This volume of essays arises from a conference sponsored by the Seals in Medieval Wales project to coincide with an exhibition at the National Library of Wales. The papers necessarily include a range of apparently disparate and unconnected studies, but as well as the three themes under which the editors have grouped their papers – Status and Power; Law and Practice; and Sources and Their Content – they also demonstrate the uncertainties and paradoxes in the use of medieval seals.

Some papers focus on the ways in which motifs on seals were expressions of power and personal authority. Nicholas Vincent’s article on the seals of Henry ii and his court considers how those seals explore the nature of twelfth-century kingship and Adrian Ailes revises the date of Richard i’s second seal, demonstrating how its iconography reflected shifting networks of power. Brian Kemp demonstrates how one noble family – the Longespees – used the family’s devices and arms on the seals of both men and women to express their authority, while Jörg Peltzer suggests that English aristocratic seals of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries demonstrated family rather than rank within the aristocracy, in contrast to contemporaneous and comparable seals of the Empire.

Dealing with more problematic aspects of seals are papers by Elizabeth New, Daniel Power, John Cherry and Brigitte Bedos-Rezak. New’s careful and detailed study of radial motifs on a selection of Welsh seals from around Kenfig demonstrates that it is dangerous to make generalisations. She argues that the use of a standard motif chosen by individuals of all social statuses and by communities cannot be dismissed as all alike, as what seem to be simple geometric designs actually divulge a range of detail which can reveal family networks. Power provides a detailed analysis of the seals on one document, the declaration on the Norman church of 1205, which reveals increasing innovation and experimentation in seal motifs that reflected the status of the sigillants much less simply than seals of the mid-twelfth century. Cherry’s paper is a reminder that the seal was not the only possible form of legal authorisation for a document. He explores the ways in which late medieval Italy made use of the notarised as well as the sealed instrument. Bedos-Rezak considers the place of learned discourse about seals and sealing and the way in which the uncertainty of theory about sealing may have undermined their ability to act as signs of authority. Harvey asks a deceptively simple question – what is a seal – and answers it by drawing attention to the easily overlooked cross with which so many legends begin, suggesting that the answer might lie here.

The context of the seal is also shown to be important. Paul Brand reminds us that acts of sealing could be as important – and as complicated – as the seals themselves. His study of the seal in thirteenth-century law demonstrates that personal responsibility for the attachment of the seal was not straightforward and that whether a seal had been validly attached, and the form of the attachment itself, were questions asked in the courts. John McEwan, on the seal makers of medieval London, demonstrates that the social status of the seal maker and the economics of seal making, are an important part of the seal’s place in cultural history. Markus Späth puts English monastic seals in the context of their own history: as memorialisations of the ‘glorious past’ of these houses, using imagery of architecture and individuals to justify monastic authority through a house’s past. Memory is also important to T A Heslop and Matthew Sillence, who demonstrate how medieval seals could be used on an eighteenth-century plan to reflect views of civic governance.

Overall, this volume reminds the reader that seals cannot be either overlooked or viewed simply as providing straightforward information in their legends and iconography. They must be considered in the context of their affixing and of their creation. In particular, several of the papers here serve as a reminder that if seals were about authority – legal and personal – their use could be complex, sometimes even confusing, and that the uncertainty arising from this could make seals not only a source of strength but of instability. In short, the collection presents the study of medieval seals as a vibrant and exciting area of research.