Painted Standards (Banners)

Standards

For a more complete look at my research paper on standards, flags and banners of Western Europe during 1100-1500, please see research paper here.

Painted linen banner: 14th century parade inspired

Painted linen banner: 14th century (Pelican)

Notes on designing and creating standards

Common Components to Designing a Standard

I take themes, symbols and other inspiration for banners that we use on the field. I vary them from manuscript style to rune filled stones carved. Because we are an anachronistic society with a lot of creativity, I like to use real examples and inspiration. While I realize that in period we would not create a banner that has Norse design elements we have many people who are inspired and recreate that aspect of our history, and to add to the excitement, the beauty of our day to day tournaments, showing off artistic skills and personal flare. Silk, linen, and embroidered banners are a wonderful way to create an ambiance and feeling, just like any other art form.

Source of Inspiration

Look for inspiration from period examples. Look to period illuminations, patent of arms, roll of arms, funereal certificates, tapestries and other depictions. These are great sources for inspiration and quality recreation art.

Shapes and Size

The hoist or Chief of the flag is standardly set to the lance, spear, or pole.

Tail or fly is the part of the banner that flies in the wind.

Standards have many different shapes and can be almost any size. Pennant, square, rectangular, triangular etc. Favors are generally worn on a person representing something that they wish to show off or represent a job. They can be various lengths and widths, that can be pinned or tied on.

Shapes

Fähnchen (Translates to “Flag”) German

Standard: stiff rectangular piece of cloth attached to a staff or spear

Banderole/Bandrol: 1. A narrow forked flag or streamer attached to a staff or lance or flown from a ship's masthead. 2. A representation of a ribbon or scroll bearing an inscription.

Gonfanons are flown from a vertical staff and have tails on the fly

The streamer was a long tapering flag, the nautical equivalent of the standard, used to identify the allegiance of troops on board a warship

Pennons were small single-pointed banners used on spears.

Period information on the basics of creating painted standards

Reviewing sections from The Craftsman’s Handbook “ Li Libro dell’ Arte” by Cennino d’ andrea Cennini “ How to work in silk on both sides”, Various ways to do hangings’ and “ A section dealing with work on cloth” Discuss working the fabric by stretching the silk or linen onto a frame, gesso the fabric and then to draw on the design on with charcoal onto both sides- indicating the fabric would be thick enough to need the design on both sides for painting. While he discusses the treatment of cloth regarding varnish, he indicates that the banners used for churches and ones carried outside would need a layer of varnish after painting. In the “more fluid” fabric he talks about leaving the fabric un-gesso’d or varnished. (Cennini, 1933)

A note on Gesso- I use this for linen paintings, shields and other “hard” surfaces. For the softer banners (lightweight linen or silk) that we tend to use for SCA recreation I use a very light weight silk. Gesso is used as a base primer, helping to close the open pores of the fabric and overall you use less paint to get the look you are aiming for. In period a practice recommended by Vasari (see supplemental) recommends that the fabric be primed with a mix of White lead, walnut oil and flour to coat the banner. Recommending multiple layers, and this would make the piece easy to roll up and transport. Vasari is not indicating this specifically for banners or flags but extrapolating the information for painting and convenience. (Vasari)

In period, a wax mixture of hot sheep’s fat and rosin were very likely to be a common “resist” and varnishing agents.

There are accounts of these items being purchased with pigments for work on streamers and standards. The great wardrobe accounts 1342-3. (Staniland, 1986) Another accounting of wax (thought to be for sealing/waterproofing flags was an account of Philip the Good’s listing expenditures for flags including wax candles and tallow candles. (Wescher, 1949)

Basic steps

Design
Stretch the fabric onto a frame
Prime the fabric with size, or size and gesso, or other resist
Add the design to be painted
Paint
** adding more layers, painting and varnishing
Treating/ Varnishing/ Finish

Banner Design

Here are a few design elements that are commonly seen in period depictions of standards.

Colors: utilize the standard heraldic set of colors for primary charges and design. While I use all of the colors for shading and highlighting these are the standard colors to base your bight visually captivating banner: Sable (Black), Gules (Red), Purpure (Purple), Vert (Green), Azure (Blue), Or (Yellow or Gold), Argent (White or Silver).

Use good clear charges: These can be personal heraldry, house or kingdom incorporations. Another thing we see in period design are Mottos. These can be a large part of the standard or a small “hidden” part of the design.

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