Spanisshe Stiche

Painting of Elizabeth I, by unknown artist. 1590. The blackwork is probably carried out with the double running stitch. Painting of Elizabeth I, by unknown artist. 1590. The blackwork is probably carried out with the double running stitch.

The 'Spanisshe stiche' was a mid-sixteenth century English term for a double running stitch (also known as the Holbein stitch). In Henry VIII’s inventory of 1547, for example, there is a reference to a cloth (either a napkin or coverpane) “wrought with redde Spanisshe stiche mailed betwixt two borders".

Source: MITCHELL, David (1998). 'Coverpanes: their nature and use in Tudor England,' CIETA Bulletin 75, pp. 81-96.

Digital source of illustration (retrieved 8th July 2016).

GVE

Last modified on Saturday, 13 May 2017 17:41