Livery collars on late-medieval English church monuments : a survey of the south-western counties and some suggestion for further study

Abstract

The objectives of the thesis are threefold. First, to propose a classification of livery collars based on archaeological evidence. Second, to analyse the evidence, both archaeological and documentary, in order to improve our understanding of the nature of the livery collar. And, third, to consider the significance of the armorial devices depicted on livery collars. In order to achieve the first objective, it was necessary to compile a provisional catalogue of collars on monuments throughout England, Ireland and Wales (Appendix B). In the event, these were found to be so numerous that detailed study was confined to the 44 examples in the south-western counties of Cornwall, Devon, Dorset, Gloucestershire, Hampshire, Somerset and Wiltshire. These have been visited, measured, sketched, photographed and catalogued (in Appendix A). The thesis is in four chapters. Chapter 1 is an introduction in which the livery collar is defined and the scope and format of the study set out. Chapter 2 deals with the development of armorial badges, the practice of livery and maintenance, the nature of the livery collar, and the various Lancastrian and Yorkist devices of which the majority of collars are formed. Chapter 3 provides an analysis of the collars in the study area and the sample is placed in a national context. Chapter 4 sets out a series of conclusions and suggestions for further research. Far from suggesting a precise, thematic or chronological classification of livery collars on late Medieval and Tudor effigies, the study has revealed only two categories of collar. The first, those collars composed of Lancastrian or Yorkist devices, is self-evident. The second, those Lancastrian collars which date from the pre-1461 period and are characterised by toret clasps and annulet pendants, requires fiarther research beyond the study area. The available evidence suggests that collars in effigial figures which are neither Lancastrian nor Yorkist are personal collars and not the livery collars of other affinities. It also suggests that, while the nobility only occasionally incorporated a collar on their effigies, those who held less exalted positions in the medieval establishment almost invariably commemorated their success by the inclusion of a collar. No evidence has been found which might assist in determining whether collars as depicted on effigies were copied from real life, from drawings or from templates. It is suggested that it may be possible to trace, by reference to a wider sample and to documentary evidence, a stylistic transition from collars which were distributed in the fifl;eenth century as livery to those which were granted as insignia of office in the Tudor period.

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