Page:Archaeological Journal, Volume 1.djvu/226

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208
SEPULCHRAL BRASSES, AND INCISED SLABS.

Hertfordshire; and an interesting plate in the church of St. Mary-Key, Ipswich, an excellent representation of which is given by Shaw in his Dresses and Decorations. To this list may be added the fine brass of Robert Attelath, formerly to be seen at Lynn: the plate was sold for five shillings by a dishonest sexton, who is said to have hung himself, through remorse, and the only memorial of this figure now known to exist is the impression taken by Craven Ord, which may be seen at the British Museum. A few other Flemish specimens may probably be found in England, such as the noble figure of an ecclesiastic at Wensley, Yorkshire, but the greater number of our sepulchral brasses appear to have been executed in England, an opinion which is corroborated by certain peculiarities of costume and ornament, and the letter used in the inscriptions. It particularly deserves to be noticed, that, with scarcely a single known exception, the brasses of France and Flanders differed from those commonly used in England, in this respect, that they were formed of one large unbroken sheet of metal, the field or back-ground being richly diapered to set off the figures, whereas in England the slab of dark grey marble, to which the brass was affixed, served as the field; the figure, the scutcheons, the surrounding architectural decorations, and the inscriptions, being all formed of separate pieces of metal, which were affixed in separate cavities, prepared on the face of the slab to receive them. It will not be forgotten that the small number of brasses which have been noticed above as of Flemish workmanship, differ from other brasses in England in this feature, and accord with the fashion which appears to have been usually adopted on the continent, possibly because the brass plate, which was there manufactured, was more readily procured in sheets of large dimension, whereas in England no manufacture of brass plate existed, previously to the establishment of works at Esher by a German, in 1649. A remarkable example, conformable in every respect to the brasses of the same period which exist in England, has recently been noticed in Constance cathedral, a representation of which may be seen in the Archæologia, vol. xxx. It is the memorial of Robert Hallum, bishop of Salisbury, the special envoy of Henry V. to the Council of Constance, who dying there in 1416, during the sitting of the Council, was interred with great solemnity. It is asserted traditionally that this brass was brought from