mosaics, and other ornamental materials, brought to England by Edward I.[1] There is no mention certainly of any artists employed, but we may fairly presume that men who understood the application of these decorative accessories, were sent with them.
Mr. T. Hudson Turner, who has devoted much time to the examination of the records, has been unable to supply more ample information on the names of artists employed in the public works in England during the middle ages.
The records inform us that the design of the effigy of Queen Eleanor at Westminster, was furnished by Master William Torell, goldsmith, the canopy of the monument being painted by Walter de Durham. Mr. Hudson Turner suggests, and I am of his opinion, that Torell's name was Anglicised from Guglielmo Torelli. He was contemporaneous with William the Florentine.
It appears that there were two statues of Queen Eleanor, the second being a fac-simile of the first, taken probably from the model of that by Torell at Westminster, and placed over the viscera of the queen in Lincoln cathedral. There were also other smaller statues, three of which were made by William de Suffolk, others by Master Alexander de Abyngton, and one by Dymenge de Legery, or "de Reyns," destined for the tomb in the church of the Black Friary, London, in which the queen's heart was deposited.
The crosses at Northampton, Stony Stratford, Woburn, Dunstable, and St. Alban's, were the work of John de Bello, or Battle; and John de Pabeham, in one instance, is mentioned as his "socius;" these were the "cementarii," or builders: the statues were the work of William de Hibernia, who executed also fifteen other statues, assisted by Alexander, called the "Imaginator."
Waltham cross, the most splendid of the works of this character, has by some been ascribed to Nicholas Dymenge, a foreigner; Roger de Crundale and Alexander the "Imaginator" being employed in the decorations.
The cross at Westcheap appears to have been of a more costly character; Michael de Canterbury, called "cementarius," is the only name mentioned in the records relating to its construction.
- ↑ Compare Weever, Funeral Mon. 185; Walpole's Anecdotes of Painting, vol. i. c. 1.
