̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge - Paul Binski

Going to the dogs: the 500-year old greyhounds of King’s and in the fight against cancer

amb206 — Wed, 15 Jul 2015 11:03:00 +0000

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̽��ֱ��fabulous architecture of King’s College Chapel is not just about piety. Its gravity-defying fan vaulting, decorative sculpture and stunning windows are an assertion of legitimacy by a royal family under pressure. ̽��ֱ��Tudors faced many threats – from other claimants to the throne (both dynastic rivals and pretenders) as well as from disease and infertility.

̽��ֱ��chapel was constructed over a period of 70 years (1446-1515) under the instructions of four English kings: Henry VI, Richard III, Henry VII and Henry VIII. All four were obsessed by questions of succession; the provision of a healthy male heir was vital to carrying the family line forward.

Henry VII (the first Tudor king) was responsible for the phase of building which saw the creation of the interior that today draws thousands of visitors. Henry VII’s master mason John Wastell and chief carver Thomas Stockton were tasked with creating a chapel ablaze with the emblems of royal dynasties that were sometimes warring, sometimes united.

In Carving in King’s Chapel, a booklet published in 1970, the historian John Saltmarsh wrote that the antechapel at King’s represented “the most lavish display of worldly pomp to be found anywhere in English Gothic”. One of the most eye-catching features of the stone ornamentation of the antechapel is its imposing Tudor armorials – great stone badges.

Saltmarsh described how “over and over again the arms of Henry VII are repeated with his dragon and his greyhound, the crowned Tudor rose, the crowned portcullis which was the badge of his mother’s house of Beaufort, and the crowned fleur de lis for his titular kingship of France”.

Each shield (or escutcheon) is flanked by heraldic ‘supporters’: a dragon on the left and a greyhound on the right. Carved from pale limestone, the slender greyhounds have collars set with jewels, marking them out as favoured members of a wealthy household. All the shields have holes in their left-hand corners. This is a reference to jousting: a knight would pass his lance through the hole in the shield in order to defend himself while tilting at his opponent.

“ ̽��ֱ��Renaissance sculptor skilfully reveals the physical characteristics of the greyhounds which stand on their long thin legs and with their front legs both against, and in front of, the vertical architectural framework structuring the walls, thus placing the animal both inside, and in front of, the three- dimensional space of the heraldic devices,” says Professor Jean Michel Massing, Fellow in History of Art at King’s and co-author of a recent book about King’s Chapel.

“ ̽��ֱ��elongated bodies of the slim-built animals are elegant, with their broad chests, while their alertness is emphasised by their heads which are turned to catch the gaze of the viewers, with ears pricked and elongated muzzles.“

̽��ֱ��greyhound is the symbol of the Beaufort family; the dragon is the emblem of the Tudors. Henry VII’s mother was Margaret Beaufort, Countess of Richmond, and his father Edmund Tudor. Margaret was just 13 years old when she gave birth to Henry. Edmund died before his son was born. Margaret, who went on to marry a further three times, founded two Cambridge colleges: St John’s and Christ’s.

As a symbol of celebrity and loyalty, the greyhound is etched into the visual identity of not just one but several powerful families, making its presence in King’s Chapel even more potent. ̽��ֱ��animal was the emblem of the Richmond family as well as the Beaufort family. Edmund Tudor, First Earl of Richmond and father of Henry VII, was granted a white greyhound as a heraldic supporter by his half-brother Henry VI.

“ ̽��ֱ��greyhound is both a Lancastrian emblem and a Tudor one – and thus very handy as a heraldic expression of the dynastic right of the Tudors to the English throne,” says Peter Jones, the librarian at King’s College. “In this way the dynastic badges in the Chapel are all about legitimacy, a right to rule inherited from the Chapel’s founder, Henry VI, by the Tudors.”

̽��ֱ��lean forms of dragon and greyhound can also be spotted in carving on the wooden rood screen that divides the antechapel from the choir stalls and altar. ̽��ֱ��carvings are in the Renaissance manner and made by foreign craftsman. “ ̽��ֱ��carvings feature the linked initials of Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn, who was executed that year,” says Professor Paul Binski, Professor of Medieval Art and author of Gothic Wonder. “ ̽��ֱ��screen and stalls at King’s display some of the earliest Renaissance detailing in England and show how influential courts were in changing taste.”

Built for hunting, coursing and lolling beside open fires, greyhounds feature in art as far back as 5,000 years.

Considered one of the world’s oldest breeds, greyhounds are the world’s second fastest mammals (cheetahs are marginally faster) and their large ribcages contain big hearts and lungs. ̽��ֱ��animals achieve their famously high speeds by arching and then contracting their spines like an arching spring.

When it became apparent to vets that greyhounds suffer markedly more than other breeds from bone cancer (osteosarcoma), it was suggested that the disease may result from the stress they experience when they are raced competitively. But preliminary investigation soon showed that greyhounds which never race, and are simply kept as pets, also have a high incidence of the disease with the likelihood of bone cancer increasing as the dogs grow older.

Professor Matthew Allen and his colleagues at the Department of Veterinary Medicine are developing new ways to diagnose and treat bone cancer in dogs. “Greyhounds and other larger breeds, including the Rottweiler, are significantly more likely to develop bone cancer than small dogs,” says Allen. “Environmental factors may make a contribution but it’s clear from the data that genetics play a key role in the development of osteosarcoma. Our research has recently identified five genes that are associated with spread (metastasis) of osteosarcoma in dogs, opening up possibilities for better diagnosis and treatment.”

̽��ֱ��dog is an excellent translational model which will help scientists to diagnose and treat humans with bone cancer. Osteosarcoma eats away healthy bone tissue, leaving weaker, damaged bone which can break easily, even with normal activity. In dogs, the disease typically first develops between the ages of five and seven, a stage of life that is ‘middle age’ for dogs. ̽��ֱ��treatment most commonly offered by vets is amputation followed by chemotherapy and perhaps radiation therapy.

“Amputation seems drastic but dogs manage well with three legs – even greyhounds. But removing the affected leg doesn’t cure the animal. In combination with chemotherapy, it can provide good quality of life for an average of 14 months,” says Allen. “Our work into gene expression in canine osteosarcoma will enable us to better predict which dogs are most at risk of developing metastasis, and should allow us to design better therapies for these patients. Perhaps most importantly, given the close similarities between canine and human osteosarcoma, the work should have direct and tangible benefits to the diagnosis and treatment of humans with this disease.”

Humans are some ten times less likely to develop bone cancer than dogs. But osteosarcoma is notoriously hard to treat in people. It often develops during the late teen years and progresses fast, spreading to other parts of the body with devastating results. “In humans, physicians do everything they can do to save the limb that is affected using therapeutic treatments and implants to replace the damaged bone,” says Allen. “But, especially if the cancer has spread beyond the bone, the long term prognosis can be poor, with five-year survival rates hovering around 50%.”

In addition to collaborating with physicians who treat human osteosarcoma, Allen and colleagues will be working with a network of veterinary practices to reach owners of greyhounds and other large breeds throughout the country. ̽��ֱ��goal of this programme will be to collect samples of tumours from dogs with primary and metastatic osteosarcoma and to determine whether the genes identified in the research to date can be used to discriminate between tumours with different levels of aggressive behaviour.

“In our experience, the general public is keen to help,” says Allen. “Owners have an opportunity to transform a terrible situation – a diagnosis of osteosarcoma in their dog – into hope for the future by contributing to research that will help to understand and treat the disease in dogs and, ultimately, in humans.”

Next in the Cambridge Animal Alphabet: H is for an animal whose model teeth can be found in the Whipple Museum, which dominate the frieze adorning the Parthenon, and which played a central role in the rise of many great civilisations.

Inset images: Greyhounds on King's College Chapel (Mike Dixon © 2011 King's College, Cambridge); 'Interior of a hall - detail', by Nicolaes de Gyselaer (Fitzwilliam Museum); Osteosarcoma in the dog, showing the significant bone destruction that is typical of this tumour (top). In this dog, the tumour was successfully removed and the bone replaced with a metal implant (lower panel), in a procedure known as limb-sparing surgery (Matthew Allen).

The Cambridge Animal Alphabet series celebrates Cambridge's connections with animals through literature, art, science and society. Here, G is for Greyhound – as heraldic symbols of the Tudors' right to rule, and as part of important research into treatments for osteosarcoma in dogs and humans.

̽��ֱ��greyhound is both a Lancastrian emblem and a Tudor one – and thus very handy as a heraldic expression of the dynastic right of the Tudors to the English throne

Peter Jones

Escutcheon on King's College Chapel

̽��ֱ��text in this work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. For image use please see separate credits above.

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Heavenly matters, earthly delights

amb206 — Mon, 26 Jan 2015 08:00:00 +0000

“I greatly disdain piddling little buildings (plerumque indignor pusillis edificiis),” wrote a forthright Flemish monk called Goscelin of Saint-Bertin in a book dated around 1080. He went on to declare that: “I would not allow any buildings, however much they were valued, to stand unless they were, in my view, glorious, magnificent, tall, vast, filled with light and thoroughly beautiful.”

Goscelin, who dedicated his life to documenting the lives of saints, could have been describing the great Gothic cathedrals built to proclaim Christianity in the 12th and 13th centuries, when they played a pivotal role in medieval life. These masterpieces of structure and style remain extraordinary examples of human ingenuity in moulding materials into places that still inspire awe and wonder.

Piddling is not a word you would choose to describe the cathedrals of Ely, Norwich or Canterbury. These magnificent stone buildings dwarf the ancient streets that cluster around them and even today dominate the skyline. Size (magnitude in Latin) mattered to the architects, builders and patrons of these Gothic masterpieces: the bigger and taller the building, the greater its political and spiritual punch.

A league table of lengths of European cathedrals appears in the first few pages of Gothic Wonder: Art, Artifice and the Decorated Style 1290-1350, a book by Paul Binski, Professor of Medieval Art at Cambridge ̽��ֱ��, that looks afresh at a remarkable flowering of English creativity.

Top of the list in the size stakes is Cluny Abbey in Burgundy, begun in 1088, at approximately 172 metres, setting a standard that challenged the English to think big and bold. Winchester Cathedral ranks second, measuring 157 metres from its great west door to its east end, with London’s St Paul’s Cathedral (155 metres) close behind.

In early medieval England, most people lived in dwellings constructed from local materials. Amid the humdrum and struggle of daily existence, something extraordinary happened: teams of workers overseen by highly skilled craftspeople challenged ideas of what could be accomplished in art and architecture and told compelling stories about all manner of earthly and heavenly matters.

Size is just one measure of the majesty of a building. Another measure, equally important to the makers of Gothic buildings in the race for maximum visual and sensual impact, was variety (varietas). ̽��ֱ��interiors of Salisbury Cathedral and Westminster Abbey gleam and dazzle with semi-translucent alabaster obtained from Nottingham, white marble quarried in Purbeck (Dorset) and richly-veined marble imported from southern Europe.

Marble was the ‘must-have’ material of the world of Gothic architecture. ̽��ֱ��word itself comes from the Greek marmairo, to shine. In a world where natural light was augmented only by candles, the sparkle and gleam of marble, and its similarity to skin tones, appealed to the senses. ̽��ֱ��allure of this exotic material contributed to what Binski calls the ‘soft’ power of the building, its subtlety, whereas sheer scale is a form of ‘hard’ power.

̽��ֱ��transportation of stone across land and sea was costly, dangerous and difficult. ̽��ֱ��efforts of man pitted against nature, and emerging as winner, were heroic in the same way as literary epics which spoke of the human capacity to conquer difficulties in war or peace. Similarly, craftsmanship sought to create objects of supreme beauty, imitating and surpassing the complexity found in the natural world.

While Norman and Romanesque buildings were ponderous with their rounded arches, relatively small windows and wooden roofs, the architects of Gothic buildings sought to create what Binski calls a “wondrous heightening” in their playful treatment of light and shade and exploitation of the plasticity of materials to create decorative effects, such as wall arcading, that enriched the interiors of these buildings.

In many instances, Gothic was a process of ‘improvement’ that saw earlier buildings dismantled, adapted and enlarged to make room for expanding pilgrimage and religious activities. In the 14th century old buildings underwent makeovers which gave architects in the Gothic style an opportunity to study and emulate the achievements of their forebears.

To non-specialists, ‘Gothic’ is shorthand for pointed arches, elaborate window tracery and daringly vaulted roofs – though, curiously, the word itself emerged during the Renaissance as a term of abuse for northern European art. But Binski’s latest book is much more than a generously illustrated exploration of style. In his introduction, he explains that his emphasis is on human agency – why we do things and how we do them – expressed in all manner of arts and crafts.

His motivation, he says, stems from the question of “why aesthetic decisions were made in the light of beliefs about how and to what ends art creates experience”. In other words, Binski is interested in the power of things to manipulate thoughts and feelings – “art as the rational education of desire” is how he puts it – and how Gothic works of art were wrought through supreme human effort in order to convey unshakable statements about belief, control and sovereignty with God, the Church, royalty and man enmeshed in an entire social and artistic network.

In tackling these fundamental and often trickily complex themes, Binski explores not just architecture but also the decorative arts and especially manuscript illumination and painting, in the great age of ‘marginalia’ when English devices amused those who encountered them all over Europe. Among the weirdest are the grotesques found in the famous Luttrell Psalter of around 1340. Human and animal body parts are mixed in bizarre combinations: a human head pops out of a pair of goatish legs; an archer has a horse’s body and long swishing tail; a man is swallowed by a fish that has sprouted legs.

These hybrids and monsters, with their saucy sense of humour, fed into the literature of the time, providing a rich fodder of witty and disturbing imagery. ̽��ֱ��writer Geoffrey Chaucer called them ‘japes’. “Amusement was part of the point,” says Binski. “ ̽��ֱ��tendency to see ‘marginal’ art as always subversive or political has obscured the pleasures that marginal art, often apolitical and nonsensical, created for viewers.”

̽��ֱ��impact of Gothic buildings, whether in their scale or the intricate detail of their decoration, cannot be overemphasised. Impressive to us today, 650 years ago they were powerful embodiments of the greatness of their patrons – whether bishops, abbots or kings – with greatness being a virtue measured in terms of magnificent conduct and charitable largesse. And English Gothic architecture surpassed European in the sophistication and complexity of its designs for window tracery and the patterning of stone vaults.

̽��ֱ��silhouette of Ely Cathedral broods over miles of Cambridgeshire fenland. One of the most striking of the 300-plus plates in Gothic Wonder is a photograph taken from the cathedral’s nave crossing looking up into the Octagon tower that was built after the collapse of the earlier campanile tower which came crashing down one February night in 1322, just after the singing of Matins.

Ely was a desolate place, surrounded much of the year by water, but the crafting of its cathedral’s Octagon Tower and Lady Chapel suggest that this tiny city was locked into a network of trading and cultural connections that extended far and wide – right to southern France. ̽��ֱ��inside height of the Octagon Tower is 43 metres, making it almost the same height as the Pantheon in Rome, and its lantern-shaped top directs beams of light in much the same way as the circular opening in the Pantheon’s vast dome.

Whether religious or secular in purpose, buildings are about the assertion of political power. In the wake of the Norman Conquest, tensions ran high between the incoming Normans and the subjugated English. In 1097-1099 William Rufus (son of William 1) ordered the construction of the palace hall at Westminster. By far the largest hall in England, measuring 73 metres by 21 metres, it was designed for events such as banquets, court meetings and other displays of consumption and control.

Reactions to the lavish scale and splendour of the hall were divided. In his Historia anglorum, Henry of Huntington described that, on entering the hall, some people said “that it was a good size and others that it was too large. ̽��ֱ��king said it was only half large enough. This saying was that of a great king, but it was little to his credit”.William of Malmesbury, on the other hand, regarded the new hall as an example of William Rufus’s liberality rather than his pride. ̽��ֱ��king, Malmesbury wrote “provided some examples of real greatness (magnanimitas)”.

̽��ֱ��Gothic buildings that rose above the English landscape are the outcome of a flow of cultural traffic not just from Christian Europe but also from the Islamic world where similar values about magnanimity held sway. It was a cultural flow that went both ways. Artists identified as English or working in the English style can be traced to Trondheim in Norway, to Santes Creus in Catalonia, where the architect of a cloister is described as an ‘English mason’, to Papal Avignon, and even as far away as Cyprus.

“I think that to understand the true achievement of English Gothic art, we need to travel far afield, as far as Scandinavia and the Mediterranean, to follow the activities of English architects and artists and their ideas. Even Popes took an interest, whether in English carving or embroidery,” says Binski.

Binski’s particular focus is the half century from 1300 to 1348, the date that marked the onset of the Black Death (bubonic plague) in England. This period saw the first flowering of Gothic art and architecture, sowing the seeds of a style that has endured for centuries. Many of England’s most splendid and most visited buildings incorporate in their fabric and spirit strong elements of Gothic style.

“Gothic as a style has proved the most successful of all ways of building since classical times, shaping our cities and our ideas of what impressive public buildings should look like,” says Binski. “ ̽��ֱ��much-admired Gothic Revival architecture of St Pancras station and the Midland Grand Hotel is just one of many examples.”

Great buildings are a result of the work of great people. Among them is Alan of Walsingham, who became sacrist (church official) of Ely in 1321, just months before the cathedral’s original tower collapsed into a pitiful pile of rubble. A passage in the Ely chronicon (chronicle) describes how, immediately after the disaster, Alan set about the task of removing the debris and, “with architectural art”, made meticulous plans for a replacement tower even more splendid than the one that had fallen.

“And at once in that year, the most artful wooden structure of the new campanile, conceived with the highest and most wonderful ingenuity of mind … was started, and with great and burdensome outlay especially for the huge timbers needed for assembling the said structure, sought far and wide and at length found with great difficulty and purchased at great cost, carried by land and by sea to Ely, and then carved, wrought and assembled for that work by cunning workmen; with God’s help it was brought to an honourable and long-wished-for conclusion.”

“ ̽��ֱ��British are modest about their achievements in art,” says Binski. “My aim is to show to readers here and abroad just how inventive and versatile our arts really were at this time.”

Gothic Wonder: Art, Artifice and the Decorated Style is published by Yale ̽��ֱ�� Press. Paul Binski will talk about the book at the 2015 Heffers Lecture at Heffers Bookshop, 20 Trinity Street, Cambridge CB2 1TY, on Thursday, 29 January, 6.15pm. For details contact Francé Davies fc295@cam.ac.uk

Inset images (all cropped): Lady Chapel wall arcade, Ely cathedral, begun 1321; Ely Octagon, designed 1320s; Pantheon, interior, Rome; Westminster Hall, late 14th century; boss depicting a woman fending off a laundry thief, Norwich Cathedral cloister, east walk (all taken from Gothic Wonder).

In his book, Gothic Wonder, Professor Paul Binski explores a period in which English art and architecture pushed the boundaries to produce some of Europe’s most spectacular buildings and illuminated manuscripts. Binski’s research sets into context the whole gamut of human endeavour: from awesome cathedrals to playfully irreverent grotesques.

̽��ֱ��British are modest about their achievements in art. My aim is to show to readers here and abroad just how inventive and versatile our arts really were at this time.

Paul Binski

Fitzwilliam Museum

Macclesfield Psalter, skate surprise, circa 1330-40

̽��ֱ��text in this work is licensed under a Creative Commons Licence. If you use this content on your site please link back to this page. For image rights, please see the credits associated with each individual image.

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