Iconography Libraries

Symphonie and bagpipe on the pulpitum of York Minster, 1473–1500.
Photograph © Ian Pittaway.

Iconography refers to illustrations or representations in art – in drawings, paintings, sculptures, stained glass windows or needlework. On this site there is now one and there will soon be two early music iconography libraries.

Lute and harp in Saint Wendreda’s Church, March, Cambridgeshire, 1528.
Photographs © Ian Pittaway.
EMILE: the Early Music Iconography Library of England

Compiled by Ian Pittaway from thousands of photographs he has taken in English churches of medieval and renaissance music iconography, together with images from English manuscripts. The plan is for this to go online in 2027. 

MIMFABB: Musical Iconography in Medieval French And British Buildings

Compiled by Laurence Wright from photographs – 6,000 in black and white, 250 in colour – of medieval music iconography he has taken in churches in Britain and France, accessible by clicking here. This page also has links to Laurence’s 1985 PhD thesis, Attitudes to minstrels and musical instruments in Old French narrative poetry, 1100-1400, and A collection of references to music in Medieval French literature on which the thesis was based.

Left: psaltery, Chartres Cathedral, south porch.
Right: giga (fiddle), Poitiers Cathedral.
Photographs © Laurence Wright.
Left: bagpipe, Clifton Hampden parish church, Oxon (near Abingdon).
Right: harp in the east window (Jesse window), Saint Mary’s, Shrewsbury.   
Photographs © Laurence Wright.