Flanders, with carving similar to that existing in the church of Thosan near Bruges. The stipulated price had been paid, and the master carpenter was called to account for delaying to complete the work; whereupon he pleaded various excuses, stating that the work had been impeded by popular commotions at Bruges, during which he had been deserted by his workmen and had suffered heavy losses. It was decided that Melrose abbey should bear the cost of its transport to the town of Sluys and embarkation there for Scotland, and should make some allowance to Cornelius towards his journey to Melrose; and that they should give him and his chief carver (formiscissori) a safe-conduct for their journey and return. This document was dated 7th October, 1441.[1]
No such wholesale example of foreign design occurs in England; nevertheless there are two important instances in which Flemish design is to be suspected; viz., in the Royal chapels at Windsor and Westminster. As regards the stalls in St George's chapel, Windsor, it is known that the tabernacled canopies were begun in 1477 and were completed in 1483; thus they took six years to make (69).[2] The canopies are known to have been made in London; the carvers being Robert Ellis and John Filles, apparently Englishmen. On the other hand the great Rood, with the statues of St George and St Edward and others, was made by Diricke Vangrove and Giles Vancastell, who are just as evidently Dutchmen; for four images the two Dutchmen were paid at the rate of 5s. per foot; for six canopies the two Englishmen received £40, say £480; i.e., about £80 of our money for each canopy. Now here we have Dutch and English carvers engaged together on what was practically one work: moreover the more artistic and difficult part of the work, the figure sculpture, is entrusted to the Dutchmen. It is to the latter probably that the general lines of the design are due. The detail is sufficiently English; not so the general design. For the Windsor stallwork is intermediate between that of Chester (c. 1390) and Carlisle (1433) on the one hand, and Ripon (c. 1490) and Manchester (1508) on the other. But it is not a development arising out of either of the earlier designs, nor was the stallwork of Ripon and Manchester in any way a development from that of Windsor.
- ↑ Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries, i. 112.
- ↑ For information relating to the Windsor stalls I am indebted to Mr W. H. St John Hope: see his paper "On a remarkable series of Wooden Busts surmounting the stall-canopies in St George's chapel, Windsor," in Archæologia, liv. 115, and the building accounts to be published in his forthcoming work on Windsor Castle.
