PILGRIMS' SIGNS.

BY CECIL BRENT, F.S.A.

THE small Signacula which form the subject of the following paper are signs, or brooches of lead or pewter, mostly relating to St. Thomas à Becket, purchased by Pilgrims to shew that they had visited the shrine of the Martyr. These Signs were often sold at the Shrines by priests, who derived a large revenue from their sale.

At Dartford the Guild of All Saints in Overy Street, and the Guild of the Virgin in Spital Street, supplied Pilgrims to St. Thomas of Canterbury with such Signs. When Henry VIII ordered all pilgrimages to cease, and Becket to be declared a traitor, the altar of St. Thomas was removed. from Dartford Church, and the townspeople's trade in Signs was totally ruined. I have been informed that, at Canterbury, and in one or two other places, furnaces for melting the lead used in casting the Signs are still in existence. Dean Stanley, in his Memorials of Canterbury, states that the Pilgrims who visited the shrine received the blood of the Martyr mixed with water, in a small leaden bottle, or ampulla, which became a regular mark of Canterbury Pilgrims.

A sign in my collection is said to have been one of these bottles. Its height is 14-inch; its diameter is, at the mouth -inch; at the waist -inch; and at base -inch. Steps deeply worn away appear in the South aisle of the Trinity Chapel in Canterbury Cathedral, and it has been suggested that here Pilgrims knelt, to receive the blood. Besides these leaden bottles, pilgrims usually procured more common reminiscences, on their way back to the Inn.

Mercery Lane, the narrow street which led from the Cathedral to the Chequers Inn, in all probability was so

named from its shops and stalls, where objects of ornament, or devotion, were clamorously offered for sale, to the hundreds who flocked by, eager to carry away some memorial of their visit to Canterbury.

Every Pilgrim who visited the Shrine was expected to purchase a sign of the Saint, to be worn by him in his hat, or fastened to his garment. Most of the Signs bore a pin at the back for the purpose.

Erasmus, in his Colloquy of the Pilgrimage for religion's sake, makes Mendemus ask Ogygius, "But what strange dress is this? it is all over set off with shells scolloped, full of images of lead and tin, and chains of straw work, and the cuffs are adorned with snakes' eggs instead of bracelets." Ogygius answers, "I have visited St. James of Compostella,* and returning I visited the Virgin beyond the sea."

Giraldus Cambrensis in the twelfth century states that returning from the Continent, by way of Canterbury, he had on his arrival in London an interview with the Bishop of Winchester; the Bishop, seeing him and his companions with Signs of St. Thomas hung about their necks, remarked that he perceived they had just come from Canterbury.

In Urry's edition of the Prologue to the Canterbury Tales, published soon after Chaucer's death, we are told what the Pilgrims did on their arrival in Canterbury.

"Knelid adown tofore the shrine and hertlich their bedis
They preyd to Seint Thomas in such wyse as they couth ;
And sith the holy relikes ech man with his mowith
Kissid as a goodly monk the names told and taught.
And sith to othir places of holynes they raught
And wer in their devocioune tyl service wer al doon :
And sith they drowgh to dinerward as it drew to noon :
Then as manere and custom is signes there they bought ;
For men of contre shuld know whome they had sought
Eche man set his silver in such things as they liked:
And in the meen while the miller had ypikid
His bosom ful of signys of Caunterbury brochis;
Though the Pardoner and he pryvily in hir pouchis
They put them afterwards that noon of them it wist."

* Papal Bulls excommunicated those who dared to sell pilgrims' scallop shells except at Santiago. A pilgrimage to Compostella was as indispensable in the middle ages, as that to Mecca is for the Mohammedan. No fewer than 2460 licence for the pilgrimage were granted to Englishmen in the year 1434.

29 Mediæval Brooches and Pins worn by Pilgrims after visiting Shrines at Canterbury.

2/5ths of actual size.

afterwards

"They set their signys upon their hedes and som upon their capp
And sith to the dyneruard they gan for to strapp."

Pilgrims' Signs are also referred to in Piers Ploughman's Vision, when a Pilgrim is introduced, who

Bar by his side

an hundred of Ampulla

on his hat satin

Signs of Synia

and shells of Galicia.

Sir Walter Scott in Quentin Durward, describing Louis the Eleventh of France, says "his hat was ornamented with a paltry sign of the Virgin, in lead, such as the poorer sort of pilgrims bring from Loretto."

Pilgrims' Signs are seldom found in any place except in the bed of large rivers; numbers of them are found in the Thames. One has been found in the Ouse at York, and preserved in the York Museum, and is a fine specimen of the Ampulla of St. Thomas à Becket. A Sign of St. Thomas has been found in the Stour at Canterbury and one at Lynn.

M. Forgeais, in his Collection de Plombs Historiés, figures a fine Ampulla of St. Thomas, which was found in the Seine in 1862.

DESCRIPTION OF THE PILGRIMS' SIGNS OR BROOCHES, SHEWN ON THE PLATE (beginning at the left hand of the top row and proceeding from left to right along each row in succession). No. 1. Demi-figure of St. Thomas, mitred and richly jewelled, under a canopy, half of which only remains.

(Dug up in the London Steelyard, 1864.)

No. 2. Two circular signs of St. Thomas, an inch and a half in diameter. The field of one is occupied by a sexafoil. In the margin is this legend, Sacte. Thoma O.R.P.me. The other sign is inscribed, S. Thom. O.R.P.me. In its field is an octofoil, enclosing a cross composed of four fleurs de lys. These two signs are of foreign work of the fifteenth century, and are most likely from the shrine of St. Thomas at Sens.

No. 3. Head of St Thomas, part of a demi-figure; a perfect

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