Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History

The Metropolitan Museum of Art


    • Embroidered sampler, 1766
    Rebekah White (American, born ca. 1753)
    Salem, Massachusetts
    Silk on linen

    16 1/2 x 17 1/4 in. (41.91 x 43.82 cm)
    Inscribed: [two full alphabets, two partial alphabets] / Rebekah White Wroug / ht This is The 13th Ye / ar of Her Age 1766
    Gift of Barbara Schiff Sinauer, 1984 (1984.331.8)

    The pastoral courting scene embroidered beneath the lettering on this sampler relates to the more formal tent-stitch needlework pictures created by Boston girls during this decade. Salem samplers are characterized by long filling stitches made from untwisted silk floss. This early sampler is one of a small group made in the school of an unknown teacher who may have introduced this technique, which remained popular in Salem into the nineteenth century.

    Related


    MoveSeparatorPrint
    Close
  • Embroidered sampler, 1766
    Rebekah White (American, born ca. 1753)
    Salem, Massachusetts
    Silk on linen

    16 1/2 x 17 1/4 in. (41.91 x 43.82 cm)
    Inscribed: [two full alphabets, two partial alphabets] / Rebekah White Wroug / ht This is The 13th Ye / ar of Her Age 1766
    Gift of Barbara Schiff Sinauer, 1984 (1984.331.8)