The Crucifixion in British collections, 1000-1350: a comparative study

the ‘Noli me Tangere’ iconography on the top left (where Mary Magdalene meets the risen Christ, in John 20:17), and the scene of Judas’s kiss which identifies Christ to the Romans in the bottom left hand corner (Matthew 26:47-50 and Mark 14:44-45) (V. and A. Museum, “The Soissons Diptych”).
The curve of Christ’s body on the cross, in the Crucifixion scene found in the centre right panel, and the suggestion of agony in the twisted posture was typical of devotional objects after around 1250, as with the Italian example by Pisano (Figure 2). The influence of St. Francis of Assisi was leading to the development of a deeply bodily form of devotion, which encouraged empathy with Christ’s suffering and veneration of his wounds (Vauchez, Dobson and Lapidge 387).
4 – The Marnhull Orphrey, 1315-35 (Figure 4), (Figure 5)
Embroidery, in particular for ecclesiastical purposes, was one of the most popular artistic products coming out of England in the medieval period. Such works were known as opus anglicanum.
An orphrey would have normally decorated part of a priest’s garment or chasuble during Mass, although some were commissioned and owned by lay people and this seems to have been the case for this example. The shields at the top of this section are those of the Wokyndon family, who were benefactors of St Paul’s Cathedral (V. a. A. Museum “The Marnham Orphrey”). It is particularly richly sewn with silver-gilt thread, and the work is very fine, the contours of the faces being formed by tightly winding the thread to indent the fabric. Lewes Gee comments, ‘The orphrey is particularly interesting as it represents another type of patron: a knightly family, wealthy enough to purchase an embroidery where the linen ground was covered entirely with gold thread and which must have equalled in quality any of the work done for the court’ (Lewes Gee 66-67).
The iconographic scheme represents scenes from the Passion of Christ, including Christ in Majesty at the top, and the Flagellation in the bottom part. Fashionable Gothic architectural elements frame each scene.
5 – The Crucified Christ Flanked by Mary and John, late 13th century (Figure 6)
This plaque made from highly polished steatite was originally gilded in places. It represents the Crucifixion with the Virgin Mary and St. John, who mourn Christ with traditional gestures of grief – only the Virgin’s hand reaching to touch her son’s body is an unusual iconographic motif and lends an emotional accessibility to the group. Originating from the declining Byzantine Empire, the plaque was produced as a devotional amulet in the late 13th century (Trustees of the British Museum, “Steatite Plaque with Crucifixion Scene”).
The fairly conventional iconic grouping is lent a touch of dynamism by the way in which Christ’s halo breaks out of the ‘frame’ surrounding the image. Noting the same phenomenon of framing (referring to cross-shaped icons), Glenn Peers comments, ‘By making the Crucifixion less discrete in a framed-off space and establishing a continuity between inside and outside, the new format aided the devotional desires… for more intense intimacy with the divine’ (Peers 8-9). Belting describes these later Byzantine icons as using ‘a narrative mode of depicting emotions’ (Belting 216).
6 – Crucifixion, early 1200s (Figure 7)
This scene in stained glass from the Corona Redemption Window at Canterbury Cathedral was originally made in the early 1200s, although the central panel representing the Crucifixion was entirely renovated in 1853. It was the iconographical programme at the Basilica of St. Denis, planned by Abbot Suger in the mid 12th century, which originally gave stained glass windows their subsequent significance in an iconography focused on the symbolism of light. Suger wrote that ‘the dull mind rises to truth through that which is material’ (Panofsky) and popularised an extremely dense iconographic programme for the archetypal Gothic cathedral (see in particular Grant). Windows with complex Biblical stories were considered as ‘the Bible of the poor and illiterate’ since they would be seen by all churchgoers and therefore had a practical pedagogical and theological purpose (Honor and Fleming 391).
The central Crucifixion image is at the heart of the reflection this panel was intended to inspire, with the four surrounding panels containing imagery from the Old Testament which foreshadows the New Testament imagery of the Passion. For instance, the Sacrifice of Isaac at the top refers to God’s sacrifice of his Son and this is reinforced by the cross shape on Isaac’s altar, a rare motif which is also to be seen in the Capella Palatina mosaics in Sicily (Hayes). The bottom panel represents the grapes brought back from Canaan in the story of Moses. The inscription reads, ‘The one refuses to look back at the cluster and the other thirsts to see it; Israel knows not Christ, the Gentiles adore him’. The right hand side refers to the marking of doors with lamb’s blood at Passover (Exodus 12:1-13), the mark being conceived of as a cross to reinforce the iconographic system. The left hand panel shows Moses striking the rock to make water flow (Exodus 17:6-7), which foreshadows the stabbing of Christ with a spear and the shedding of his blood at the Crucifixion (Hayes).
Conclusion
In all the representations brought together here, the purpose and medium of each artwork is closely tied to the way in which the Crucifixion story is portrayed. Throughout the Romanesque and Gothic styles in the European visual arts, the body of Christ was the primary referent for an artistic practice firmly connected to devotional and ecclesiastical patronage. Alongside the differences in purpose, media and role touched upon here, it is the different emotional and empathetic treatment of Christ’s agony which tells us the most about the development of the role and purpose of visual art in the medieval period.