My second Lady Apollonia West Country Mystery, Plague of a Green Man, is set in Exeter, Devon, in the year 1380. Exeter’s fourteenth century cathedral had been re-built in the Decorated Gothic Style by then and members of the cathedral clergy and staff play important roles in my story. A unique feature of the great church is its medieval Minstrel’s Gallery which was viewed by the Lady Apollonia when she was given a tour of the cathedral. There are other major churches in the West Country of England that feature carvings of angel musicians, but Exeter is the only one to present them so grandly across the face of a balcony called the Minstrel’s Gallery. A dozen angels, the sizes of small children, stand across the front of the gallery, each playing a different medieval instrument as shown below. They include string, wind, and percussion instruments.
The medieval string instruments which are displayed include a harp, a citole, a gittern, and a fiddle. Harps came in various sizes but the one in Exeter is portable, carried by its angel musician. The citole was believed to be the ancestor of the gittern, and the gittern is probably a medieval ancestor of the guitar. The medieval fiddle is the only one of Exeter’s string instruments played with a bow but does not yet have the modern indentations that making bowing easier.
Wind instruments include a portative organ, a pipe, a shawm, bagpipes, and one and possibly two trumpets. The musician had to carry the portative organ, play keys to determine the notes, and pump the bellows to supply the wind. The pipe is a recorder type of instrument whereas the shawm is an ancestor of the oboe. The bagpipes of Exeter have been damaged somewhat, as has the first of two trumpets. Only the mouthpiece remains of the first trumpet, making its identification dubious. The other trumpet is probably a replacement since the trumpets of the period were much longer than the one displayed.
The timbrel and cymbals are the percussion instruments shown on the Minstrel’s Gallery. The timbrel is like a modern tambourine. Cymbals survived in England from Roman times and could be found in various sizes.
For more information on medieval instruments, click on https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_medieval_musical_instruments
Tags: Chaucer's England, historical fiction, medieval mysteries