medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture May I remind members of the fact that medieval reading desks have a slant of at least 30 degrees and often more (look up any medieval picture of one). The more people have to read from it, the steeper it is (as in choirs in churches). They are also smooth (so not carved on the surface to lay your book on) and have a lip at the bottom, sometimes rather large ones (ca 5-8 cm) because the books used on them were large and heavy. That's why they had desks in the first place; the books were too heavy to hold in your hands for a longer time. The moveable reading desks attached to large writing desks or even to the large chairs used by scholars were even steeper and had large lips too, because they were used very close up. Writing desks have about the same slant, sometimes a little lower (ca 25 degrees) but often up to 45 degrees or more. They are never as low as the Radegund 'desk'. This has a very practical reason: feather quils have to be held quite horizontally to prevent ink from spilling from them. Besides that: footstools or -rests were often a bit sloping, as modern piano or guitarists footrests. That the Radegund one is not damaged or doesn't look worn is probably because it's a relic. And if she used it as a fooststool in her capacity both as a queen or an abbess, don't forget that medieval shoes are soft. They have thin leather soles and make no impression on wood, except when you use a stool like that for a long long time. I'm still not sure about the crosses on them, but could it be that the stool was carved after she died and so made all the more symbolic? Or is that too far fetched a notion? Henk In Peter Lasko's, The Kingdom of the Franks, pp. 74-75, he calls it "St Radegund's so-called reading desk" and judges it "almost certainly" a gift from the East, the imagery on the top showing distinctly eastern Christian features (Radegund is known to have written to the Byzantine Emperor Justin II, who on her request sent her a relic of the True Cross in a reliquary, which is also preserved in Poitiers). The accompanying photographs show no lip at the bottom, but since the covers of missals -- precious ones, anyway -- would have had considerable surface texture, this could have interacted with the relief on the top of the "lectern" to stabilize the open text on it. Had this object, whatever it actually is, been used as a footstool, one might expect more wear on the top surface. In fact, had it been used much at all, one might have expected it to be in far worse shape than it appears to be in currently (surviving works made of wood from this early period are extremely rare). Whatever its original function, it appears to have come quite early to have been regarded as a "secondary relic" of the saint who apparently owned it and thus carefully preserved, rather than regularly used. Jim ********************************************************************** To join the list, send the message: join medieval-religion YOUR NAME to: [log in to unmask] To send a message to the list, address it to: [log in to unmask] To leave the list, send the message: leave medieval-religion to: [log in to unmask] In order to report problems or to contact the list's owners, write to: [log in to unmask] For further information, visit our web site: http://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/lists/medieval-religion.html