medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture
Noted. A little Greek is a dangerous thing.
--V. K.
Quoting Henk 't Jong <[log in to unmask]>:
> medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture
>
> Hi Chris,
>
>
>
> You wrote:
>
>
>
> >> Suit yourself.
>
>
>
> >thanks, i will.
>
>
>
> That was meant for mr Inman, not for you. I really admired your explanation
> of the joinery subject.
>
>
>
> >> There were no cabinetmakers in the Middle Ages, because there were no
>
> cabinets.
>
>
>
> >?
>
> >?
>
>
>
> Let me explain. A cabinet originally was a little room. (Italian: gabinetto,
> from gabbia: cage, which comes from latin: cavea; at least that's what my
> etymological dictionary says). It was the place where learned men and
> princes of 15th c Italy liked to retire to and receive special guests who
> were shown the collections of books or objects these men kept in there. For
> this they had cupboards made (the name is significant, it really means a
> board to put crockery on, but became a lockable, high and free standing
> receptacle) fixed to the walls and behind doors. Later drawers were added.
> In the 16th c people who had travelled to Italy brought this idea back to
> their homes and introduced it to France, the Low Countries, Germany and
> England. Not everybody was rich enough to build a whole room to house their
> art or items collections and had separate cupboards made. These usually
> consisted of a set of large drawers on the lower part and a separate upper
> area with lots of little drawers behind two doors. There were all kinds of
> variations. During the 17th c this upper part was often connected with a
> desk making it a bureau-cabinet.
>
>
>
> Except for extremely late medieval Italy, probably after 1450, but I may be
> wrong there, the word cabinet was not known and in that country was a room
> not a cupboard. Hence during the Middle Ages there were no cabinets in the
> sense of a cupboard with lots of drawers and 2 doors made.
>
>
>
> >and you, of all people, Hunk, should know this one:
>
>
>
> Yep.
>
>
>
> >>A joiner, as I wrote, just meant (in general) somebody who joined pieces
> of
>
> wood together
>
>
>
> >would have been o.k., if you'd just stopped there, but NO...
>
>
>
> >in a more finicky way than in the manner wooden housebeams and stiles were
>
> joined together.
>
>
>
> >joining together rails and style (whether on a door or cabinet) is, by
>
> definition "joinery."
>
>
>
> Agreed. As I wrote: all people who had to fit two pieces of wood together
> were in practice joiners, but in reality only people who made household
> furniture were really called joiners, as I understand. On the continent we
> have far more specialized names for all these kinds of craftsmen.
>
>
>
> >it is, to my way of thinking, also "cabinetmaking."
>
>
>
> Not in mine, although 16th and 17th c cabinetmakers certainly were joiners.
> But, as I said, not all joiners were cabinetmakers and certainly not during
> our middle ages.
>
>
>
> >and the joints involved in timber house construction were very, *very*
>
> sophisticated (some even "finicky").
>
>
>
> I do agree there. But I've also found that carpenters and joiners worked
> together building houses during the later middle ages in the Low Countries,
> especially when rooms were done with wooden panelling wth doors and windows
> taken up into the decor. Before that carpenters did windows and doors as
> well. By the finicky work joiners did I did not mean to degrade the
> craftmanship of carpenters. I've seen many examples of their work and I
> cannot do anything else but admire them for their skills. Carpenters were by
> no means shoddy workmen who only used axes.
>
>
>
> >> I was merely pointing to the fact that the description of what was called
> a
>
> tekton was during the later middle ages called, in English, a joiner.
>
>
>
> >not as i understand, from DW & Terryl's remarks.
>
>
>
> >it *could* indicate a "joiner" --or it could mean any of several other
> (rather
>
> specialized crafts).
>
>
>
> Reading back, I might indeed have been a bit hasty there.
>
>
>
> >> BTW If Joseph made plows and yokes, he also needed metal parts, if the
>
> latter wasn't the very primitive all wooden plus leather and/or rope yoke,
>
> that is. I wonder if he needed a smith for that or that being a tekton
>
> included simple blacksmithing. I have a feeling that craftsmen in a near
>
> eastern village around 2000 years ago could set their hand to more things
>
> than one.
>
>
>
> >depends upon the village.
>
>
>
> >big villages, in prosperous regions, might have had a lot of very
> specialized
>
> craftsmen.
>
>
>
> >small villages, in poverty-stricken regions, might have had guys who were
> not
>
> "specialists" and were just trying to scrape out a living doing whatever
> they
>
> could.
>
>
>
> OK.
>
>
>
> >in any event, the crafts of woodworking/carpentry/cabinetmaking are *so*
> far
>
> removed from the metalworking crafts that i would be extremely surprised if
> we
>
> could document a single fellow mastering both.
>
>
>
> 'Mastering' might indeed be the wrong word.
>
>
>
> What came after this was nice, but did not have to do much with the subject.
> But thanks anyway. I'm a bit wary though to compare 19th c rustic England
> with its medieval counterpart, although some things might not have changed
> much. It's even scarier to compare it with very early 1st century Palestine,
> which was really the starting point of this discussion.
>
>
>
> And all I wanted was to point out that a tekton would not have been called a
> cabinet-maker during the middle ages but a joiner.... or a smith, or
> whatever.
>
>
>
> Henk
>
>
> _____
>
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