The Cleveland Museum of Art

Collection Online as of June 22, 2025

Chasuble with Orphrey Band

1500–1520
(embroidery) and Italy, Florence (velvet)
Silk, gold thread, sequins; appliqué, embroidery: couching stitches Velvet: solid pile, silk; embroidery: or nué (shaded gold)
Overall: 122.5 x 74 cm (48 1/4 x 29 1/8 in.)
Gift of Walter C. and Alvin W. Littwitz in memory of their father, Max Littwitz 1947.2
Location: not on view

Description

The English adopted a simpler style of embroidering vestments suitable for mass production around 1500. Isolated motifs, often floral, were embroidered on plain velvet, as in this ecclesiastical chasuble.

The orphrey, or embroidered band, in the center depicts Saints Peter, John the Evangelist, and Andrew, identified by their names and attributes (top to bottom). Most of the surface is covered with gold thread sewn down by silk thread passing over it in different densities to create the effect of modeling. Silk thread was also used to embroider areas of skin and hair (mostly disintegrated).
  • Young, Bonnie. "Opus Anglicanum." The Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin 29, no. 7 (1971): 291-98. Accessed December 20, 2020. p. 291-298 3258645
    Staniland, Kay. Embroiderers. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1991.
    Monnas, Lisa. 1994. "Opus Anglicanum and Renaissance Velvet: The Whalley Abbey Vestments". Textile History 25:1. p. 3-28
    Bergemann, Uta-Christiane. “Serial Production of Embroidered Orphreys in the Late Middle Ages.” in Wetter, Evelin, and Michael Bangert. Iconography of Liturgical Textiles in the Middle Ages. Riggisberg: Abegg-Stiftung, 2010. p. 171-182
    Heard, Kate. “‘All holie companye of heaven’: Uniformity and Individuality in the Iconography of Late Medieval English Orphreys.” In Wetter, Evelin, and Michael Bangert. Iconography of Liturgical Textiles in the Middle Ages. Riggisberg: Abegg-Stiftung, 2010. p. 155-162
    Browne, Clare Woodthorpe, Glyn Davies, M. A. Michael, and Michaela Zöschg. English Medieval Embroidery: Opus Anglicanum. 2016.
    Michael, M. A. The Age of Opus Anglicanum. 2016.
  • Art of Embroidery in Late Medieval Europe (Textile Rotation) - Gallery 115. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (December 19, 2020-April 11, 2021).
    Only for Beauty? (Textile Rotation) - Gallery 115. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (December 8, 2014-December 7, 2015).
    Draped in Splendor: Renaissance Textiles and the Church. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (September 7, 2003-September 26, 2004).
  • {{cite web|title=Chasuble with Orphrey Band|url=false|author=|year=1500–1520|access-date=22 June 2025|publisher=Cleveland Museum of Art}}

Source URL:

https://www.clevelandart.org/art/1947.2