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one other of Pteroplochus, all of which are peculiar to Chile or Patagonia. The species of Scytalopus are as small as Wrens, mostly of a dark colour, and inhabit parts of Brazil and Colombia, one of them occurring so far northward as Bogota. (A. N.) TAPER (probably of Celtic origin, cf. Irish tapar, Welsh tampr, taper, torch), a small thin candle of tallow or wax (see CANDLE); from its early shape, in which the circumference of the top was smaller than that of the base, the word came to be used in the sense of "slender," particularly of something diminishing in size at one end. In architecture the word is used of the gradual diminishing of a spire or column as it rises. The spire tapers almost to a point, where it is terminated by a finial or vane: the column tapers only to a less diameter at the top, and as a general rule the more ancient the column the greater its diminution or taper; thus in one of the early temples at Selinus in Sicily the upper diameter is about half the lower diameter, while in the Parthenon it is about one-fifth.

TAPESTRY. The Gr. Tárns and Lat. tapesium, from which our word "tapestry" is descended, implied a covering to both furniture and floors, as well as curtains or wall hangings, and neither of them really defines the particular way in which

such articles were made. The decorations on these Greek and

low warp frames.

(low warp or basse lisse). In the one case the worker sits up to his work, in the other he bends over it. In each he is supplied with the design according to which he weaves, and notwithstanding the varied positions the method of weaving is the High and same. The thread-supply of each separate colour required in the design is wound upon its appointed peg or bobbin, which is a simpler implement or tool than a loom weaver's shuttle. Fig. 1 shows a Gobelins high-warp tapestry weaver of the 18th century at work. With his left hand he is pulling above his head a few of the looped strings (lices or lisses) through which the warp threads (chaine) pass, so as to bring forward the particular warp threads, in between and around which he has to place the weft threads of the selected colour. In fig. 2 the workman's left hand pulls forward groups of warp threads upon the lower part of which the weaving has been finished; and with a comb-like implement in his right hand he presses down and compacts the weaving. In the story of the competition between Minerva and Arachne (Metamorphoses, vi. 55-69), Ovid appears to be describing this very process, and Roman workmanship corroborate the presumption of its a great number of specimens of 2nd to 5th century Egyptoexistence in Ovid's time. The absence of evidence to show that loom and shuttle weaving was capable at that period of producing elaborate figured fabrics is remarkable, and supports the probability that the tapestry-weaving process was that

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FIG. 1.-Gobelins high-warp tapestry frame, with weaver (18th century), holding in right hand (a) bobbin with weft thread wound round its thick end, and with his left hand taking (e) some of the lisses or strings with a loop at one end of each of them, through which a warp thread is passed, and thus pulling forward those warp threads in between which he will pass his weft. mm is the tapestry he has woven, which has been wound round (p) the cylinder. The other letters in this diagram relate to details in the frame which are of subsidiary interest. The description of them would not further elucidate the act of weaving which is here in question.

Roman coverings were effected by painting, printing, embroidery, or a method of weaving with coloured threads; and specimens and other conclusive evidence show that early Egyptians, Babylonians, Chinese, Indians, Greeks and Romans employed some at least of the means above-named.

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Process The purpose of this article is to give some account oflapes- of those decorated stuffs which are produced by weaving coloured threads on to warp threads in a weaving. manner that differs from shuttle-weaving, and at the present day is called tapestry-weaving, such for instance as is practised at the famous Gobelins and Beauvais tapestry manufactories in France. At the Gobelins, the warp threads are stretched in frames standing vertically (high warp or haute lisse): at Beauvais in frames placed horizontally with the ground

FIG. 2.-Gobelins tapestry-weaving, showing (a) the left hand of the weaver pulling forward (c) a group of warp threads, into which with (b) the comb in his right hand he is compressing at point (d) the weft threads which have been passed around and in between the warp threads; (e) are various bobbins, hanging at rest, suspended by their weft threads; and (f) is the tapestry as woven and compressed.

commonly known and practised for most if not all woven decoration and ornament. It was certainly as freely used for costumes as for hangings, couch and cushion covers and the like (see CARPET). The frames in which the work was done varied according to size from small and easily handled ones to large and substantially constructed frames. As mentioned in the article EMBROIDERY, ornament of tapestry-weaving occurs in a fragment of Egyptian work 1450 B.C., and Greeks in the 3rd or 4th century B.C. also worked in this method, as is demonstrated by specimens, now in the Hermitage at St Petersburg, which were found in the tomb of the Seven Brothers at Temriouck, formerly a Greek settlement in the province of Kouban on the northeastern shore of the Black Sea. The simplicity of the process is so obvious that it is found to be widely employed in expressing a variety of primitive textile decoration of which pieces from Borneo, Central Asia, Tibet, the Red Indians of America, and the ancient inhabitants of Peru2 (see fig. 10) are to be seen in museums.

1 See Compte rendu. Com. Arch., 1878-79.

1 See Account of Graves at Ancon, Asher & Co.; see also specimens from Graves at Lima in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London.

TAPESTRY

As regards the antiquity of the two sorts of frames (the low, wools and linen thread is shown in fig. 6. At the top there is a and high warp) the Beni Hassan wall paintings (1600 B.C.) include diagrams of horizontal (low warp) frames, with weavers squatting on the ground at work on them; while a vertical or high warp frame is represented on a Greek vase of the 5th century B.C. found at Chiusi (fig. 3), and corresponds with frames used in Scandinavian countries. In both these last-named the lower ends of the warp threads are merely weighted, thus presenting

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fragment of a horizontal border of floral and leaf ornament befloating in the air and holding ducks; elsewhere are figures of boys running and carrying baskets of fruit, and large and small blossom neath which, and enclosed by festoons of leaves, are two boys 4th century, and is 4 ft. 5 in. by 4 ft. 1 in. Fig. 7 presents a square forms or rosettes. This also is Egypto-Roman work, about the with a child mounted on a white horse: in the border about him are ducks, fish and (?) peaches. This too is Egypto-Roman work (from a small tunic) of very fine warp and weft tapestry-weaving, of about the 2nd or 3rd century and is about 4 inches square. The square in fig. 8 is from a tunic or robe and is of tapestry-weaving in bright-coloured wools, with a representation of Hermes holding the caduceus in one hand and a purse in the other. About his head is a nimbus and his name in Greek characters. This again is Egypto-Roman work of about the 1st or 2nd century and is 61 inches square. The panel of tapestry-weaving in fig. 9 is from a couch or bed covering, and is wrought in purple wools and linen threads. The design recalls the description of the toralia or couchcovering alluded to in Petronius Arbiter's account of Trimalchio's banquet," on which were depicted men in ambush with hunting poles and all the apparatus of the chase." Egypto-Roman work about the 2nd or 3rd century, about 12 in. This piece is also of by 10 in.

The well-known 6th-century Ravenna mosaics of the Emperor Justinian and the Empress Theodora are rich with hangings and costumes decorated presumably with tapestry weavings similar to those just described. From the 5th century and

for many centuries later, monasteries, nunneries and Tapestrythe like, under ecclesiastical control or influence, weaving in became centres of activity in this and cognate arts, monas stimulated by the patronage of the Church and teries, courts; and in the 8th and 9th centuries the Em- 5th to 9th peror Charlemagne's body of travelling inspectors, century. and in parts of Germany. Two centuries later, free, as distinct missi dominici, appears to have exercised for a time a helpful influence upon such centres throughout France throughout England, Flanders and Brabant, France being a little from bond, handicraftsmen were forming local associations for later. The gilds of weavers in London and Oxford their industries, and in this movement the weavers took the lead were granted charters by Henry I. In the 11th century gilds of wool weavers existed at Cologne and Mainz, gild at Spires: it is quite probable that some of their weaving would be of tapestry. The fragment in fig. 11 is conand in the following century there was a similar sidered by authorities to be of 12th-century north European work, possibly from some Rhenish place. At one time the whole piece

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(9th century).
FIG. 4-High warp frame from MS. Codex by Rabanus Maurus

by A. Jubinal, 1840, p. 13.
2 See Recherches sur l'usage et l'origine des tapisseries à personnages,

See L. Brentano's History and Development of Guilds, § IV.
"The Craft Guilds."

by " Meginwart of Welt in burch," a tapetiarius, as well as another
(1177) in which mention is made of Fredericus, lapifex de familia
Eugène Müntz quotes a deed (between 1164 and 1200) witnessed

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Figs. 5-9.-Specimens of Egypto-Roman tapestry weaving of about the 2nd to 5th century A.D. Victoria and Albert Museum.

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Fig. 12. An antependium, or altar hanging of tapestry woven in coloured wools, with the Adoration of the Magi, probably from a design by Wohlgemuth (1434-1519). The tapestry is reputed to have been executed in a convent at Bamberg; below the folds of the Virgin's cloak, to the right, the "tapissière" has woven a figure of herself at work. German, 15th century. This interesting piece is in the museum at Munich. About 5 ft. 6 in. by 2 ft.

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Fig. 13. One of a series of designs (the Trojan War) by Jean Foucquet
(1415-1485) from which tapestry hangings were woven, probably at
Arras in the middle of the 15th century.

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Fig. 16.-Long and narrow tapestry (8 ft. 10 in. by 22 in.), German work of the 15th century.
Field labours, &c.

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