Medieval Tomb Research Articles

Stone Fidelity: Marriage and Emotion in Medieval Tomb Sculpture

Stone Fidelity: Marriage and Emotion in Medieval Tomb Sculpture

Stone Fidelity: Marriage and Emotion in Medieval Tomb Sculpture by Jessica Barker (review)

Stone Fidelity: Marriage and Emotion in Medieval Tomb Sculpture by Jessica Barker (review)

Раскопки кургана у села Каиры в верховьях Тилигульского лимана

In 2020, in the area of the village of Kayry (~ 65—70 km to NE from Odessa), one barrow was excavated, in which 15 graves were discovered. The earliest burials were 4 burials of the Yamnaya culture. One of them (the central grave) was accompanied by several processed stones (stelae). Two graves belonged to the Catacomb culture of different variants, or cultures (Ingul, for sure, and Donetsk, perhaps). In one grave (plundered) there was a vessel of Berezhnovsko-Mayevsky Srubnaya culture. Two graves of the Early Iron Age are the latest ones. One of them belonged to the Scythian culture (6th—5th centuries BC), the other — to the era of Late Nomads (11th—12th centuries AD). The construction of a medieval grave destroyed the central burial of the Yamnaya culture. In turn, the medieval tomb was looted. Almost all burials of the Bronze Age were built by the using of stone slabs. In the burials of the Yamnaya and Catacomb cultures, these were massive slabs that covered the grave pit (or catacomb).

Art and typology of Women’s sights of northern and northeastern Montenegro

Research and study of sights is not new in the Balkan area. The first important research in this field was carried out by two Bosnian-Herzegovinian researchers, namely Mehmed Mujezinović and Šefik Bešlagić. Those researches were carried out in Bosnia and Herzegovina through three levels - history, epigraphy and art. In addition to these two great men, we also have some other researchers who worked on sights such as Ćiro Truhelka, Antun Hangi, Seid Mustafa Trajlić, Alija Nametak, Alija Bejtić, Džemal Čelić. Often, these and many other authors classified men's sights into ulema, dervish, martyr, pashin, agin, hajji, clerical, etc. They did this, first of all, because of their rich decoration, which is as different as the weapons that are a frequent motif on those sights - shield, sword, bow, mace. It is not difficult to distinguish the sights of men from the niches of buried women. Men's sights are reminiscent of medieval tomb in their dimensions, with the difference that the headboards are represented with creases. Women's sights are significantly different: smaller, more modest and simpler, mostly in the form of a truncated shield, less often, on the frontal edges, decorated with floral motifs, leaves and tree branches. In addition to these ornaments, we also notice some that reflect and symbolize female beauty and elegance. In this section, it should be mentioned to the readers that women's sights could also be characterized in a better way, that is, they could get their own characteristic shapes. For example, until now every female sights has been treated in a broader scope and in the simplest sense as a sights of a deceased woman. Certainly, there were those researchers who classified the sights into stelae and women's caps. All this points to the fact that the division within the circle of women's sights is poor and that this allows deepening and classification in a new and appropriate way. In this sense, we are of the opinion that a new division could be made among women's sights based primarily on their external appearance. Such a starting point gives us the right to classify them into women's sights in the form of a stele, women's sights in the form of pillars with a women's cap and women's sights with solufs. But, even for this division, it could be stated that it is poor and not comprehensive, because women's sights can also be observed and explained from the point of view of social position and affiliation. Large and well-decorated nishans belong to rich women, while those of smaller dimensions and with less decorative ornaments belong to poorer people. Just as the Agin and Pašina sights are very richly decorated and of large dimensions, some women's sights could be classified in a similar category. However, we cannot prove this, because in that case we would have to conduct archaeological research, with the help of which it would be possible to obtain more detailed information that would enable better illumination of the deceased person's belonging to a certain social class. On the other hand, shapes can also help us to chronologically place women's sights in the appropriate century. Steles, as the oldest form, began to be used in a slightly older period of making women's sights, already in the second half of the 15th century, and are still in use today. These niches, initially without Arabic epitaphs, with ornaments that are represented on tombs, were carved mostly in Bosnia and Herzegovina and in a somewhat wider area. In the 17th century, women's nishan got another very different form, in the way that a woman's cap was placed on the columnar sights, which began to receive an Arabic epitaph. With these sights, the upper part is in the shape of an inverted fez, while the lower part has a collar that helps us identify these sights. We also have a sight with solufluks that symbolize women's zulufs and their beauty. With this, we have briefly presented the art and typology of sights from the 15th to the 20th century. There are sights that do not correspond to these types, but we have presented them in this work.

The Early Medieval relief from Malo Čajno nearby Visoko with great Nespina kaznac’s added inscription

The Early Medieval relief from Malo Čajno nearby Visoko with great Nespina kaznac’s added inscription

Review of Stone Fidelity: Marriage and Emotion in Medieval Tomb Sculpture

Review of Jessica Barker's "Stone Fidelity: Marriage and Emotion in Medieval Tomb Sculpture" by Joan A. Holladay.

Jessica Barker, Stone Fidelity: Marriage and Emotion in Medieval Tomb Sculpture. (Boydell Studies in Medieval Art and Architecture.) Woodbridge, UK: Boydell, 2020. Pp. xiv, 336; many color and black-and-white figures. $90. ISBN: 978-1-7832-7271-6.

Jessica Barker, <i>Stone Fidelity: Marriage and Emotion in Medieval Tomb Sculpture</i>. (Boydell Studies in Medieval Art and Architecture.) Woodbridge, UK: Boydell, 2020. Pp. xiv, 336; many color and black-and-white figures. $90. ISBN: 978-1-7832-7271-6.

Stone Fidelity: Marriage and Emotion in Medieval Tomb Sculpture, by Jessica Barker

Stone Fidelity: Marriage and Emotion in Medieval Tomb Sculpture, by Jessica Barker

Jessica Barker, Stone Fidelity: Marriage and Emotion in Medieval Tomb Sculpture. Boydell Studies in Medieval Art and Architecture. Woodbridge, Suffolk: Boydell Press, 2020, 336 pp., 95 ill. (34 color, 61 b/w).

Jessica Barker, <i>Stone Fidelity: Marriage and Emotion in Medieval Tomb Sculpture</i>. Boydell Studies in Medieval Art and Architecture. Woodbridge, Suffolk: Boydell Press, 2020, 336 pp., 95 ill. (34 color, 61 b/w).

The sculpted epitaph

This ‘Sources and Documents’ section presents the longest sculpted epitaph on a medieval tomb in western Europe, comprising just short of 1,700 words. The Latin inscription has been translated into English for the first time and is accompanied by a comprehensive photographic record. The epitaph belongs to a fifteenth-century monument commemorating Joao I, King of Portugal, and his English wife, Philippa of Lancaster, situated in the centre of the Founder’s Chapel at the monastery of Batalha in Portugal. Straddling the threshold between text and image, art and literature, sculpture and chronicle, epitaphs have been overlooked in traditional accounts of memorial sculpture. The inscription at Batalha raises important questions about the status and function of the epitaph during the fifteenth century, a time at which attitudes towards the written word – and its sculpted manifestations – were undergoing a radical transformation in western Europe. The feature is supplemented by a conversation with Dr Pedro Redr...

Stripped from the Altar, Recycled, Forgotten: The Altarpiece in Lusignan Cyprus

Decontextualized medieval works of art can slip from one functional category to another, depending on the opinions and agendas of different scholars. A prime example of this phenomenon, the medieval altarpiece has occasioned much discussion with respect to form, function, and even legitimacy as a valid category of artwork. What formal traits identify an altarpiece long divorced from the altar it once adorned? Is the altarpiece defined by its distinct form or function, or is it set apart from other kinds of images merely because of its location on an altar? This article addresses these and related questions through the lens of the multicultural and multiconfessional society of Lusignan Cyprus (1192–1489). It focuses on two test cases: the vita painted panel and the rectangular stone relief. Because altarpieces began as a primarily Latin (that is, Roman-rite) phenomenon, not attested for the Greek (that is, Orthodox-rite) or other non-Roman-rite Christians who composed Cypriot society before the sixteenth century, the existence of thirteenth- to fifteenth-century vita images identical to those produced for the Latins in Greek, Syrian, Armenian, or other contexts confirms recent scholarship on Italian vita panels that suggests functions (and locations) other than that of the altarpiece. At the same time, a number of rectangular stone slabs, carved with Christological imagery in relief and thought to have been parts of medieval tomb chests, are here reinterpreted as altarpieces mainly on the basis of their iconography. These considerations redefine our knowledge of the Cypriot altarpiece and contribute to broader questions about the fluidity between functional categories in medieval art.

“Print by Print: Series from Dürer to Lichtenstein” (review)

Reviewed by: “Print by Print: Series from Dürer to Lichtenstein” Ronald Paulson (bio) “Print by Print: Series from Dürer to Lichtenstein” (Baltimore Museum of Art ) Why is the World Series not called a World Tournament? Perhaps because it is a given number of games (seven) between the winning teams of the two major American baseball leagues to decide the championship. There is a beginning, middle, and (with the fourth win) end; the same is true of each game, which is divided into innings. A baseball series is won or lost; but by the logic of the game and the skill of the players, not by the intervention or arrangement of an artist. A series (Latin serere, to weave together) is a group of related or similar things. By “series” the curators of the Baltimore Museum of Art, in their exhibition “Print by Print: Series from Durer to Lichtenstein,” mean pretty much anything that comes in twos, threes, and on up that has some common element, such as a baseball. A series could also be called a set–a tennis set, a deck of cards, a set of Dickens or Thackeray, or their serializations. As a pack of cards, a series invokes other terms such as sequence, which emphasizes a logical or numerical connection between the elements (1–10, Jack-Queen-King); succession implies one thing following another, Louis XVI succeeding Louis XV; and progression, a movement forward (as regression, back). John Coplan, in what is still the standard work, Serial Imagery (1968), distinguishes series from serial as, with serial, the repetition of purely formal or structural elements: a deck in which all cards are the Ace of Spades, all “of equal value and all imprinted with the same emblem, which may or may not vary in size, color or position” (Warhol’s Marilyn Monroes, Noland’s Targets). Pure seriality for Coplan, drawing on serial composition in music, is formal variation only—colors in a Warhol (inking), larger formal variations in a Rothko, Noland, or Stella abstraction; but with de Kooning’s Women we are dealing again with both form and content: a shape which bears some relationship to a figural representation. Newman’s Stations of the Cross and Motherwell’s Spanish Elegies, abstractions, depend on the title to connect the repeated forms with a content. The BMA’s “Print by Print” is a popular outreach exhibition, selected by Johns Hopkins students, and it is arranged according to theme and subject matter in the following order: series of Imagination, Narrative, Design, Places Real and Imagined, Appropriation, and War. I wish that it had been arranged for a more scholarly audience according to types of seriality or, better, types chronologically arranged, but there are also virtues in a thematic hanging. Better to begin with the category of Narrative, corresponding as it does to the earliest historical sense of series (short of sheer decorative pattern). The prototype would be the Biblical representations of Christ’s life. One could argue that the series began with the dissolution of the single scene containing all the events of Christ’s life, or of a Tabula Cebetis (the most accomplished version is de Hooghe’s illustration for Epictetus’ Enchiridion [End Page 573] of 1670) in which temporal progression is rendered by a sequence of figures scattered across a landscape, along paths, moralized as right and wrong ways taken. The single panel exfoliates into the Via Crucis, The Fourteen Stations of the Cross, in which Christ, the common element, is both form and content. Seriality begins with a second scene, a contrast to (or variation upon) the first, for example an After follows a Before. Serial composition offers us the other, the alternative—as in the memento mori that accompanies each of the outrageous luxuries paraded by Trimalchio in Petronius’ Satyricon: the constant reminder that he will die tomorrow. And so accompanying the story of Christ is the double-image: the Triumph of Death, Death and the Maiden, the beautiful woman being tapped by Death, whether as lover-rapist or the worm-eaten figure (the transi) that lies below the living image of the medieval tomb. So, life and death, action and consequence, beauty and ugliness...

Elizabeth of Aragon, queen and saint of Portugal: Her medieval tomb as an image extolling holiness

Dona Isabel, infanta de Aragao (filha de Pedro III) e rainha de Portugal (mulher de Dom Dinis), nasceu, segundo a tradicao, no ano de 1271 e foi santificada pelo papa Urbano VIII a 25 de Maio de 1625. Pelo caminho, deixou o testemunho material de uma vida dedicada as boas obras, na figura de clarissa de que fez dotar o seu moimento, marcando, com grande significado, uma intencao bem determinada de deixar de si a memoria de uma fiel devota. Acompanhando de muito perto a feitura do seu lugar ultimo (realizado provavelmente cerca de 1330, portanto ainda em vida da rainha, falecida em 1336), Dona Isabel de Aragao revelou-se promotora de uma iconografia de marcada originalidade, quer porque, no seu modelado considerado tipico de Mestre Pero, lhe coube inaugurar uma nova fase na escultura tumular coimbra, quer pelo caracter ostensivamente religioso da sua representacao, conseguido inclusivamente pela adopcao de caracteres iconograficos de consideravel inovacao. Aos atributos, apesar de tudo, mais divulgados do Livro de Horas, dos anjos e do baldaquino (conformador tambem de um certo sentido de sagrado), o jacente de Dona Isabel acrescenta o habito de clarissa (numa proposta verdadeiramente original, embora repetida noutros jacentes posteriormente), a esmoleira a cintura com a concha de Santiago e o bordao de peregrina, identificadores das virtudes cristas da caridade e da peregrinatio – todos estes elementos articulando-se com outros de uma representacao tipificada da nobreza feminina trecentista (a realeza simbolizando-se apenas pelo uso da coroa) para dar a imagem ultima de Isabel de Aragao o sentido pleno de uma rainha de santidade.

Amplification and sequencing of Trichuris trichiura ancient DNA extracted from archaeological sediments

Despite high prevalence of Trichuris trichiura infection, PCR-based analysis on T. trichiura from archaeological samples has not been established so far. In the present study, we sought to perform PCR-based amplification of T. trichiura aDNA using the sediments from medieval tomb of Korea. The presence of Trichuris eggs were first detected by microscopic observation; then confirmed by PCR-based aDNA analysis. Obtained sequence showed 100% homology to that of the small subunit ribosomal RNA (SSUrRNA) gene of T. trichiura but distinct from that of other Trichuris species. PCR-based aDNA analysis in this study can serve as effective method to confirm the presence of T. trichiura eggs in the soils or coprolites collected from archaeological sites.

Tomb Destruction and Scholarship: Medieval Monuments in Early Modern England (review)

Reviewed by: Tomb Destruction and Scholarship: Medieval Monuments in Early Modern England Stefanie Knöll Tomb Destruction and Scholarship: Medieval Monuments in Early Modern England. By Phillip Lindley. (Donington, UK: Shaun Tyas Publishing. 2007. Pp. x, 257. £35.00. ISBN 978-1-900-28987-0.) In Tomb Destruction and Scholarship, Phillip Lindley, reader in the history of art department of the University of Leicester, deals with the destruction of medieval tomb monuments in England during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. The study, which resulted from Lindley’s 2007 Leverhulme Research Fellowship, offers new insight into the mechanisms of earlymodern iconoclasm in England. At the same time, Lindley points to the side effects of destruction—that is, the increasing number of cultural tourists visiting tomb monuments as well as the growing historical scholarship. In his first chapter, Lindley recounts the fate of funerary monuments during the sixteenth century. Often parts of tombs were sold for the sake of the material. However, Lindley is able to show that tomb defacement was nothing more than “collateral damage” under King Henry VIII and that active defacement of tombs started only under King Edward VI. Now, images of saints as well as phrases requesting prayers for the dead or—for the most zealous reformers—representations of clergy in their traditional vestments were regarded as offensive. These attacks also influenced the design of new monuments. We might think of the ensuing concentration on the virtues of the deceased and the celebration of his bloodline through the display of heraldry. Lindley is convinced that it was the sixteenth-century experience of the fragility of material heritage that created a particularly strong desire to study and document tomb monuments. Chapter 2 thus analyzes the genesis and development of Tudor antiquarianism, which differs from late-medieval antiquarian attempts in various aspects: the introduction of formalized networks (Society of Antiquaries), a more critical evaluation of historical sources, and the wider dissemination through printed records. Many quotations from the works of authors such as John Leland, Sampson Erdeswick, or Ralph Brooke give a sense of the discussed antiquarian writings and point to the scholarly debates going on at the time. A good example of such debates is the argument between Camden and Brooke, which demonstrated that the knowledge of heraldry had to be supplemented by a knowledge of the stylistic development of tomb monuments as well as by archival research. Consequently, the preservation of medieval texts and the inclusion of illustrations in antiquarian works was afforded more and more importance. Significant examples such as Sir Robert Cotton’s library and John Weever’s Ancient Funerall Monuments (1631) are discussed in chapter 3.Weever’s publication was the first nationwide collection of epitaphs. The inclusion of illustrations in this work shows an awareness of the fact that images possess an authority distinct from that of texts. Chapter 3 further deals with the fate of tomb monuments during the Civil War, when Parliament actively encouraged iconoclasm. The Puritan iconoclast William Dowsing even kept a journal of the destructions he carried out in various churches between 1643 and 1644. [End Page 613] The first three chapters, which offer a broad overview of the attacks from the time of Henry VIII to the 1640s, are followed by three chapters with detailed case studies: Lindley employs antiquarian accounts to reconstruct the appearance of King Arthur’s tomb at Glastonbury (chapter 4), to draw conclusions about the original functions of the Percy tomb in Beverley Minster (chapter 5), and to analyze the attacks and reconstructions of the Herbert monuments at Abergavenny (chapter 6). However, considering that this is a book dealing with the development of research into tomb monuments, it is disappointing that the book does not include an overall bibliography of the large number of primary and secondary sources consulted. In his conclusion, Lindley concedes that he might have exaggerated the extent of tomb destruction in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Indeed, many scholars have already shown that a lot of damage was inflicted only in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Still, Lindley has achieved his aim—namely, to show that early-modern attacks were endorsed by national authorities on a scale unprecedented in Western Europe...

Human mummified brain from a medieval tomb with lime‐soil mixture barrier of the Joseon Dynasty, Korea

AbstractAlthough all of the Korean medieval mummies found up to the present time have shown relatively well‐preserved brains, relevant biomedical information has been difficult to acquire owing to the obstacles to obtaining permission to conduct invasive investigations. However, recently we were able to secure permission to investigate, through various forms of examination including dissection, a well‐preserved brain found in a lime‐soil mixture barrier (LSMB) tomb in Yongin, Korea, because the remains found within the tomb were mostly skeletal. As in the cases of mummified brains from tombs found in other countries, the current Yongin case showed well‐preserved grey and white matter within well demarcated brain lobes, on which sulci and gyri could be identified. On histological examination, we found that the remaining brain tissue was composed mainly of lipids, which seems to correspond to the preserved myelin sheath. The present paper is the first report on the general preservation status of a mummified brain found in Korea. Moreover, because mummified brains are found quite frequently in LSMB medieval tombs, this study could provide a good basis upon which further such palaeo‐neuropathological studies can be progressed. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley &amp; Sons, Ltd.

Seeking Truth and Bearing Witness: The Noli Me Tangere and Incredulity of Thomas on Tino di Camaino’s Petroni Tomb (1313–1317)

This article examines Tino di Camaino’s monument for Cardinal Riccardo Petroni, focusing on the narrative cycle of relief panels on the tomb casket. The reliefs are shown to function in a complex and reiterative manner, speaking to the hope for personal resurrection and reunion with God at the end of time, as well as to the salvific potential of a well-lived, well-balanced life of devotion and professional achievement. It is proposed that this relatively uncelebrated monument mediates between what Panosfky described as “prospective” early Christian and medieval tomb sculpture and the more “retrospective” Renaissance tombs. This article also explores the meaning of the pendant panels of the Noli Me Tangere and Incredulity of Thomas and proposes new theories about sources of inspiration for the artist, the possible interests of the deceased in the question of bodily Resurrection, and his devotion to Saint Mary Magdalene.

Radiological analysis on a mummy from a medieval tomb in Korea

Although naturally mummified corpses have frequently been found in medieval tombs of Korea, there have been no scientific reports on the physical status of the mummies. In this study, we first tried to investigate the mummy using radiological methods. On physical examination, there were no findings suggestive of the cause of the death. From the radiological studies, we found that some internal organs were well preserved, while the bones showed similar appearances to those of living cases. From the stage of development of the teeth and carpal bones, the age of the mummy was estimated to be 4.5 to 6.6 years old. Although the exact cause of the mummification could not be clearly elucidated, it may be due to the lime-soil mixture outside the outer coffin, completely sealing the inner coffin from the outer spaces. In this study, as the mummy in the medieval tomb has proved to be well preserved over the last 400 years, similar cases could give invaluable clues to the physical status of medieval Koreans.

Brendan Cassidy. Review of "Memory and the Medieval Tomb" by Elizabeth Valdez and Carol Stamatis Pendergast.

Brendan Cassidy. Review of "Memory and the Medieval Tomb" by Elizabeth Valdez and Carol Stamatis Pendergast.

Medieval death: ritual and representation

This is a study of the social, theological and cultural issues involved in death and dying in Europe from the end of the Roman Empire to the Reformation in the early 16th century. Drawing on both archaeological and art historical sources, the book examines pagan and Christian attitudes towards the dead, the aesthetics of death and the body, burial ritual and mortuary practice. The evidence is accumulated from a wide variety of medieval thinkers and images, including the illustrations of the Dance of and other popular themes in art and literature which reflect the medieval obession with notions of humility, penitence and the dangers of bodily corruption. Also discussed is the impact of the Black Death on late medieval art and the development of the medieval tomb showing the changing attitudes to the commemoration of the dead between late antiquity and the late Middle Ages. In the final chapter the progress of the soul after death is studied through descriptions of Heaven, Hell and Purgatory in Dante and the other writers and portrayals of the Last Judgement and the Apocalypse in scripture and painting.