The Potential Importance of the detailed measurement and study of the proportions of different elements in metal alloys used for early Anglo-Saxon artefacts has been appreciated for several years now. Such analyses add, for instance, to the direct observations of early Anglo-Saxon metalworking practice that can be made, and have a contribution to make to attempts to construct absolute and relative chronologies. Two ranges of alloys in particular have been profitably studied: alloys predominantly of gold, of the late sixth and seventh centuries, in which a progressive decline in the gold content allows dating estimates to be made on the strength of the results of metallurgical analysis (Hawkes, Merrick and Metcalf 1966; cf. Brown and Schweizer 1973 for the application of such results), and the predominantly copper alloys that are characteristic of the diverse and plentiful range of artefacts—particularly dress-jewellery—found in Anglo-Saxon graves of the Migration Period, dating from the fifth century to some point in the second half of the sixth. Study of these copper alloys has been organized in terms of particular artefact-types—for instance studies by Peter Northover and Tania Dickinson of saucer brooches and by Catherine Mortimer of cruciform brooches (Mortimer 1990: the unpublished results of Northover and Dickinson's earlier work are reported in this thesis)—and in the form of comprehensive surveys of the material recovered from individual cemeteries, such as Spong Hill, Norfolk (Wardley in Hills, Penn and Rickett 1984, 38–40), Watchfield, Oxfordshire, and Lechlade, Gloucestershire (Mortimer, Pollard and Scull 1986; Mortimer 1988).

In The Society's Journal of 1944, G. C. Dunning F.S.A. published a brief article, with a map, entitled ‘The distribution of black Tournai Fonts’. There has been no other view published since that occasion (at least not in Britain) and indeed J. R. Blatchly and Birkin Haward (1983), writing some forty years later on the font in St Peter's church, Ipswich, reproduced Dunning's map. The body of knowledge of Tournai fonts has advanced considerably since the war and this article offers a more up to date picture. As discoveries of fragments of fonts continue to be made, it does not claim to be exhaustive, though it is most unlikely that there are any more complete bowls to be found (see map fig. 1). In fact further research may show that the list published here may need to be reduced by three or four examples, which are discussed below.

The only surviving manuscript of the Lord Marshal's Roll (LM) is preserved in the Library of the Society of Antiquaries of London (MS 664, vol. 3, fols 19–25 [Roll 15]; Wagner 1950, 38). The original was no doubt in poor condition when this copy, a Hatton-Dugdale facsimile, was executed c. 1640. Many shields are defective, often showing silver instead of gold (e.g., LM 59, 60, 64, 68, 71, 73, 79, 82, 87, 304; similarly, silver instead of vair, LM 127, 331, 463, 554), omitting charges (LM 58, 90, 103, 434 (see below), 585), and reversing tinctures (LM 322). Other shields are blank and/or bear no caption. In spite of these and other flaws, LM remains one of the most important rolls of arms of the reign of Edward I (1272–1307).2 It is one of the lengthiest rolls of the period—588 entries—and although some captions are garbled, most of the identifying names are quite legible. Also, LM was composed at a time of crisis for Edward I (1294–8) and on the eve of the war against the Scots (1296–1307) to which several later rolls bear witness (Prestwich 1988, 401–35; 469–516).

Marwell Hall Hampshire (fig. I), N. G. Ref. SU 508217, stands in the middle of the well known Zoological Park, and now serves as the main administrative building of Marwell Preservation Trust. Until a few years ago, it was supposed that the house dated originally from the reign of Elizabeth I, though it had clearly been extensively refashioned in Tudor-Gothick style in the early nineteenth century; indeed Sir Nikolaus Pevsner (Pevsner and Lloyd 1967, 331) considered that the house had been completely built in the latter period.

The fourteenth-century wall-painting in the church of St Hubert, Idsworth, Hampshire, have attracted repeated attention since their initial discovery in 1864. This is, of course, partly a reflection of their artistic quality—both E. W. Tristram (1955, 89) and David Lloyd (Pevsner and Lloyd 1967, 307) referred to their liveliness and vigour and the exceptional quality of their design—but clearly also reflects the difficulties art historians have found in providing a convincing interpretation of their iconographic programme.

This paper is intended as a contribution to a wider study of medieval secular decoration; but its starting point is the Doge's Palace in Venice. The medieval decoration of that palace has never received the direct and minute attention devoted to the magnificent decorations of later centuries. That is not to say that the original schemes have been entirely neglected; but they tend to be subordinated to discussions of the ‘Venetian Renaissance’ and to problems associated with the emergence of the ‘Myth of Venice’. Central to the present discussion is, of course, the Sala del Gran Consiglio, one of the largest chambers in medieval Europe with its various themes of Majesty, History and Ruler Portraits. The essence of that imagery is still present in the late sixteenth-century decorations installed after the disastrous fire of 1577.