Antique Samplers And Needlework

1829 Antique Sampler By Margaret Main Aged 12

Antique Samplers - In a nutshell

Samplers are a form of embroidery that evolved in the 17thC, used to demonstrate needlework skills.

Most commonly, samplers are stitched by children, using silk or wool thread, onto a canvas ground. They often feature alphabets, numbers, verses and motifs. They are then mounted into a frame, ready for hanging on a wall.

Samplers have been stitched for many centuries and are still stitched today. We are mainly interested in samplers created between around 1650 and 1850.

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Antique Band Sampler

Antique Samplers - Appeal

They resonate with social history. The changing significance through the centuries of embroidery and stitch work in the lives of women, from royalty to ordinary school children, is utterly fascinating.

Motifs were often full of symbolism passed from generation to generation over centuries and across national boundaries by means of pattern books and borrowed examples. But the patterns were not static. They were continuously adapted. Some motifs reflect a very English curiosity about nature and the English garden: shells, plants, flowers, birds, and animals.

They have strong decorative appeal. Available in sizes from miniature to two feet square and larger. They come in monochromes or in colors, from muted to loud, in value from $100 to $200,000. Suitable samplers can be found and frames matched to enhance any decorator theme, fitting conveniently into spaces on the walls. Individually, or grouped, samplers make compelling decor.

They are the only antiques in existence that were made by children. Children are adored universally, well almost. To preserve, to own, to display the work of young girls and women who were alive as long ago as the time of the Mayflower, to glimpse something of their schooling, their homes, their families’ country estates, holds an irresistible appeal. When occasionally we sense their emotions as they stitch - unfettered frustration, joy, sorrow - we cannot help but be moved.

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Jean Siméon Chardin - The Hard-working Mother (c.1740)

Antique Samplers - Social History

Samplers resonate with social history. The changing significance through the centuries of embroidery and stitch work is explored below.

15th Century 1400-1499

Egyptian sampler fragments survive from as far back as the 14thC, possibly due to the dry climate.

Some of the earliest examples of decorative needlework in Europe date from the 15thC, but no samplers, nor references to samplers exist.

16th Century 1500-1599

Following the Dissolution of the Monasteries (1536-1541) and into the reign of Elizabeth (1558-1603) decorative needlework becomes a highly fashionable occupation for upper class ladies, a mark of wealth and status. Their work was invariably unsigned, with rare exceptions. Examples survive, together with one solitary signed and dated sampler.

References to the stitching of samplers in the literature of the day can be found, and pattern books were in print from 1520 onwards, so there is little doubt that undated unsigned samplers do exist, but identifying them is difficult when so few examples are available to compare.

17th Century 1600-1699

Social patterns gradually change. The traditional modesty over signing and dating of samplers is relaxed. Education for girls and the poor is considered for the first time. Needlework and literacy, become elements in any curriculum.

Early samplers, which were unsigned and undated, recorded only motifs and patterns. Skill in letters and numbers was not a requirement. This gradually changed until by 1660 most band samplers included alphabet, numerals, and name, and were dated, though spot samplers almost never were.

Inscriptions too, were appearing more often, intended to improve the mind. Pattern books continued to spread knowledge.

18th Century 1700-1799

The moral issue of relief for the poor was beginning to be taken up by philanthropists who had made fortunes in commerce. Some institutions and schools were built to improve life expectancy and to provide some hope for the needy. Useful needlework, with sampler making in some cases a purely recreational adjunct, formed a significant portion of the curriculum.

Household linen, clothing etc. continued to be hand-made, marked, repaired and embellished by womenfolk. Her ability to read and if necessary to write her name, was becoming an important consideration in addition to needlework skills when a gentleman was seeking a wife.

Heralding further change in domestic embroidery, new color printed cottons were becoming available despite legislation protecting against cotton imports from 1700-1774.

Sampler forms had changed in direct response to their change in purpose from pattern records to decorative objects. Band sampler rigid patterns and long thin shape gave way to a rectangular form suitable for framing behind glass and hanging.

Inscription from circa 1650 whitework band sampler ‘This is my beginning. God be my good spe? In grace and wit’

1780 dress fabric: resist dyed, mordant dyed, overprinted with gold spots, India fabric.

1780 dress.

1739 Silkwork Sampler by Barbara Hogan. Good example of the transition from long thin bands to rectangular with borders. This one is half way.

1757 Silkwork Band Sampler by Marie Areton.

Marie Areton above, a good example of a late band sampler in transition, half-hearted bands, name, date, alphabet, numbers, the latest pattern craze and some Algerian eye the only variety in stitches, impossible to believe that fourteen year old Marie had any intention of keeping this as a pattern sample for future use, in fact the sloppy stitchwork towards the end, and the fact it was unfinished leaves us with a definite sense that she abandoned it in disgust.

Borders could now enclose pictorial elements, with more freedom of artistic expression, trailing flower and leaf patterns, and new stitches.

Emphasis moved to longer inscriptions, prayers, bible verses, and hymns, and to more landscapes, pictorial scenes, houses, buildings, genealogies, memorial samplers, and biblical samplers.

From circa 1780-1820 there was a craze for the oval format, seen in map samplers , darning samplers, and Quaker School extract samplers. The fashion came, and just as suddenly disappeared.

19th Century 1800-1899

The founding of new schools continued. But for the desperately poor, living in squalor with no sanitation life expectancy was short. Until mid-century it was believed that disease was caused by bad air. In 1852 it was proved that bad water was the cause. Action to provide piped fresh water followed, with sewers soon after .

Aniline dyes began replacing vegetable dyes in the 1840’s. Home sewing machines for embroidering were becoming available in the 1850’s.

Compulsory education was introduced in 1870. Simple school samplers were stitched by children as young as six years of age and were used for the teaching of alphabet and numbers, often with a short ‘improving’ inscription. Older girls progressed to more ambitious designs, usually with longer ‘improving’ inscriptions, verses, and extracts, in addition to collections of practical needlework.

20th Century 1900-1999

In 1900 the first ever major exhibition of samplers was organised by the Fine Art Society Exhibition, showing 340 samplers from 1640 onwards.

Patterns continued to be published, and samplers stitched for fun, but the need for samples for reference had long ceased, and skill with the needle was no longer a necessity of life. Needlework and sampler making were at a low ebb for some decades.

Happily publications, guilds, research, attainment of the highest levels of skill, and the sheer pleasure of stitching have in recent decades enjoyed a strong revival.

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Antique Sampler Close Up