Notes on Grandmaster Bowman scroll for Beileaq Urquhart

His Lordship François Thibault

5 January to 5 February, A.S. XXXIIII

(This online image looks pretty washed-out. That's an artifact of the scanner; everything else kept coming out with too little contrast, to the point where you couldn't see details.)

• Paper: 9"x12" Aquarelle Arches Hot Press
• 1" margins
• Calligraphy:
  • Hand: Gothic Littera Bastarda (Drogin 153)
  • Ink: Winsor & Newton Black Indian Ink
  • Nibs:
    • Capital: 2mm Brause
    • Rest: 3/4mm Brause
  • Line spacing: 3mm minim, 3mm each above and below
• Illumination:
  • As you can probably tell, I went for an "archers in the forest" theme (not explicitly Robin Hood, but, yeah, it's close).
  • Sources:
    • The trees are made up out of whole cloth.
    • So are the people, mostly. The style of the kneeling archer comes from a TI cover a few years back; the musician's mandolin (?) is patterned from one a friend of mine had. I tried to show the oversized-arm effect which British longbowmen supposedly built up.
    • The boar up at the top is taken from the Très Riche Heures, the November page (p. 12 of the Longon/Cazelles edition).
    • The deer at the bottom is taken from the TRH, Psalm XLI (p. 87 of L/C).
    • The bird in the middle of the right side is also taken from Psalm XLI of the TRH.
    • The ferret at the bottom is from a 12th-century Latin bestiary, Cambridge University Library II.4.26 (in the library since 1655), translated in modern times by T.H. White (ISBN 0-486-24609-4); this illustration was on p. 92.
    • The other animals are made up. The rooster is probably out of keeping with the forest theme, but I put it in anyway because it's on my arms.
    • The target is the style I'm told is used for Royal Rounds (gold, red, blue, black, white), except I left off the white circle because I didn't have space (nor any good way to make the white stand out as part of the target instead of just the blank paper).
  • Colors (all are Winsor & Newton gouaches unless otherwise noted):
    • Treetops and hats: Forest Green
    • Grass and boots: 4 parts Forest Green, 2 parts Golden (Caran D'Ache), 1 part Chinese White (W&N watercolor)
    • Treetrunks: Burnt Umber
    • Bows, mandolin: Raw Sienna
    • Shirts, deer, squirrels, lower half of curved-beak bird: 1 part Raw Sienna, 1 part Burnt Umber
    • Cardinal, rooster: Flame Red
    • Beaks, yellow bird, head & fletching of arrow, blonde hair: Golden (Caran D'Ache)
    • Pants, inside of mandolin, upper wing of curved-beak bird, boar's body: 1 part Burnt Sienna, 1 part Burnt Umber
    • Boar's head: 1 part Raw Sienna, 1 part Burnt Umber
    • Human skin: Flesh
    • Target: in order from the middle: Golden (Caran D'Ache), Primary Red, Prussian Blue, Burnt Umber
    • Bluebird: Prussian Blue