A milestone for the Thomas tapestry

Anne and Katinka busy with the St. Thomastapestry in the Kemenade of castle Ammersoyen, 10 June 2019

Previous two weekends we have been active with living history at both castle Ammersoyen (together with the re-enactment group Het Woud der Verwachting) and at the Historic open air museum in Eindhoven. The ladies of our group have been very busy working on the recreation of the Thomasteppich (of which the original resides in cloister Wienhausen in Germany). Last Sunday Katinka finalised the first row of the tapestry, which allowed us to see this part of the story of Saint Thomas in its full glory.

The last few stitches by Katinka before this row is finished: five-and-a-half years work.

 Embroidering the last threads of the first row of the St.Thomastapestry in the Historic open air museum in Eindhoven, the Netherlands.

 

The complete view of the first row of the Thomas tapestry.

 The first row of the Thomasteppich on the table.

Earlier that Sunday, St. Thomas (in the small shrine) clearly blessed that day's work on the tapestry.

A new visit to Kloster Wienhausen

Yesterday we went for our second visit to Kloster Wienhausen in Germany. This cloister - one of the six protestant female convents around the Luneburger Moor - hosts the famous Thomasteppich dating from the fourteeth century. During our first visit, five years ago, we saw the Thomastapestry for the first time and Anne and Katinka hatched the plan to embroider a (bit smaller(but still large) replica of this tapestry. Several blog posts have shown the progress of their work and now we wanted to show and compare the tapestries. We also had some questions on the tapestry which we hoped to solve as well. Like the previous time one of the konventualinnen - Frau Daenicke, who is also an expert on the tapestry stitchings - showed us around and answered our curiousity.

 

Our tapestries at the entrance of the cloister together with konventonalin Frau Daenicke.

The rows of the original tapestry were embroidered separately, just like Anne and Katinka are doing. However, the linen shrinks during the embroidery process, so both our rows likely end up having a slightly different width. Did this also happen with the original tapestry? This is quite possible. The end scene of the second row shows Thomas in prison. Next to the prison is a tree with a cut-off branch, but there are still some lines of blue and green next to it, which could indicate an extension of the row. On the other side of the same row, the space next to the throne is relatively large.

Another of our questions was how the rows were fixed to each other. This could probably be seen from the backside of the tapestry; however, as the tapestry nowadays is fixed in its showcase, this was not possible to see. There was however a part of another tapestry where the method of attachment could be seen. For this fragment, a 'hexenstich' was used, which is used for instance for seams and is a bit elastic. With this knowledge we again had turned our attention to the original Thomasteppich. What we then noticed was that the rows of text were neatly attached to the rows with the images. Likely the sewing together of both image-rows was hidden beneath the text row; and the added text row thus provided extra strength to the tapestry.

Some parts of the Thomastapestry have been cut off, most notably the top decorative row and part of the left decorative row that surrounds the tapestry. According to Frau Daenicke, there are still some fragments of the tapestry in the museum depot, e.g. a dragon that used to be part of the top row. The top row would thus have looked more or less similar to the bottom row.

Another thing we noticed was that the wool the nuns used to embroider the Thomasteppich was much thicker that the wool used by us. The spinned threads also looked more rough, having thicker dots of wool at places along the threads. Such unequal thickness of the thread have made embroidering more difficult for the nuns.

 

The 'old' and 'new' Thomastapestries together in the museumroom. 

From our tapestry 2 rows are almost ready (lying on the table).

After the meeting of the Thomas tapestries, we also received a small tour of this inspiring convent were we were shown some additional Thomasses, as well as some unique and interesting medieval furniture.

 'Unbelieving' St. Thomas on the ceiling of the nonnenchor of the chapel. The complete walls and ceilings of the chapel are covered with paintings dating from the 1325 (of course restored as can be seen by the bright colours). It is an impressive sight, showing the wealth of colour in medieval buildings.

'Unbelieving' St. Thomas putting his finger into the ressurected Christ. It is one of the images on the inside of the doors of the 'holy grave' reliquary shrine of Kloster Wienhausen. The shrine itself dates from the late thirteenth century. The inside shows 30 scenes of the Vitae Christi. The paintings on the shrine seem to be of a later date, more likely 15th century, according to the type of clothing the figures are wearing. The texts on the Thomas image are: D(omi)n(u)s meus et deus meus. [My Lord and my God] by Thomas. Mitte manum tuam et cognosce loca clauorum  [Take thy hand and know the place of the nails] by Christ. A complete description of the scenes and texts can be found on this site [in German].

Thomasteppich embroidery: the second and a halfpanel.

Anne has nearly finished the second panel of the Thomasteppich; only a tree needed to be 'greened'. As the next scene consists of only half a panel, she decided to move the panel now. When the tapestry was loose from the frame, I took the opportunity to make a one minute video of the embroidered story of Saint Thomas so far. Below two photo's of the 'old' and the 'new' panel in the frame.

Left: the 'old'panel with the unfinished tree. Right: the new panel, with the last scene of this row of the tapestry.

 

 

The unrolled second row of the st. Thomas tapestry. On the left there is also 1.5 panel to do.

Thomasteppich: the first panel finished!

Last weekend we were at the historic open air museum in Eindhoven, the Netherlands. While the men of the St.Thomasguild did all the hard work, the ladies were very busy embroidering. But with results! The first panel of the tapestry was finished; and the second one is nearly finished as well!

It was indeed hard labour for the men of the St. Thomasguild ...

  The first panel finished. Details and faces that were also on the original tapestry, but have disappeared (or better faded) through time.

Katinka's panel is also nearing completion. At the end of the day she only needed to do a small piece of green and the details of the faces.

With the first panel finished Anne moved the canvas roll to the next the next scene of the Thomasteppich: St. Thomas spending the money for the King's palace to the poor and his imprisonment. But there was a surprise! We we unrolled the canvas it became apparent that some years ago Anne already had outlined some of the scenes and windows with black wool. The new canvas panel was fastened again with extra thick thread (as shown in a previous post in July 2013) at the short sides first, followed by the long sides. The tensioning is necessary, as embroidery will cause the canvas to "shrink". When we measured both the embroidered panel and the unembroidered canvas, a difference of 1 cm had occurred. This difference would have been much larger without tensioning of the canvas.

  

The next scene is unfurled ... with already some embroidery on it!

First the short sides of the frame are attached to the frame, followed by the long side. Note that the thread is first attached in the middle of the frame.

The second panel at the end of the weekend. One the left side, a horse of the first panel is watching the new scene. You can also see the difference in height of the embroidered and unembroidered piece.

'Do you think we get some apples at the end of the day?' 'No, Thomas will surely give them to the poor - as always'

'Sire, I have seen Thomas cheating on you with your gold. You must take care of this untrustworthy unbeliever' "I will send my noble knight to seize him!

'Here rides the gallant knight on his noble quest, to imprison the vile stinkard Thomas.'

 

Progress on the Thomasteppich: August 2014 - April 2015

Anne embroidering in the great hall of castle Hernen. The beautiful sun rays were created by the smoke of coming from the fireplace in the next room which had a badly working chimney. Photo made by Geldersch Landschap en Kastelen.

Like the previous progress report on the Thomasteppich embroidery project, I have made a photo for most of the days from August 2014 to April 2015 when Anne did something with her part of the Thomasteppich, and turned these into another small video. During winter time not much was done on the teppich as we were working on our new house. However, the first panels of the tapestry are nearly finished, both that of Anne and Katinka.

St. Thomas in India: glass window versus tapestry

When I looked up the painted glass window of the joiners guild in Chartres cathedral (France) on internet, I accidentally stumbled upon another stained glass window depicting the same legend of St. Thomas in India that is on the Thomas tapestry in Wienhausen, Germany. This glass window is in one of the bays of the aisles of Chartres cathedral (see the red arrow on the cathedral map). The window was made between 1205 and 1235. It has a lancet form and is roughly 8.1 m long and 2.2 m wide. In comparison, the Thomas tapestry dates from the late 14th century and measures roughly 4 by 2 m.

 

              














It is interesting to compare both legends of St. Thomas and note the similarities and differences. The photos of the windows were made by Dr. Stuart Whatling and taken from his website on medieval glass windows, which is well worth checking out. The legend of St. Thomas starts at the bottom of the window and moves more or less zigzag to the top. The specific details of the reading order are found on this web-page. The detailed images of the Thomas tapestry make use a scanned photo from a book. The original tapestry hangs in Kloster Wienhausen.

The incredulity of the unbelieving St. Thomas. This scene was later in the 13th century added to the window

 Christ sends St. Thomas on a mission to evangelise India ('Ga int lant India').

 St. Thomas is given to Abbanes, an envoy of an Indian king, who seeks an architect.

 St. Thomas and Abbanes travel by boat to India and disembark on the shore.

St. Thomas is welcomed to a marriage feast.

  At the wedding feast Thomas refuses to eat, and is struck by the cupbearer.

The cupbearer is killed by a lion or bear, and a dog brings back the hand that had struck St. Thomas (see previous images).

Abbanes presents St. Thomas to King Gundophorus as his new architect.

 King Gundophorus provides St. Thomas with gold to build his new palace.

  King Gundophorus leaves for a long journey.

 Thomas erects churches instead of building a palace.

 The remainder of the money is divided among the poor.

 The King returns and throws St. Thomas into prison in order to be executed.

The kings brother, Gad, becomes very ill.

     

 Gad dies and is welcomed into heaven.

 

Gad is shown the palace in heaven that St. Thomas has build for his brother.

 

 Gad is resurrected and reconciles his brother with St. Thomas. Thomas baptises King Gundophorus and his people.

(St. Thomas moves on to the realm of King Mydeus. He converts his wife and children.) 

St. Thomas is captured and thrown into an oven, but survives.

 St. Thomas is commanded by King Mygdeus to worship an heathen idol.

Thomas orders the demon inside the idol to destroy its own temple.

The angry high priest of the temple slays St. Thomas with a sword.

Followers of St. Thomas bury his body.

Pilgrims go to the shrine of St. Thomas.

Pilgrims succumb to sleep at the shrine. St. Thomas returns from the grave to give his blessing to the pilgrims. The last part is only found in the tapestry and not part of the official 'lives' of the Saint.

Angels watch from above.