Chaucer's Friar John and the Place of the Cat Though subsequently never quite attaining the statu... more Chaucer's Friar John and the Place of the Cat Though subsequently never quite attaining the status it held in ancient Egypt, the cat has undoubtedly always held a special place in the West. Spreading first to Italy, and then throughout Europe as the Roman Empire expanded, the cat had, by the late Middle Ages, established itself very much on account of its practical attributes. The Bestiary, for example, drawing upon Isidore of Seville, informs us that, "[t]he cat (musio) is so named because it is inimical to mice (muribus)." 1 Consequently, although divested of the sacred status accorded to it by the Egyptians, the cat made itself perfectly at home within sacred spaces as readily as it did in the domestic environment, its characteristic independence no doubt accounting for its ubiquity in both spheres. 2 The Bestiary goes on to note that: People call this animal cat (catus), from prey (captura); some say because it seeks (captat), that is, it observes. For it sees so keenly, that it overcomes the darkness of night with the brightness of day. Wherefore, "cat" comes from the Greek, that is, cunning. [Hunc vulgus catum a captura vocant; alii dicunt quod captat, id est, videt. Nam tanto acute cernit, ut fulgore luminis noctis tenebras superet. Unde a Greco venit catus, it est, ingeniosus.] 3 Cunning the cat may be but, as with most examples derived from Isidore, the Bestiary resists the easy temptation of allegory and moralisation. Instead, it is described very much in terms of its workaday function: the cat is by virtue of its physical attributes a
The wealth of stained and painted glass which survives in York Minster is without parallel in Bri... more The wealth of stained and painted glass which survives in York Minster is without parallel in Britain, and one of the most striking features is the well-preserved sequence of early fourteenth-century windows in the north aisle of the nave (nXXIII to nXXVII, nXXIX being a hybrid of later fourteenth-to sixteenthcentury insertions). These windows clearly display the prevalent aesthetic of window design of the period; the`banded' effect of alternating panels of grisaille and richly coloured historiated panels. Upon closer inspection, however, three particular windows show a striking divergence from the norm, not for formal or major iconographic reasons, but for the distinctive character of the minor decoration that fills the borders. These are the Bell-Founder's Window (nXXIV), the Penancer's Window (nXXVII) and the Pilgrimage Window (nXXV; plate 46). I shall, in the present paper, consider the latter, with particular reference to the`monkeys' funeral' in the lower border. This image, however, must not be considered in isolation but in the context of the whole window.
Chaucer's Friar John and the Place of the Cat Though subsequently never quite attaining the statu... more Chaucer's Friar John and the Place of the Cat Though subsequently never quite attaining the status it held in ancient Egypt, the cat has undoubtedly always held a special place in the West. Spreading first to Italy, and then throughout Europe as the Roman Empire expanded, the cat had, by the late Middle Ages, established itself very much on account of its practical attributes. The Bestiary, for example, drawing upon Isidore of Seville, informs us that, "[t]he cat (musio) is so named because it is inimical to mice (muribus)." 1 Consequently, although divested of the sacred status accorded to it by the Egyptians, the cat made itself perfectly at home within sacred spaces as readily as it did in the domestic environment, its characteristic independence no doubt accounting for its ubiquity in both spheres. 2 The Bestiary goes on to note that: People call this animal cat (catus), from prey (captura); some say because it seeks (captat), that is, it observes. For it sees so keenly, that it overcomes the darkness of night with the brightness of day. Wherefore, "cat" comes from the Greek, that is, cunning. [Hunc vulgus catum a captura vocant; alii dicunt quod captat, id est, videt. Nam tanto acute cernit, ut fulgore luminis noctis tenebras superet. Unde a Greco venit catus, it est, ingeniosus.] 3 Cunning the cat may be but, as with most examples derived from Isidore, the Bestiary resists the easy temptation of allegory and moralisation. Instead, it is described very much in terms of its workaday function: the cat is by virtue of its physical attributes a
The wealth of stained and painted glass which survives in York Minster is without parallel in Bri... more The wealth of stained and painted glass which survives in York Minster is without parallel in Britain, and one of the most striking features is the well-preserved sequence of early fourteenth-century windows in the north aisle of the nave (nXXIII to nXXVII, nXXIX being a hybrid of later fourteenth-to sixteenthcentury insertions). These windows clearly display the prevalent aesthetic of window design of the period; the`banded' effect of alternating panels of grisaille and richly coloured historiated panels. Upon closer inspection, however, three particular windows show a striking divergence from the norm, not for formal or major iconographic reasons, but for the distinctive character of the minor decoration that fills the borders. These are the Bell-Founder's Window (nXXIV), the Penancer's Window (nXXVII) and the Pilgrimage Window (nXXV; plate 46). I shall, in the present paper, consider the latter, with particular reference to the`monkeys' funeral' in the lower border. This image, however, must not be considered in isolation but in the context of the whole window.
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