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Seals may not be the first objects that come to mind when studying medieval visual culture: relatively small, often damaged, and stored in archives they are easily overlooked. However, in European society between 1100-1500 seals held real presence. What started out as artefacts signifying royal and imperial status and identity, territorial claims, and the authenticity and validity of documents developed into a medium employed by many: religious communities, nobility, civic governments, and burghers. Their wide spread together with their specific markers (size, iconography, heraldry, text) and their performative qualities (imprinted, attached, displayed, broken) indicate that seals were highly visible. While this seminar addresses practices of display, we will also focus on practices of concealment and loss by taking into account the rich material culture that surrounded seals: bags, drawers, chests, grave goods (such as jewelry), waste, and the human body. Taking seals’ itineraries as point of departure this seminar explores how medieval people engaged with seals as treasured objects. |
