medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture
Today (8. November) is the feast day of:
All the saints of the diocese of Bologna (various dates). Okay, so this is not a medieval feast (it was introduced into the Bolognese diocesan calendar in 1964). But it does provide an opportunity for a few words about Bologna's cathedral of San Pietro. Now a seventeenth-century building with a late sixteenth-century crypt and an eighteenth-century facade, it had late antique, tenth-, and twelfth-century predecessors. Of these, the last at least was very richly decorated and featured an ornamental porch added in 1220. It is flanked by an early thirteenth-century rectangular belltower built around and over an originally tenth-century circular predecessor. Here's a view:
http://www.bologna.chiesacattolica.it/cattedrale/immagini/212.jpg
And here are two formerly stylophore lions from the aforementioned porch, now doing duty as bearers of holy water fonts:
http://tinyurl.com/ygnt38
From 13. December 2003 through 12. April 2004 Bologna's Museo Civico Medievale mounted an exhibition focusing on sculpture surviving both from the cathedral that burned in 1141 and from its replacement reconsecrated in 1184. Entitled "La cattedrale scolpita. Il romanico in San Pietro a Bologna", this was the subject of an extensive catalogue of the same name edited by Massimo Medica and Silvia Battistini and published in Ferrara by Edisai in 2003. Here are two visuals from announcements of the exhibition:
http://tinyurl.com/yneuxc
http://tinyurl.com/yht5sw
Some of the most striking pieces are carved stones that were re-used in the interior construction of the present belltower, where they were discovered during restoration work in 1999. But the exhibition included other treasures, such as the two wooden statues (of the BVM and of St. John) that flank the cathedral's wooden crucifix shown here:
http://tinyurl.com/yexh97
In the exhibition these figures had a somewhat different appearance:
http://tinyurl.com/yklbsv
Best,
John Dillon
PS: Today is also the day of remembrance of the Blessed John Duns Scotus (d. 1308), whose cult was confirmed in 1993. He reposes in the thirteenth-century Minoritenkirche Mariae Empfängnis (i.e., Franciscan Church of the Immaculate Conception) at Köln, formerly a church for foreign teachers and students. A couple of views of this structure:
http://www.andreaonline.de/koelle/cologne/minoritenkirche.jpg
http://www.orgelsite.nl/kerken44/keulen95Y.jpg
And here's a link to his entry in the _Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy_:
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/duns-scotus/
**********************************************************************
To join the list, send the message: join medieval-religion YOUR NAME
to: [log in to unmask]
To send a message to the list, address it to:
[log in to unmask]
To leave the list, send the message: leave medieval-religion
to: [log in to unmask]
In order to report problems or to contact the list's owners, write to:
[log in to unmask]
For further information, visit our web site:
http://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/lists/medieval-religion.html
|