Long Remembered.

 

 Interior of Jerusalemkerk with the monumental tomb in the
foreground.

 As mentioned in my previous blog, the news that the monumental memorial tomb of Anselmus Adornes and his wife, Margriet van der Banck, in Jerusalemkerk is currently under much-needed renovation in Antwerp, brought me to consider the astonishing length of time which the name of Anselm Adornes has remained in the public eye. Born in Brugge in 1424, Anselm was the fifth generation of a Bruges-based noble family originally from Genoa; he regularly fulfilled all kinds of functions in Bruges City council, and on behalf of the central authority of the Duke of Burgundy. The Adornes family was pious and had an enduring connection to, and reverence for, Jerusalem. Pieter 11 and his brother, Jacob Adornes, began the building of Jerusalemkerk in 1428, inspired by the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem and, though unfinished, it was consecrated in 1429. The architecture and layout provide an exceptional illustration of the great reverence of the Adornes family for Jerusalem while the

Stained glass window in Jeerusalemkerk showing
Anselm Adornes and his wife, Margriet van der Banck.

beautiful stained glass, the monumental grave itself and its relic of the Holy Cross, are unique. Anselm, often credited erroneously with having built the church, merely completed the work started by his father, Pieter, and uncle, Jacob.

Anselm lived a public and adventurous life. He became a merchant, patron, politician and diplomat. and, in concert with the family tradition of public duty, filled many prestigious functions on the City Council between 1447/8 and 50/51. He became Comptroller in 1459-1460 and Mayor of the Council 1475-6, surviving accusations of theft from the City Treasury, with several other notables, during the infamous Brugge riots. Alone in retaining his possessions, a pointer, perhaps, to lesser guilt [the other two accused lost everything and were forced to retire to a monastery for life], in May 1477, he nonetheless had to parade publicly, barefoot and bareheaded, confessing his guilt and asking for forgiveness. Adornes had to repay four times the amount he had allegedly stolen, and was disbarred from future public office. All of this turmoil occurred during a period of civil unrest and riots in Brugge and when eventually peace was restored, lords like Adornes were honoured again though he never held public office in Brugge afterwards.

Urban jousts in the Middle Ages..

From 1444-1449 he took part in the jousts organised by the knightly company of the White Bear. His
public life, more or less coincided with his marriage to Margriet van der Banck in 1443 and the couple went on to have 16 children. The family lived in a large complex on Vervesdijk in the midst of the important Scottish merchant community until a sudden decision by the Scottish Parliament to forbid trade with Flanders caused the Scots to leave Brugge altogether in 1468. Adornes headed delegations to Scotland to try to restore the previous mutually-beneficial Scots-Bruges trade and it was during this period that he established a positive relationship with James 111, leading to a restoration of the Scots’ merchant presence in Bruges with the attendant trade, in 1470.. His status was elevated by this success particularly when King James made him a Knight of the Order of the Unicorn in Scotland in 1468. On 14 June 1470, Adornes was appointed Curator of Scottish Privileges in the realm of the Duke of Burgundy and was effectively Ambassador for the Duke of Burgundy to the court of James 111.

Close-up of the Adornes tomb.

In 1470 Adornes left on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem accompanied by his oldest son, Jan, eventual Canon of St. Peter’s Chapter in Lille, and after their return, the completion of Jerusalemkerk was accomplished with some added “Eastern” flourishes to the architecture, fashioning the little church into more of a true copy of the Holy Sepulchre Chapel in Jerusalem as originally intended. It is believed that the idea of the monumental tomb originated with Anselm himself at this time, and with the central importance of the funerary monument, this succeeded in moving the identity of little church into that of a mausoleum.

Tommaso Portinari.

In 1472 Edward 1V and James 111 of Scotland authorised Anselm to represent the Scottish Court in Rome and “among the Muslims of the East.” He acted as intermediary between Hugo van der Goes and King James for the portrait of the King and his wife, now kept in the National Portrait Gallery in Edinburgh. In the 1460s and 1470s Adornes fulfilled many assignments for Charles the Bold, including important advice, based on his first-hand knowledge of Jerusalem, on a proposed Crusade. He led negotiations in 1473 for Bruges, to try to regain the Tommaso Portinari ship, the San Matteo, high-jacked and taken to Gdansk in Poland. The ship had been laden with precious goods including a large painting by Hans Memling depicting The Last Judgement. Adornes’ subsequent failure to retrieve the ship and its contents.

King James 111 and his wife, Margaret of Denmark.
Painted by Hugo van der Goes.
National Portrait Gallery, Edinburgh.

 means that the painting is still in Gdansk today!

Anselm Adornes’ strong relationship with King James 111 was further evidenced in the years 1477,1479 and 1480 when he made the long and arduous trips to Scotland to contact, and be of service to, the king. In 1482, again to Scotland where he led a military expedition on the King’s behalf in Linlithgow, and then, on a pilgrimage subsequently, he stayed in a monastery in North Berwick where he was ambushed on January 23, 1483, by an armed gang and killed. His body is interred at Linlithgow but his heart was subsequently returned to Brugge and installed inside the monumental tomb in Jerusalemkerk where his wife already lay, having died in 1480.

The life of Anselm Adornes lasted less than sixty
years but it was hugely influential and high-achieving. In addition to his varied and important public life in Bruges, Flanders and in Scotland, he taught himself Latin to further his interest in manuscripts and literary texts; he delved into contacts with humanists and polyphonic religious music and in 1472, commissioned by King James of Scotland, trained a lute player. This was an extraordinary life of action and service; learning and leading. Adornes’ highly original and magnetic personality managed to exert a profound influence both

The White Bear on the 
Poorters Loge where the company
of the White Bear met.

locally and internationally 
accounting, at least in part, for the enduring fame of his name.

Jerusalemkerk.

Digging Up Brugge.

 

 I have not exactly grumbled properly, because I do approve of what the Commune is doing.

Jan van Eyckplein under seige.

That is the restoration and repair of many streets in the town including the underlying cables and pipes. It is just that one cannot turn a corner now without finding the way is closed by trenches in the road and multiple piles of cobblestones. I applaud the fact that the City Elders are taking advantage of the negative effects of the pandemic to use the unparalleled opportunity to renovate while the streets are more or less empty of tourists. It is just the tiny inconveniences and larger efforts to circumnavigate that occasionally irritate!

Sint Annarei. 13th century foundations.

However, an unlooked-for side effect of this massive regeneration project [for such it is] is the archaeological benefit. Several really interesting finds have occurred over the past few months within the Egg, unsurprising given the age of that august space. Perhaps the most interesting is along Sint Annarei; the discovery in March 2021, of the foundations of the former brewery, Den Hert plus the remains of a 13^th century wall. Den Hert had stood at numbers 17-18, from 1580-1921 with another brewery, Den Arend, at 23-27 Sint Annarei nearby. 13^th century foundations and walls of several houses have also appeared. Five large wooden vats with diameters of more than 1. 8 metres, have been

St Annarei and the present archaeological site showing
the disappeared street. Marcus Gerards' 1562 map

recovered and there is analysis currently to determine what the contents were. These pre-date the brewery

and it is expected that they may well indicate use by crafts such as those of dyers, tanners and fullers, given that traces of similar crafts have been discovered along Vervesdijk on the opposite, western side of the canal. The area would have been well suited to such activities given the slight distance from the centre, in case of unpleasant odours, and the proximity of running water. Signs of a disappeared street, marked on the Marcus Gerards' map of 1562  have also been located.

Sint Amanduskapel on the Marcus map 1562

Hand water pump which replaced the church, 
demolished in 1817.

Burial vault with wall decoration beneath the      
former Sint Amanduskapel.

In Feb 2021 workmen, working on the town water supply, discovered brick foundations, a fieldstone wall and a burial vault in Sint Amandstraat.

 A skull and shards of highly-decorated Brugge pottery, judged to be from the period 1250-1325, were also found. An old chapel, Sint AmandusKapel, probably founded by Sint Amand in the 8th century, had stood there from 1562, the chapel of the craft of herbs and groceries.  Presumably, eventually less used, it had been sold in 1798 and demolished in 1817 to be replaced in 1820, by the very large water pump still there.

The Anselm Adornes tomb in Jerusalemkerk

Unrelated to the incidental archaeological activity in Brugge but echoing these ancient links to the past, is the news that the monumental tomb of Anselm Adornes and his wife, Margriet van der Banck, in Jerusalemkerk has been removed for urgent restoration in Antwerp. It is estimated that in September 2022 it will be re-installed in its original important space in the family church. Anselm Adornes, born of a patrician family in Brugge, in 1424 and descended from Genoese merchants, became a merchant, patron, politician and diplomat. He had an extraordinary life ending, prematurely with his murder in Linlithgow, in Scotland in 1483 where he is buried; his heart was sent back to Brugge for interring in the impressive memorial tomb currently under renovation.

The following blog will outline details of this extraordinary man’s life.

A footnote to thank Kristien Boulinguez, in case she reads more than one blog! Just to ask her to contact me if she actually does visit Brugge on her historical quest for mediaeval Brugge. Would love to meet Kristien.