User:Emanuel Davis

The Castle of Love and Knights Jousting


Gothic artist procuced lucurious objects for secular, as well as religious, contexts. Sometimes they decorated these costly pieces with stories inspired by the romjantic literature of the day, such as the famous story of Lancelot and Queen Guinevere, wife of King Aurthur of Camelot. One of the most interestin objects of this typeis a woman's jewely box. The castle of love is a lid of a jewelry casket, from Paris, France (currently displayed at Walters Art Museum, Baltimore) adorned with ivory relief panels. The story goes like this: Gathic knights attempt to capture love's fortress by shooting flowers from their bows and hurling baskets of roses over the walls from catapults. Among the castle's defenders is cupid, who aims his arrow at one of the knights while a comrade scales the walls on a ladder. The scene in the lid's two central sections shows two knights jousting on horseback. Several maidens look down on the contest from a balcony and cheer the knights on as trumpets blare. A youth in the crowd holds a hunting falcon. The sport was a favorite pastime of the leisure class in the late Middle Ages. At the right, the victorious knight receives his prize (a bonquet of roses) from a chastely dressed maiden on horseback. The scenes on the casket's sides include the famous medieval allegory of female virtue, the legend of the unicorn, a white horse with a single ivory horn. Only a virgin could attract the rare animal, and any woman who could do so thereby also demonstrated her moral purity. The Theme of the panel illustrated is related to the Romance of the Rose by Guillaume de Lorris, written ca. 1225 -1235 and completed by Jean de Meung between 1275 - 1280. Religious themes may have monopolized artistic production for churches in the Gathic age, but secular themes figured prominently in private contexts. Unfortunately, very few examples of the latter survived (Page 505)

The relief on the panels are very well detailed. The pacement of the iron poles and the half open rectangular shapped "door nocker" really makes it look like it can be opened. The artist made it look very lively and full of activity. You can see covers hanging from the balcony and the maiden interacting with one another at the same time, enjoying the show and cherrying on the knights that are jousting. But at the same time, the art work is kind of clumsy. At first glance, everything looks symetrical but the line on the brick wall and the slants on the windows and the roofs gives the art work a kind of active and fun feel to it.

Reference
Kleiner S. Fred, Mamiya J. Christin. Gardner’s Art Through the Ages. 12 Edition. 10 Davis Drive, Belmont,CA: Joan Keyes,2005

User:Emanuel Davis/The Castle of Love and Knights Jousting