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HISTORY OF LACE.

CHAPTER VII.

FLANDERS.

“ For lace, lot Flanders bear away the belle.”

Sir C. Hanbunj Williuins.

“ In French embroidery nnd in Flanders laceI’ll spend the incomo of a treasurer’s place.”

The Man of Taste, Iter. IV. Bramstune.

Flanders and Italy together dispute the invention of lace. Inmany towns* of the Low Countries are pictures of the fifteenthcentury, in which are portrayed personages adorned with lace, 1and Baron Reiffenberg, a Belgian writer, 2 asserts that lacecornettes, or caps, were w'orn in that country as early as thefourteenth century. He also brings the evidence of contemporarypaintings, to show how early it was made. In a side chapel ofthe choir of St. Peter’s, at Louvain, is an altar-piece by QuentinMatsys, date 1495, in which a girl is represented making lacewith bobbins on a pillow with a drawer, similar to that now inuse. We have not seen the painting.- There exists a series ofengravings after Martin de Vos, 1581, giving the occupation ofthe seven ages of life: in the third, 3 assigned to “age mur,” isseen a girl sitting with a pillow on her knees, making lace(Fig. 45): the occupation must have been then common, or theartist would scarcely have chosen it to characterise the habits ofhis country.

The historian of the Duke of Burgundy 4 declares Charles theBold to have lost his “ dentelles ” at the battle of Granson, 1476;he does not state his authority: probably they were gold or silver.

In 1651, Jacob van Eyck, a Flemish poet, sang the praises oflace-making in Latin verse. “Of many arts, one surpasses all

1 Those in the collegiate church of 2 “ Mcmoires de l’Academie de Brux-St. Peter’s, at Louvain, and in tho ellos,” 1820.

church of St. Goinar, at Liurre (Antwerp 3 Engraved by Collaert. Bib. Nat. GravProvince).— Auhry. ' M. de Baraute.