Chests

[Julia]

I am thinking of having a play at making some simple small wooden chests. I have seen at shows people with small chests maybe just over a foot long, by 6 inches on each of the other dimensions, with various iron banding and fittings. What I haven't been able to find anywhere is what these are based on.

What evidence do we have for small chests in the 11th Century. I have plenty of info on the various sea chests, I am mainly interested in smaller chests now.

Thanks

J

[Normannis]

Chests of this size were usually referred to as ''coffins'' in medieval manuscripts (as indeed any wooden chest under the size referred to as a 'chest'). Pictorial images are a little sparse and don't generally show much to go on design wise- most people have just scaled down one of the extant 12thC chests.

[Julia]

Chests of this size were usually referred to as ''coffins'' in medieval manuscripts (as indeed any wooden chest under the size referred to as a 'chest'). Pictorial images are a little sparse and don't generally show much to go on design wise- most people have just scaled down one of the extant 12thC chests.

Cheers, Will have a play with scaling down some of the larger chests on a drawing board.

I notice that nearly all the chests appear to be long, thin, and relatively tall for their width. Do we have any ideas why they chose the sizes they did?

J

[Normannis]

Forgot I'd posted this so sorry it took me a while to reply.
There seems to be a trend for making them-
A) A good height to sit on and
B) Good for storing a sword and maille.
Now, whilst I wouldn't immediately assume this is a causal thing, it could be perhaps because they descended from sea-chests that were used for those purposes and used as a rowing bench. That's my first thought.
-Dan

[Julia]

Forgot I'd posted this so sorry it took me a while to reply.
There seems to be a trend for making them-
A) A good height to sit on and
B) Good for storing a sword and maille.
Now, whilst I wouldn't immediately assume this is a causal thing, it could be perhaps because they descended from sea-chests that were used for those purposes and used as a rowing bench. That's my first thought.
-Dan

That was my thought, alas designing a chest to fit a sword I don't have, whilst also sensibly fitting in a smallish hire car seems to be contradictory requirements, and as I currently don't have a sword...

I have several sketches for designs, I am thinking of.

J

[Normannis]

If you want to e-mail them to me I could refer you to similar medieval chests for some inspiration. I've got an archive of online listings somewhere... including the magnificently painted Breton marriage chest (early-mid 12thC).