Gold and Glass Going North

This book presents the results of years of research on Limoges enamels in the medieval Norwegian Church province (established 1152/1153). This is the first study of the 133, more-or-less complete, surviving objects. In presenting this new knowledge, the book aims to stimulate further research about the material culture of the Middle Ages, and to provide an important resource for those studying churches and places in the Nordic countries, medieval art and especially Limoges enamels.

Over 4000 of the French enamels probably found their way to the northern fringes of Europe in the 13th century. This estimate is based on the numbers of preserved objects and pieces that have been discovered in Norwegian medieval churches, as well as on the references to such items in the Icelandic church inventories. The results of this new study question some of the earlier interpretations accepted by European medievalists.

The lustrous copperworks of the Limousin district were known throughout Europe in the Middle Ages. Their products – reliquaries, crucifixes, candlesticks, book-covers, censers – embellishing churches and coffrets, boxes, belt buckles and harness fittings, revealed the success of the elite. Yet, these works have not received much attention in the Nordic countries, and the secular enamels have been particularly underestimated. We have no evidence for the location and organisation of workshops, or to the diffusion of products, including exports to the Nordic countries. The author argues that enamels destined for Norway, and probably Iceland too, travelled by established sea routes and reached Bergen via the port of London.

The book keeps the object at the centre, explores its setting and history and emphasises that the enamel itself supplies the main information; it becomes a source to itself. The focus is not the traditional art historical study of typologies and styles; instead, the key theme is the cultural context of the enamels and the visual vocabulary, supplied by the ecclesiastical conventions, that they convey. The enamellers consistently employed the same imagery from the 12th–14th centuries. Yet, the works reveal amazing individual variations and are a remarkable fusion of creativity and continuity – no two are identical.

The role of these liturgical objects is as guides to devotion. Accordingly, a specific survey of the crowned and robed Christ enamels reveals that he is epitomised not only as King, but also as High Priest and Celebrant of the Mass: he thus becomes a mediator between God in Heaven and the earthly congregation. The author also explores the effect on Limoges enamels from renewed interest in the Middle Ages in the 18th–20th centuries: the production of modern enamels in ‘the Limoges style’ (fakes), and the dismounting of medieval enamels and re-use in modern contexts. This suggests that the acknowledged Catholic allegories have been lost in the transformation process.

The surviving collection from medieval Norway reveals that rare, exclusive enamels are outnumbered by the more modest ones meant for a wider market. Yet, every single item is proof of and a unique source for the history of Nordic material culture in the Middle Ages.