contemporary dates, covering about 400 years, from the time of Harold
to Edward IV. The hangings may have been more effective than appears
at first sight, if the materials were rich and enlivened with gold. I
give two textile designs which in their style are peculiarly English
(plates 74, 75).

Now we enter on the age of romance and chivalry, when all domestic
decorations began to assume greater refinement. Carpets from the East
covered the rushes strewn on the floors, and splendid tents were
brought home by crusading knights; and the decorative arts of northern
Europe were once more permeated with Oriental taste and design.

We know that in the so-called "days of chivalry," i.e. from the
Conquest till the beginning of Henry VIII.'s reign, needlework was the
occupation of the women left in their castles, while the men were away
fighting for the cross, for the king, for their liberties, or for
booty.

This period included the Crusades, the Wars of the Roses, wars with
France, and rebellions at home; and yet there was a taste for art,
luxury, and show spreading everywhere.[586]

The women were expected to provide, with their looms and their
needles, the heraldic surcoats, the scarves and banners, and the
mantles for state occasions.[587] They also worked the hangings for
the hall and chapel, and adorned the altars and the priests'
vestments. Alas! time, taste, and the moth have shared in the
destruction of these gauds. The taste for the "baroc" is a new
acquisition; no one cared for what was old, merely because it was old.
The rich replaced their hangings and their clothes when they became
shabby; the poor let them go to pieces, and probably burned the old
stuff and the embroideries for the sake of the gold thread, which was
of intrinsic value. But both in prose and poetry we read descriptions
of beautiful works in the loom, or on the frame, executed by fair
ladies for the gallant knights whose lives and prowess these poems
have preserved to us. I will give one quotation from that of Emare,
in Ritson's collection: "Her mantle was wroughte by a faire Paynim,
the Amarayle's daughter." This occupied her seven long years. In each
corner is depicted a pair of lovers, "Sir Tristram and Iseult--Sir
Amadis and Ydoine, &c., &c. These pictures were adorned with precious
stones." The figures were portrayed--

"With stones bright and pure,
With carbuncle and sapphire,
Kalsedonys and onyx clere,
Sette in golde