An introduction to medieval seals
by John Ashdown-Hill

Formal fifteenth century documents generally carried the seals of those who issued or witnessed them in much the same way as modern formal documents might bear a signature. The word ‘seal’ is commonly used with two meanings: first, it refers to the seal matrix (plural: matrices) — a metal object, usually engraved with a design and often also an inscription, which was used to seal a document; second, it refers to the seal impression — a piece of wax, or similar impressionable material, attached to a document, upon which the seal design was imprinted using a matrix.

Seal Types

Seals survive both as matrices and as impressions, though impressions are more common. A matrix may be of various kinds. Seals of royalty, great aristocrats and important institutions usually used a circular matrix. Sometimes there were two matrices, a seal and a counterseal, so that the wax impression which resulted would be two sided, with a different design on each side. Circular seals are known as coin seals because they resemble a coin. Coin seals vary considerably in size, but royal seals were often large. Richard III’s great seal, for example, was 900mm in diameter. The seal of a middle-ranking aristocrat would be smaller; perhaps around 350mm in diameter. Fifteenth-century great royal seals normally showed the king galloping on horseback, with drawn sword and a shield bearing the royal arms. In the early middle ages great aristocrats had used similar designs, but by the fifteenth century most of them avoided what had by then come to be seen as a royal pattern. (Unsurprisingly, perhaps, the seal of ‘Warwick the Kingmaker’ is an exception.) Instead most noblemen used seals which depicted their arms, often with the shield couché (inclined at a 45 degree angle) beneath a large helm.

Prior to the fifteenth century pointed oval designs, called vesica seals, were popular with noble women and also with high ranking ecclesiastics. The shape allowed room either to depict a full length standing figure of the owner, or alternatively to show scenes at two levels. Monastic seals often used the latter device, with a main, upper register depicting the monastery’s patron saint, and a small lower register in which the prior or abbot was shown praying. By the fifteenth century, vesica seals were somewhat out of fashion, but they still occur on documents, because monasteries in particular tended to continue using seal matrices made years — or sometimes centuries — earlier.

By the fifteenth century, use of seals was widespread. One nobleman is said to have remarked acidly that in earlier times it had not been the custom for every Tom, Dick and Harry to use a seal. Most seals were quite small, and the most common forms of matrix were the pyramid seal (a small, usually circular design with a stem on the back, by which it could be held) and the signet, which could be of any shape (but was often circular or oval) and comprised the bezel of a ring.

Seal impressions are usually of wax, though royal and papal seals were sometimes impressed in metal such as lead, or even gold. Such metal impressions were called bullæ. (This word is the origin of the expression ‘papal bull’, referring to a sealed letter from the pope.) Seal impressions were not directly attached to their documents, but hung from them on small strips of parchment or (for persons of high rank) silk threads.

Reading Seals

Inscriptions on a fifteenth century seal will normally be in Latin, and will contain abbreviations similar to those used in written texts. The inscription normally starts at twelve o’clock. The beginning is often marked by a cross, a rose or a mullet (star). Very commonly, the first word will be sigillum (‘the seal’), often abbreviated (sometime simply to S’). In the case of a personal seal, the name and title of the owner will follow this word immediately. When looking at an institutional seal, on the other hand, it may be better to focus on the end of the inscription. The last word is likely to be a place name.  

Middle class seals may carry inscriptions which tell you nothing whatever about the owner’s identity. A recent Essex metal detector find was a pyramid seal matrix showing linked hands, and carrying the inscription (in French, this time) Fay me tene. (‘Keep faith with me’.) Signets, even of the aristocracy, may carry minimal or no inscriptions, but may bear coats of arms which can be identified. Sometimes livery badges are used instead, though these may be harder to identify, since not all have been catalogued. Punning devices are also found, such as the three bottles on the seal of a member of the Butler family.           

Many seals are miniature works of art of great beauty. Occasionally they also have important and interesting things to reveal about the people who used them. Seals of the dukes of York, for instance, prove that they consistently used a rose badge throughout the fifteenth century, so Shakespeare’s rose-plucking scene in the Temple gardens must be an invention. Lady Eleanor Talbot’s seals dating from the 1460s emphasise her religious links.

Seals may also be valuable in dating documents. The seal of John de la Pole, Earl of Lincoln, which proclaims him to be ‘the nephew of King Richard III’ cannot have been made before June 1483, and its continued use after August 1485, while not impossible, would have been rather foolhardy!

Illustrations and Captions all ‘Reproduced by kind permission of the Museum of Colchester

Copyright Colchester Museums (Colchester Borough Council). All rights reserved.

1.       Seal of Richard Neville, Earl of Warwick

Regal pretensions? Warwick the Kingmaker copies the design of a contemporary royal seal.

2.       Seal of John de la Pole, Earl of Lincoln

‘The Nephew of King Richard III’. The seal of John de la Pole, Earl of Lincoln.

 

3.       C15th Colchester seal

4.       Typical vesica seal – Berden Priory?

 

5.       Pyramid seal matrix

Links

Durham University Library is one of the richest British archives for surviving medieval seals.
http://www.dur.ac.uk/library/asc/seals/index.htm

University of Notre Dame hosts an on-line catalogue of seals at the Medieval Institute.
http://www.library.nd.edu/medieval_library/seals/