Flowervases on your table, yes or no?
Interpretation work is an enduring effort to question everything that is taken for granted in your modern life. One question we have been asking ourselves is, weither flower vases were common on the 14th century table.
Let’s have a look at the sources….
The sources are rare, but there are a few examples of vases in the 14th century:
1340-50, Maigen Österreich, Filialkirche St. Johannes der Täufer
Duccio di Buoninsegna, Altar in Siena
And Lorenzetti, around 1340 in Italy
For the 15th century, it is much easier:
Maria am Gestade Altar around 1460
And a whole collection right here
A 1470s bed embellished with roses
Unfortunately none of these pictures show a flower vase on the dining table. Although there are plenty of dining tables to be found in original pictures, people of the late medieval centuries seemed to have preferred fine tablecloth, expensive candleholders, Aquamaniles, fine tindishes and fragile classes as decoration (with a practical component) rather than flower vases and -arrangements.
But let’s see the good side in that, it leaves more space for medieval delicacies on the table :-)
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