Page:Archaeological Journal, Volume 5.djvu/264

 204 NOTICES OF ANCIENT ORNAMENTS consort of Edward II., the following entry appears. " De Capella. Duo flagella pro muscis fngandis. Duas pixides de ebore et unum coffinum pro pane imponendo," &c., 33 Edw. III. 1359. John Newton, treasurer of York Minster, be- tween the years 1393 and 1413, gave a sacred fan to that church, as noticed in the following entry in a description of its valuable possessions, taken at the Reformation. — " Manu- brium flabelli argenteum deauratum, ex dono Joh. Newton Thesaurarii, cum ymagine Episcopi in fine enamelyd, pond' V. unc." In the costly furniture of the chapel of Wilham Exeter, abbot of Bury St. Edmund's, according to the CotU' potus dated 1429, preserved in the register of his successor, William Curteys, occurs — "j. muscifugium de pecok." By the extracts from the churchwardens' accounts at Walberswick, Suffolk, we learn that occasionally it was even found in small parochial churches, in rural districts. Under the year 1493, is the payment, " for a bessume of pekoks fethers, iv. d.^" These examples may amply suffice to shew that this usage of eastern origin had been adopted pretty generally in western countries, where, as in our own, it could in no degree be I'ccpiisite, as regarded its original intention. A few ancient Jluhdla have been preserved on the continent, and I regret to be unable here to offer representations of any : they are very rarely represented in illuminated MSS., and one such design alone has hitherto been published ; it is given by Paciaudi from a Service Book written early in the thirteenth century, and preserved in the Barberini Library^, In default of an illustration from any muscarium, actually in existence, I have to offer two curious exhibitions of its use, taken from the ilhnninated MSS. preserved in the public Library at Bouen. In one of these, a missal of the thirteenth centmy, formerly belonging to the abbey of Jumieges, and known at Rouen by the class mark 234 — 412, the priest appears attended by the deacon and sub-deacon, in front of the altar, upon which is placed the chalice covered : the first, standing immediately behind him, raises the flabellum, a circular fan, the centre of which is coloured green, with a broad border of red ; this .fan is attached to a long handle. The sub-deacon standing be- hind holds up with both hands an object which appears to ' Gardner's Uist. of Dunwich, p. 185. or fann to drive away flies from the chalice." It is singular that so late as 1688, Holmes p. 465. in his Academy of Armory, amongst things b Pauli Paciaxidi de Umbellae gestatione pertaining to an altar enumerates " the flap Commentarius, Roma, 1752, p. Ixiii.