Claremont Coptic Encyclopedia 26 March 2023
gayet, albert (1856-1916): the coptic tapestry albums
Nancy Arthur Hoskins Keywords: Albert Gayet; Albert Jean Marie Philippe Gayet; Henry Art Gallery; Musée du Louvre; Antinoöpolis; Antinoé; Coptic textiles; Coptic tapestries; Coptic fabrics; Coptic art; Thaïs; Sarapion; Henry Bryon; Mamluk textiles; Early Islamic textiles; Archaeology; Burial; Tomb. Albert Gayet Thousands of coptic textiles were collected by the French archaeologist Jean Marie Philippe albert gayet (1856–1916) from Coptic burial grounds in Egypt (Hoskins 2023). The textiles and other grave goods were brought back to Paris and donated to museums or expedition sponsors. A large number of Gayet’s textiles were sold at auction in 1901. Those textiles are now scattered in public and private collections around the world (Hoskins 2004). One group of Gayet’s textile fragments and artifacts from the sale were artfully arranged over a hundred years ago in a pair of unique volumes—The Text Album and The Textile Album. The pair of books and their textile treasures are now at the Henry Art Gallery at the University of Washington in Seattle (Fig. 1).
Fig. 1.A Fig. 1.B Fig. 1.A: The Text Album, 11¼” x 9½” (28.6 cm x 24.8 cm x 4.8 cm).
Fig. 1.B: The Textile Album, 11¼” x 9¾” (28.6 cm x 24.8 cm x 7.6 cm). Courtesy of the Henry Art Gallery, University of Washington, Seattle (Hoskins 2004). Images by R. Nicol.
© Claremont Graduate University 1 Nancy Hoskins, Albert Gayet (1856-1916): The Coptic Tapestry Albums 26 March 2023 The Coptic Tapestry Albums Two letters from Albert Gayet to Henry Bryon were donated with the two albums and identify Bryon as the owner in 1913 (Hoskins 2004). Either Bryon or the Parisian bookbinder Robert Joly created the way the textiles were used in the albums. Gayet wrote in a letter to Bryon that, “the albums with the clothes of Antinoé, were charming and executed with perfect artistic talent” (Gayet 1913). The albums were sold at auction by a Monsieur X at the Hôtel Drouot on 23 February 1928 in Paris. The sale catalog advertised “ancient books, autographs, objets d’art, curiosities, and a collection of Coptic fabrics of the 3rd century, and souvenirs of the excavations of Antinoé in two handsome volumes” (Hémard 1928). The details of the person who purchased the albums and where they were after the 1928 sale are unknown (Zimmer 1983). Ultimately, the pair of albums was purchased in a Los Angeles, California bookstore in 1947 or 1948 by Helen Stager Poulsen (Poulsen 1985) and donated to the University of Washington’s Henry Art Gallery by Poulsen in 1981 (accession Nos. 83.7-1 to 83.7-73; Hoskins 2004).
The Text Album The gold letters on the spine of The Text Album state AL. gayet, antinoë, sépulture de thaïs. There is a penciled inscription on a page in the album that states in English: “Unique copy made expressly for M. Gayet—archeologist and explorer of Antinoé.” Two books by Gayet: Antinoë et les sépultures de Thaïs et Sérapion (1902) and Fantomes d’Antinoë, Les Sépultures de Leukyoné et Myrithis (1904), are bound in The Text Album (Fig. 1A). The books are illustrated with aquarelles by Paul Madeline (1863–1920) (Figs. 2.A and 2.B) and etchings copied from photographs taken during Gayet’s expeditions (Gayet 1902; Guillaumont 1991). The pair of tapestry fragments in Fig. 2.C are from the mantle of Thaïs. Her mummy is preserved at the Musée de l’Homme in Paris.
There are thirty textiles in The Text Album. The cover of the album is a collage of tabby and tapestry fragments, but the back is without adornment. The insides of the front and back covers are decorated with collages of Coptic fragments. Five other pages within are covered with full-size textiles. Three of these textiles are pasted to pages in between the two books contained in the album.
The Textile Album The Textile Album, which is labeled AL. gayet on the spine, contains 114 fabrics and eight artifacts. The album cover is a collage of four fragments pasted together. The crested-basket and crossed-rosette piece on the back of the album has a matching piece in the Gayet collection at the Musée du Louvre. Many other fragments match textiles in the Louvre and other museum collections. Gayet saw the albums owned by Bryon in 1913 and autographed a page in The Textile Album (Fig. 3).
© Claremont Graduate University 2 Nancy Hoskins, Albert Gayet (1856-1916): The Coptic Tapestry Albums 26 March 2023 Fig. 2.A Fig. 2.B Fig. 2.A: Title page. Fig. 2.B: Paul Madeline, “Thaïs the Orante,” from A. Gayet, Antinoë et les sépultures de Thaïs et Sérapion (1902).
Fig. 2.C: “Two Fragments of the Mantle of Thaïs,” Musée de l’Homme, ktn 619 (DM 138). Radiocarbon dating (95.4% probability) AD 420–612. (De Moor 2022) Courtesy of the Phoebus Foundation.
© Claremont Graduate University 3 Nancy Hoskins, Albert Gayet (1856-1916): The Coptic Tapestry Albums 26 March 2023 “The exploration of Antinoé is the resurrection of a world. This statement by a foreigner, a German scholar, has hardly found any response in France, except among some savants.”
—Al Gayet (Translation by author) Fig. 3: Gayet’s 1913 autograph. (Hoskins 2004: The Textile Album, Plate 4) Courtesy of the Henry Art Gallery. Image by R. Nicol.
Some album pages are covered with one large fragment. Other pages have two or more pieces pasted to paper. There are eight collage pages. Artifacts are assembled in a shallow box at the back of The Textile Album (Figs. 1.B, 4.B).
The majority of the album textiles are made of linen, wool, or linen and wool together. There is one green cashmere fragment in The Text Album that came from a “riding coat” in the Musée Historique des Tissus collection in Lyon, France. One multicolored, striped silk is in The Textile Album. Techniques other than tapestry include tabby weaves, tablet weaves, a weft-loop weave, a sprang net, and embroidered linens. The fragments are from garments and other domestic textiles. Apart from six embroidered fragments, which are probably Mamluk (thirteenth–sixteenth century AD), the fabrics are either from the centuries of Coptic or Early Islamic Egypt. The album fragments represent themes, styles, and structures common to the period.
Every textile and artifact in The Text Album and The Textile Album reveals a story about its origin and journey from Egypt to Paris and finally to Seattle. Details about the fibers, dyes, and construction of a fabric add information about the history of textiles in the western world. At one time, each fragment was a part of a decorative garment or a functional fabric, a burial cloth, an archaeologist’s acquisition, or a museum treasure. Though separated from its context, each piece is still connected to other Coptic collections around the globe. Both Figs. 5.B and 5.C have matching fragments—cut from the same original cloth—that are in the collection at the Musée du Louvre. These Coptic tapestry albums are an important part of the tale of textiles gathered from the burial grounds of Egypt.
© Claremont Graduate University 4 Nancy Hoskins, Albert Gayet (1856-1916): The Coptic Tapestry Albums 26 March 2023 Fig. 4.A Fig. 4.B Fig. 4.A: “The Clavi and Cross Collage,” a collage page with eleven fragments from four different textiles. Fig. 4.B: “The Boxed Collage,” a box of artifacts and textiles at the back of The Textile Album. (Hoskins 2004: The Textile Album. Plate 14: 83.7-10 and Plate 42: 83.7-72) Courtesy of the Henry Art Gallery. Images by R. Nicol.
Fig. 5.A Fig. 5.B Fig. 5.C Fig. 5.A: “A Portrait of a Woman with Earrings,” a tapestry fragment from a page in The Textile Album. Fig. 5.B: “A Crossed-Rosette with a Crested Basket,” a full-page tabby tapestry fragment from The Textile Album. Fig. 5.C: “Three Dancers on a Yoke,” one of three tapestry fragments from a page in The Textile Album. (Hoskins 2004: The Textile Album. Plate 25: 83.7-62, Plate 83.7-67, Plate 83.7.56; (Hoskins 2022: Figs. 1, 4) Courtesy of the Henry Art Gallery. Images by R. Nicol.
© Claremont Graduate University 5 Nancy Hoskins, Albert Gayet (1856-1916): The Coptic Tapestry Albums 26 March 2023