Pilgrim-badge images adopted and reused in ordinary households
About the work
Imported from the workbook's Full reassessment sheet, revised 7 October 2026 (record ID 120). The assessment below is the workbook's comparative judgment under its stated criteria; source links and limits are retained.
Workbook assessment: Best supported
Date or witness: c.1150–1500 within this catalogue; domestic reuse documented especially in 13th–15th-century finds
Region: Western Europe
Workbook date-sort bounds: 1150 CE to 1500 CE; these bounds are not automatically invention or disappearance dates.
Description
Scallop shells, saints and other portable signs were worn, carried home and incorporated into domestic devotional objects.
Evidence of adoption or transmission
Cheap lead-tin badges reached ordinary purchasers. Nail holes, mounts and homemade displays document household appropriation beyond the original souvenir function.
What remains uncertain
Shrines sometimes controlled manufacture. The strongest grassroots evidence is people's adoption and repurposing; it does not prove that every design arose independently of church promotion.
Candidate-index family 3: Pilgrim-badge images adopted and reused in ordinary households
The workbook groups records 120 here and rates the family Best supported. This is a research shortlist, not proof of an independently established meme family.
Dated evidence: c.1150–1500 within this catalogue; domestic reuse documented especially in 13th–15th-century finds
Region: Western Europe
Shortlist uncertainty: Shrines sometimes controlled manufacture. The strongest grassroots evidence is people's adoption and repurposing; it does not prove that every design arose independently of church promotion.
Workbook revision note: Added after correcting the humour-based selection
Sources
Bibliography note
Reference: Sarah Blick, 'Bringing Pilgrimage Home: The Production, Iconography, and Domestic Use of Late-Medieval Devotional Objects by Ordinary People,' Religions 10.6 (2019), 392; Yper Museum, 'Pilgrims.'