As the exhibit makes clear, 15th-century England may have been rent by the Wars of the Roses at home and sporadic fighting against the French abroad, but it was hardly a cultural backwater. Wealthy, cosmopolitan lords sought out the best craftsmen across Europe, commissioning intricately illuminated books from France and embroidered cloth from Italy. Superb paintings from the Netherlands, displaying a subtle, new mastery of tone, were in high demand, as were lavish tapestries and intricate stained glass depicting vivid religious and everyday scenes. In between battles against the French, Henry V’s brother, the bibliophile warrior Duke of Bedford, picked up a gorgeous pair of illuminated manuscripts in Paris, which are reunited at the V&A for the first time in six centuries.
“Gothic” comes amid a general resurgence of interest in medieval culture. The BBC has been airing an adaptation of Chaucer’s poem “The Canterbury Tales,” the first piece of literature ever written about ordinary people in common English. Rather than draw on the set shop’s colorful staple of medieval castles, horses and hooded monks, however, the series moves the story to modern England. The staggeringly frank, much-married Wife of Bath, for instance, is effectively recast as a volatile soap-opera actress, who beautifully brings home Chaucer’s point about the different standards that apply to men and women. Such treatment emphasizes the universal appeal and ongoing relevance of medieval tales. Likewise, novelist Peter Ackroyd recently won a huge following with his murder mystery, “The Clerkenwell Tales,” which is based on Chaucerian characters.
For better and worse, the Gothic period has always been a favorite target of historians. Thinkers during the 16th-century Renaissance–and the Enlightenment 200 years later–liked to caricature the medieval world as unpredictable and terrifying, where life was shrouded by superstition, virulent plagues, violent justice and a brutal, byzantine Roman Catholic faith. Seventeenth-century classicists like John Evelyn loathed Gothic architecture with its “sharp Angles… lame Statues, Lace and other Cut-work and Crinkle-Crankle.” The 18th-century Gothic revival was based on nostalgia: the melancholy of a lost past, patriotism and closeness to nature.
But the Gothic era does lend itself easily to drama. From the narrow slit in Henry V’s heavy iron helmet–one of the scariest displays at the V&A–you can almost hear the echo of his battle cry on the eve of Agincourt: “God for Harry, England and Saint George!” Henry VIII’s immense suit of armor and Margaret of York’s stunning, jewel-laden crown–one of only two medieval crowns that survive–are thrilling evocations of medieval wealth and power. “It’s raw history, fragile and dangerous,” says Richard Marks, curator of the V&A exhibit.
The scars of the era’s political and religious upheavals are visible throughout the show. It ambitiously re-creates a 15th-century parish church, whose battered interior is a testimony to Henry VIII’s furious determination to eradicate the Catholic faith from England after the pope refused to grant him a divorce from Catherine of Aragon. The exhibit includes the most complete surviving carved rood figure, a small statue of Christ commonly displayed in churches before that time. It’s been whittled to a point at the bottom; later vicars apparently used it as a poker for the fire. Above a 15th-century painted screen is an exquisite example of medieval English stained glass, featuring Christ risen from the dead as the central figure.
It is the relentless, underlying sense that life could end at any moment, an awareness of the fragility of earthly power and prosperity, that ultimately makes this era so compelling. That feeling delivers the power behind some of Shakespeare’s greatest lines: “You may my glories and my state depose, but not my griefs; still am I king of those,” laments Richard II. Though Henry VII’s descendants went on to establish stable government and justice in England, Marks says, “the Tudor dynasty for a lot of the time was very insecure.” Why else would Henry VII emboss his arms or image in stained-glass windows, coins, even the beautiful set of Italian woven mass vestments he lavished on Westminster Abbey? In 1485 he was simply another usurper, who needed to bolster his precarious claim to the throne with bravado.
Perhaps the most poignant relics on display are those that illuminate a more mundane existence: tiny toys, tin badges bought by pilgrims as souvenirs, the wax offerings they left at shrines. They might have been owned by the vivid, storytelling pilgrims of “The Canterbury Tales.” (One of the book’s first editions is also on display.) “The characters of Chaucer’s pilgrims are the characters which compose all ages and nations,” William Blake wrote 250 years ago. Thanks to the V&A, that includes this one as well.
