Sudbury Pall

The Sudbury Pall, now in the Ipswich Museum. The Sudbury Pall, now in the Ipswich Museum.

The Sudbury pall, also called the Alderman's pall, is a fifteenth century ceremonial cloth that was draped over coffins in Sudbury (Suffolk, England). It was originally used in St. Gregory’s Church, Sudbury and was later moved to St. Peter’s Church in the same town. It is currently housed in the Ipswich Museum (Suffolk).  

The pall was used to cover the coffins of important people, especially the masters of Simon’s College, Sudbury. This college was founded and named after Simon of Sudbury (c. 1316 -1381), who was Archbishop of Canterbury between 1375 and 1381. He was executed at Tower Hill, London, during the Peasant’s Revolt.

The pall dates from the fifteenth century. It is regarded as a rare example of pre-Reformation ecclesiastical embroidery. The ground cloth of the pall is maroon silk velvet, with applied, embroidered slips. The embroidery is sometimes described as being carried out in the opus anglicanum technique, but it is not. The work has the appearance of being locally made using gold and silver threads, as well as coloured silk threads using various stitches including satin stitch.

Along the long sides, the central area is dominated by an embroidered figure of a woman with a prayer scroll encircling her head. The prayer scroll contains quotations from the Vulgate (Latin Bible). On either side of the kneeling figure are vases of lilies in gold and silver thread. There are also traces of a large, presumably embroidered crucifix on top of the pall. It may have been removed in the mid-seventeenth century when crucifixes of any type were banned in England. 

Digital sources:

Digital source of illustration (retrieved 3 June 2016).

GVE

Last modified on Tuesday, 14 March 2017 21:26
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