe... a stuff gown without lining or sleeves,” which implies that the sleeves come separately. In 1617 Elizabeth Blakeborne in her will leaves “to the wyf of Robert Houghton one paire of gowne sleeves.” Elizabeth also has in her probate inventory “1 paire of ould wollen sleves,” “3 paire of ould smocke slives 18d” and “ould sleeves and ould incle 4d” Sometimes people owned multiple pairs of sleeves. In 1672 Sarah Kitchen, had “Eleaven paire of Sleeves” in her probate.

Like Margaret Gilliebrown’s best foresleeves and best overbody, sleeves may well be made to match a pair of bodies. In 1611 Jane Byas has both an “upper bodies” and “a peire of sleeves”. The following year Anne Hodgesonne leaves, “to Margaret Atkinsonne...one good petticoate, one hatt, my best upperbodie & a paire of sleeves which is the same upper bodie …” A pair of bodies from the second half of the seventeenth century in the Victoria and Albert Museum survive with their matching sleeves. Sometimesthe sleeves are listed with another garment made from a different fabric, in 1580 Elizabeth King left to Mary Wattes her “worsted kirtell and a pair of Damask sleeves”

Are separate sleeves used only by those with enough money to warrant a probate inventory, no they are not. The Bridlington records show several poor women in 1636 receiving an “upper body and sleeves”

These sleeves can be bought separately. In 1636 James Evans has among his extensive stock of dress accessories “sixteene payre of wrought sleeves,” wrought here probably means embroidered.  An early seventeenth century blackwork sleeve panel survives in the Victoria and Albert Museum. More downmarket the clothier Ralph Eyton has in stock, again among other clothing items, 7 dozen of sleeves valued at £2 2s. If these are single sleeves, rather than pairs, it works out at 6d per sleeve.  In 1679 the haberdasher Henry Mitchell has an unspecified number of women’s sleeves in stock, valued at £2 0s 6d, and other sleeves (sex unspecified) ranging from 4s to 8s a pair.

Could it be that these sleeves are worn to show under or though the gown sleeves in the first half of the seventeenth century when gown sleeves where slashed or paned to show another sleeve underneath? In 1621 Elizabeth Smith leaves “To widow Early [my] black gown and stuff drawing sleeves” Sometimes indication is given as to where the sleeves belong, Katherine Ware in 1625 again has “one stummedger sutable to the beste kirtle and an ould paire of sleeves to the second Cote, 2 shillings”.

Whitework sleeves in Platt Hall, Manchester

What about linen, or possibly linen, sleeves?  In 1632 Elizabeth Lee, the widow of a gentleman, has listed in probate together with her neckerchiefs and coifs, “3 paire of white sleeves.”  A pair of whitework sleeves survive in the collection at Platt Hall, Manchester. (right)

Men also own linen sleeves. Between 1662 and 1669 James Master purchases several pair of holland sleeves, on one occasion laying out six shillings “for an elle & qu[arter] of holl[and] to make me a pa[ir] of sleeves.” In 1671 Lisle Stotesbury, who is referred to as a gentleman but appears to be a musician at Litchfield Cathedral, lists as his linen, “4 shirts, 3 paire of sleeves and seaven handkerchers £1 5s 0d”. In 1662 Thomas Fownes lists his linen as “2 corvats [cravats], 2 pare off halffe sleves, one shurte, two bands, two capes, 8 pare off cuffes, one handcarcher 9s.”

Were some of these sleeves working garments, perhaps used to protect other garments? One of the earliest mentions of protective wear is in the 1555 rules for student doctors attending anatomy lectures.  The students should have, “two aprons to be from the sholder downewarde and two peyr of sleaves for his hole arme with tapes for change.” In 1602 the barber Owen Singleton has in his shop “3 towells, 2 aprons & 2 forsleves 5s”, which implies that the foresleeves are working garments. These types of protective sleeve might be provided for children as well, in 1602 the widow Esworthy is paid for providing John Butler’s orphaned child with “green flanell for an apren and for sleeves.” Pepys writes of a fight in London in 1662 between the weavers and the butchers, with the butchers’ sleeves apparently being a distinguishing mark. “At first the butchers knocked down all for weavers that had green or blue aprons, till they were fain to pull them off and put them in their breeches. At last the butchers were fain to pull off their sleeves, that they might not be known, and were soundly beaten out of the field.”

In conclusion we know that various types of sleeves existed, that they were listed separately and could be purchased separately. We know that they existed at all levels of society, and that they were made from many different types of material. However we really know very little about how these sleeves were actually worn, and how they were attached to other garments, though pins seems to be one option, which appears in many medieval illustrations. The Dutch artist Pieter Aertsen shows a number of Dutch women with obviously separate sleeves, but very rarely does he show that an actual pin is holding them in place, and this example from Birmingham Museums, appears to show a woman with protective fore sleeves.   

References – I haven’t listed any as it would make this way too long, but if anyone wants a reference to a particular quote, contact me and I will provide it.