Cloth with Unicorns, Dragons, Other Animals, and Floral Patterns (1800s): Art, History and Details

Cloth with Unicorns, Dragons, Other Animals, and Floral Patterns (1800s) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection.

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

Scattered throughout this textile are depictions of both real and imaginary animals: unicorns and dragons exist alongside lions, stags, and an assortment of birds. There are also identifiable plants, flowers, and fruits as well as simply decorative or fictional ones. The maker, whose initials CM appear between the unicorns, perhaps chose to mix fantastical motifs with natural ones to create a more captivating spectacle. This large textile was perhaps meant for use as a table cover.

Object facts

• Title: Cloth with Unicorns, Dragons, Other Animals, and Floral Patterns
• Date: 1800s
• Culture: Italy
• Type: Lace
• Technique: Bleached linen: needle lace, filet/lacis (knotted ground and darned in two directions) and alternating cutwork, embroidered squares, and bobbin lace edging
• Dimensions: Overall: 113.5 x 138 cm (44 11/16 x 54 5/16 in.); Mounted: 121.9 x 146.1 cm (48 x 57 1/2 in.)
• Collection: T - Lace
• Department: Textiles
• Accession number: 1936.95

A detail from the museum

The two-legged dragon with a barbed tail at the corners of the lace cloth is called a wyvern.

Collection credit

The Frances McIntosh Sherwin Collection

Further reading listed by the museum

• Underhill, Gertrude. "The Frances McIntosh Sherwin Collection of Lace." The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 23, no. 4 (1936): 53-54.
• "New in the Galleries.” Cleveland Art: Cleveland Museum of Art Members Magazine 59, no. 3 (May/June 2019): Back cover.
• related work in the collection of The Art Institute of Chicago. Object accession number 1986.11, Cover, France, c. 1620/30. 105.3 x 137.3 cm (41-1/2 x 54 in.). linen.

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.