A Lion of An Tir is arguably the highest award in the kingdom. It is given only once a reign, and always to someone who embodies the ideals of the Society and is a role model to all. King Cedric and Queen Elizabeth elevated him to this position at Twelfth Night, 2010 (AS XLIV), and I was fortunate enough to be asked to do the scroll.

Thegn Sir Rolf Longbow is an Eleventh Century Saxon who fought for Harold Godwinson and after the war traveled extensively in Europe. Rolf eventually returned to England and married into a Norman household to retain his land. He is an accomplished axe fighter and armorer, specializing in helmets, leather breastplates, and gauntlets.

King Cedric and Queen Elizabeth have Carolingian personas, and Thegn Rolf is an 11th century Saxon, so my intent was to do a scroll in the bestiary style of the 11th and 12th centuries, using a large window-box picture as the primary illumination, and keeping the text itself fairly sparse and neat save for the colored versal introductory line.

Click on any image to see it in a much larger size.

This scroll's style is based on the Ashmole Bestiary and the Aberdeen Bestiary (both c.1100). The Ashmole Bestiary (Bodleian Library MS. Ashmole 1511) is a late 12th or early 13th century English illuminated manuscript Bestiary containing a creation story and detailed allegorical descriptions of over 100 animals. Rich color miniatures of the animals are also included. The same artist may have created both works, as they are of a period and have many similarities. The rich, gold-leafed animal portaits in the Aberdeen Bestiary, in particular, gave the icon image at the top of this scroll its lustre and structure; the saint icon used as the central figure is taken from the Winchester Bible (c.1160-1175). The two lions portrayed in the picture are non-heraldric images of the supporters he is being given with this award, and have been carefully designed to show the An Tir lion in its heraldric glory (black, tail forked and knowed). They are climbing a 'massacre,' a stylized set of stag's horns, which figure prominently as the sole charge in the recipient's arms.

The primary text is executed in an open Carolingian miniscule, with capitals of the same century. The template text was found in the Gospels of Lothair, in the 9th century, but later-period S's were substituted for legibility, making the entire text of this scroll date to approximately 1150-1200, as would be appropriate for the template works chosen. The illumination style draws from many sources; the zoomorphs ornamenting the pieces found at Kells and Lindesfarne; the bestiary box is an illumination style of the 10th through 12th centuries, particularly the Corsair Bestiary, the Rochester Bestiary and the Aberdeen Bestiary. The primary colors of the external illumination are black, white and gold, as suits both An Tir and the recipient's arms. The internal and surrounding blue colors were chosen for contrast.