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November 20, 2008
Early Medieval Church Silver at Dumbarton Oaks
I got to visit Dumbarton Oaks last weekend with my nephews (and sister!) - the Sion Treasure is a highlight for me. It was the perfect preparation for someone to spend the week reading the Liber Pontificalis and its telegraphic mentions of the largesse of the popes. Here's what the LP (in Davis's translation, linked above) says Paschal I gave to the church of Santa Caecilia, which he rebuilt:
For love of the venerable saints [Agatha and Caecilia], to decorate this church [Sta Caecilia in Trastevere] this holy prelate provided an apse adorned with mosaic and a silver canopy of wondrous size, weighing 600 lb 8 oz. He finished and marvellously embellished the holy altar's propitatorium* and the confessio** inside and out, and its grills, with silver sheets, weighing in all 154 lb 15 oz. At this virgin's holy body he presented an image of silver sheets weighing 95 lb. In front of the altar's vestibule he provided a cornice covered in silver sheets and 2 columns, where he placed 1 arch and 2 chevrons, weighing in all 100 1/2 lb. There too he presented 3 sliver-gilt images weighing 48 1/2 lb. For this church's arches this prelate provided 26 great silver chalices weighing in all 109 1/2 lb. There too he presented 2 silver canisters*** with six wicks, weighing 2 lb 9 oz; a fine gold bowl weighing 3 lb. This pontiff provided 2 silver canisters with nine wicks, weighing 10 lb; 3 silver bowls weighing 5 lb.; a silver gilt thurible weighing 1 lb. (LP, Life 100: chapters 19-20)
And that's before the biographer lists the fabrics Paschal donated.
This kind of amazing silver work - Dumbarton Oaks' example probably coming from a provincial monastery in Lycia in Anatolia - was not uncommon in the Mediterranean world. Click and see two other views of the stuff from the same site.
The inscriptions in silver are also splendid and eye-catching - and help liven up for me some of the tedious textual inscriptions I study as evidence for how patrons wanted people to see and use their buildings.
Moments like this also make the neo-Baroque so common in modern 1962 Missal arrangements seem quite dull. This is real silver, not gold leaf or gold thread embroidery. Imagine what people thought about their altars in the 6th century as opposed to what we might surmise from the plaster and gold leaf decorations of the 17th?
*propitatorium - well, it's the word the Vulgate uses for whatever was on top of the Ark of the Covenant - what the KJV calls the "mercy seat." It doesn't show up often in the Liber Pontificalis, so we're not exactly sure what it is except that it was associated with the altar. Some people translate it as "altar frontal." I find that more convincing than "ciborium" or some kind of rear ledge over the altar.
**confessio - the container for the body of the saint.
***cannister - some kind of cylindrical floor-based oil lamp
Posted by CrankyProfessor at November 20, 2008 7:28 PM
Comments
"Imagine what people thought about their altars in the 6th century as opposed to what we might surmise from the plaster and gold leaf decorations of the 17th?"
Michael, are you sure that you really want to go there? Such a line of questions raises some rather unpleasant questions about the altars created within the past 50 years....Felt, anyone?
Posted by: Bruce at November 20, 2008 10:27 PM
Dagnabbit! Just after I post saying how I failed to get there, you show me what I was missing. Ah well. Some other time.
Posted by: Jonathan Jarrett at November 21, 2008 9:04 AM