(1942). Mural Painting of the Three Livings and the Three Dead In England. Journal of the British Archaeological Association: Vol. 7, No. 1, pp. 31-40.

This dissertation examines approaches to illustrating the Three Living and the Three Dead, a moralizing tale known across Europe in the late Middle Ages. Illustrated versions of the texts survive in a number of different manuscript contexts. While the earliest depictions show an apparently benign conversation occurring between living and dead, by the late fifteenth century other ways of illustrating the tale had emerged. The most striking of these was the aggressive chase after the living by the dead, which most often accompanied the prayers of the Office of the Dead in Books of Hours. While previous art historical investigations have concentrated on localization, chronology, as well as stylistic and formal analyses, my project engages with the larger questions of function, audience, and the relationship between text and image. The thesis begins by situating the Three Living and the Three Dead in the scholarship on the art of death of the late Middle Ages. The art of that period has long been perceived as a reflection of a time of decline. This perspective was established mainly through consideration of large-scale monuments, mostly French and primarily

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Mural Painting of the Three Livings and the Three Dead In England

A Matter of Life and Death: Forms, Functions and Audiences for 'The Three Living and the Three Dead' in Late Medieval Manuscripts

Clothing ‘speaks’. The act of dressing confers narratives of identity upon the wearer. The elite of late-medieval England understood the significance of dress; they utilised rich materials, strong colours and contemporary fashions to express, visually, statements of identity. These attitudes inform the expansive descriptions of rich dress in Middle English romance, in which a wealth of valuable materials, opulent accoutrements and contemporary fashions appear. Dress functions in romance as a visual representation of identity, providing an avenue through which wider thematic concerns find expression. For the Fair Unknown, the attaining of chivalric dress represents the integration of the individual into the courtly society. In the Middle English Breton lais, dress illustrates the internal fortitude of the Constance figure; it communicates also the transience of chivalric bonds and of kingship. In the northern Gawain romances, arming rituals and rich visual display represent the means through which chivalric communities affirm their identities. Using sociocultural detail, this study explores the significance of dress in Middle English romance, demonstrating that dress in romance suggests publically inner aspects of identity.

Dress, identity and visual display : self-fashioning in Middle English romance

Studies of English medieval funerary practice have paid limited attention to the curation of human remains in charnel houses. Yet analysis of architectural, archaeological and documentary evidence,...

Mural Painting of the Three Livings and the Three Dead In England

Citations

A Matter of Life and Death: Forms, Functions and Audiences for 'The Three Living and the Three Dead' in Late Medieval Manuscripts

Dress, identity and visual display : self-fashioning in Middle English romance

Charnel practices in medieval England: new perspectives

Other Thought‐Worlds

The Interpretation of English Medieval Wall-Paintings: A Retrospective