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Your best bet is probably to do a little research on your own, and make your own paternoster, rather than trying to purchase one. There's many types of beads that you could use, and you can fingerloop your own cord, and make your own tassel. You can decide how many "decades" you want, and if you want a loop or a straight string.

I intend to make one myself at some point, though I haven't started to do in depth research into what style I want. Jeff, though, can tell you about different kinds of coral, and all sorts of things. I will tell you that there's a variety of styles, and they don't seem to follow the hard and fast rules of today's rosaries.

For starters, there's a Paternosters yahoo group:

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Paternosters/

with a lot of good information. I think Chris Laning is a good person to listen to, she really seems to know her stuff. It's rather low volume, but you always have the web only option.
http://paternosters.blogspot.com/ http://paternosters.home.igc.org/

are her websites.

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My only question about your beads, is whether or not a round paternoster would be appropriate by the mid 14th century, or if the straight strand would be better at that time. I haven't done any digging though yet, to answer that myself.

Also, what kind of coral are you using? Dyed or natural red? Jeff and I have been searching for natural red beads, to avoid the plastic-ky feel of the dyed.

Thanks!
Charlotte

[ 03-31-2005: Message edited by: Charlotte ]

quote:

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Originally posted by Charles I:
I will be portraying a knight and everyone else is wanting to be of slightly lower station. Would there be a difference in the type one would have had due to his/her station?
Thank you.
Charles I

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Among the files in the website Charlotte listed above is what Chris believes to be a list of materials by class, In case you can't find it - in general Coral is what the wealthy used for paternosters. You see this confirmed in portraits of the wealthy - all the rich people have coral PNs. Middle-class would have used glass, amber, jet, etc. and the poorer folk horn, bone and at the lowest end - wood.

So, were I in your position, of being the rich one, I'd go for the coral and have my underlings use glass, jet, & amber as they choose. If you have poor, go for wood.

Char mentioned the dyed coral. Most of what's generally comercially available is stabilized (plastic-impregnated & dyed) pacific apple or bamboo coral. Mediteranean Coral beads are more proper, but VERY expensive. (Just like they were then) We're talking A couple hundred dollars for a 16" strand of 6mm rounds, and it hit's the thousands fairly quickly if you go much larger. I can provide a link tomorrow.

Also, I believe the 14th C. Paternosters were usually 3 decades (30 beads) in a straight unlooped string, and no dangly ornament. Viktoria ought be able to help and confirm that. (nice site, Viktoria!)

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quote:

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Originally posted by Charlotte:

My only question about your beads, is whether or not a round paternoster would be appropriate by the mid 14th century, or if the straight strand would be better at that time. I haven't done any digging though yet, to answer that myself.

Also, what kind of coral are you using? Dyed or natural red? Jeff and I have been searching for natural red beads, to avoid the plastic-ky feel of the dyed.

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I usually tell people there are few enough surviving rosaries or rosary paintings that it's hard to generalize from the data we have -- so it's hard to say for sure what's appropriate for specific countries or centuries.

That said, however: there doesn't seem to be an evolution from looped to straight forms or vice versa, as far as I can see. I've found both forms from about the same time period more often than not, from early appearance right up through the 16th century.

In general, the looped forms seem to be used by both men and women (taking evidence from paintings). The short straight paternoster of ten or eleven beads (a "tenner") seems to be exclusively a "guy thing". I've seen longer straight strings used by both men and women.

There is not a lot of evidence from the 14th century of exactly what prayer beads looked like. There's more after about 1450 when the rosary devotion we are familiar with today became popular.

As for red coral, as far as I know, most of what you see around today is either dyed, or very expensive (several hundreds of dollars per string). I'm not a professional gem buyer, but genuine red coral seems to be in very short supply, and my understanding is that there's environmental concern about it as well. I've found both good and bad dyed coral, so perhaps you might find some that feels more natural.

I'm happy to correspond with anyone on this subject and to share what I know. I'd be interested in seeing anyone else's references or data , as well.

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Originally posted by Jeff Johnson:
Coral is what the wealthy used for paternosters. You see this confirmed in portraits of the wealthy - all the rich people have coral PNs. Middle-class would have used glass, amber, jet, etc. and the poorer folk horn, bone and at the lowest end - wood.

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I'd amend that slightly to include silver and silver-gilt on the wealthy end of things, and amber and jet were pretty expensive too.

I'd expect that a middle-class person who wasn't trying to overspend and show off would probably have glass or one of the less expensive semi-precious stones, such as jasper, carnelian, chalcedony or mother of pearl. The "paters" or marker beads might be silver-gilt if they could afford it. The post Jeff is referring to is probably Gauds and Gaudier

I'll be interested to see what evidence there is for 30-bead strings -- the only one I've seen was 16th century and had marker beads as well. It's in a painting so it's hard to tell what it's made of: Praying on almost all cylinders

[ 03-31-2005: Message edited by: Chris Laning ]

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The red coral of Southern Italy and the Tunisian coast used by the medieval Paternoster-makers is considered an endangered specie today, thus being both expensive and illegal to trade in many countries, among them Sweden. The coral beads sold in my webstore are of Asian origin. They have a naturally light red colour, but are colour-enhanced in order to give them a deeper red hue. The surface of these beads is semi-matte, and not as glossy and plasticy as some of the dyed coral beads sold as jewelry supplies. They do also have the large holes of the original medieval beads.

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Charles, as a sidenote, I know what you mean about the SCA. I've been in the SCA for about 4 years, and been doing LH for about a year. I enjoy LH a LOT, but still go back to the SCA to play often. I take my LH stuff with me, and educate as much as I can, which ends up pretty often as I always get a lot of questions. I've found that there's a lot of hidden talent (the wonderful cook in bad clothing, etc.) and subsets of excellence running in currents in certain areas. Then Jeff tries to recruit pretty girls for LH.

Since I've been doing this, I've found that heading up for a day to an SCA event with minimal gear, vs. our carload(s) for LH, can be a relaxing propsition.

quote:

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Originally posted by Chris Laning:

I'll be interested to see what evidence there is for 30-bead strings

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Glad I qualified my statement with "I believe"!

Thanks for sharing your info Chris & Viktoria. It's great that people are doing such detailed research into such a specialized niche of the material culture.

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16" strand

5mm Round Beads $150.00
6mm Round Beads $225.00
7mm Round Beads $600.00
8mm Round Beads $1550.00
9mm Round Beads $2,500.00

[ 04-11-2005: Message edited by: Jeff Johnson ]

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