medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture

Today (29. August) is the feast day of:

The Decollation (Beheading) of John the Baptist (1st cent.).  A few images:

1)  Relics:

Supposed head of J., kept as a relic in the cathédrale Saint-Jean-Baptiste in Amiens since the early thirteenth century:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/73553452@N00/2849375888/
http://tinyurl.com/39t68xt

Supposed head of J., kept as a relic in Rome's church of San Silvestro in Capite since at least the thirteenth century:
http://tinyurl.com/nqgtb2
http://tinyurl.com/nmhjce

Supposed right arm of J., now in the Topkapi Museum in Istanbul:
http://tinyurl.com/2eqv6zl

Supposed right hand of J., now in the Dionysiou Monastery on Mount Athos:
http://tinyurl.com/24fls8u

Supposed finger bones of J., said to be those donated by the pious woman Tigris in the later sixth century (cf. St. Gregory of Tours, _In gloria martyrum_, 13) and kept as relics in the cathedral of Saint-Jean-de-Maurienne (Savoie):
http://tinyurl.com/2czuvpx


2)  Portrayals of, or scenes related to, J.'s decollation; also, a dedication to J. in this aspect:

Herod's feast, Salome dancing, and the decollation as depicted in a later ninth-century Gospels from Chartres (Paris, BnF, ms. Latin 9386, fol. 146v):
http://tinyurl.com/2euycde

Herod and Salome and Herod's feast on an earlier twelfth-century capital (ca. 1125-1150), Toulouse, Musée des Augustins:
http://tinyurl.com/2brzxyr
http://tinyurl.com/3yhg99v
These are discussed in a Tribune de l'Art page on an exposition of 2005 in which they were shown ("La France romane au temps des premiers Capétiens, 987-1152"):
http://www.latribunedelart.com/Expositions_2005/France_Romane_231.htm

Herod's feast and the decollation on a twelfth-century capital, monasterio de San Juan de Duero (Soria) in Castilla y León:
http://www.arquivoltas.com/13-Soria/SJuanDuero%20G15.jpg
http://www.arquivoltas.com/13-Soria/SJuanDuero%20G16.jpg
Multi-page site on the monastery and its twelfth- and thirteenth-century sculptures:
http://www.arquivoltas.com/13-Soria/01-SJuanDuero01.htm

Herod's feast and the decollation on Benedetto Antelami's north portal (ca. 1210), baptistery of Parma:
http://www.artandarchitecture.org.uk/images/conway/c9c56e8a.html
http://tinyurl.com/23jq57o
http://tinyurl.com/27glsvd
Portal as a whole:
http://www.wga.hu/art/a/antelami/virgin_c.jpg
More views here (scroll down to "Il portale della Vergine"):
http://tinyurl.com/2b6dbet

Scenes of J.'s suffering as depicted in the earlier thirteenth-century St. John the Baptist window in the cathedral of Saint-Étienne in Bourges (photo by Gordon Plumb):
http://www.flickr.com/photos/22274117@N08/4279872326/
Detail (the decollation; photo by Gordon Plumb):
http://www.flickr.com/photos/22274117@N08/4279131415/

Fresco of the decollation (later thirteenth-century), baptistery of Parma:
http://www.cattedrale.parma.it/img/voltabatt/104B-decollazione_Z.jpg
Views of the baptistery's cycle of John the Baptist are accessible from here:
http://tinyurl.com/kloxg

The decollation as depicted in the late thirteenth-century (ca. 1285-1290) Livre d'images de Madame Marie (Paris, BnF, ms. Nouvelle acquisition française 16251, fol. 57v):
http://tinyurl.com/2u576u4

Herod's feast and the decollation as depicted in a late thirteenth-century copy of French origin of the _Legenda aurea_ (San Marino, CA, Huntington Library, ms. HM 3027, fol. 114v):
http://tinyurl.com/3786qnd

Expandable views of panels of the St. John the Baptist cycle on Andrea Pisano's bronze south doors (1330-1366) for the baptistery in Florence:
http://tinyurl.com/6pk95s

Scenes of J.'s suffering as depicted in the earlier fourteenth-century (1330s) frescoes of the vault of the diakonikon of the church of the Hodegetria in the Patriarchate of Peć at Peć in, depending on one's view of the matter, either the Republic of Kosovo or Serbia's province of Kosovo and Metohija:
http://tinyurl.com/2bg2kjq
Salome with J.'s head (detail from the fresco of Herod's feast):
http://tinyurl.com/2c6gru3

The decollation as depicted (lower register) in an August calendar scene in the earlier fourteenth-century frescoes (betw. 1335 and 1350) of the narthex in the church of the Holy Ascension at the Visoki Dečani monastery near Peć in, depending on one's view of the matter, either the Republic of Kosovo or Serbia's province of Kosovo and Metohija:
http://tinyurl.com/y9h2efw

The decollation as depicted in an earlier fourteenth-century (1348) copy of the _Legenda aurea_ in its French-language version by Jean de Vignay (Paris, BnF, ms. Français 241, fol. 229v):
http://tinyurl.com/268bkv8

The decollation as depicted in a fourteenth-century copy of Guiard des Moulins' _Bible historiale_ (Paris, BnF, ms. Français 152, fol. 399v):
http://tinyurl.com/2delaqx

The decollation, the presentation of J.'s head, and the burial of his headless corpse as depicted in a mid-fourteenth-century mosaic in Venice's basilica di San Marco:
http://www.wga.hu/art/zgothic/mosaics/14c/1stmark.jpg

A fifteenth-century alabaster plaque from England:
http://test.huntmuseum.com/qzty2o/2593.jpg
Archival info:
http://tinyurl.com/hw9qv

The decollation as depicted by Rogier van der Weyden in a panel of his St. John Altarpiece (ca. 1455-1460) in the Staatliche Museen in Berlin:
http://tinyurl.com/2dafav3
Detail view:
http://tinyurl.com/28bpnrk
The altarpiece's three panels (views greatly expandable):
http://tinyurl.com/3amauub

The decollation as portrayed in a relief by Andrea del Verrocchio on the silver altar (1477-80) in the baptistery of Florence:
http://easyweb.easynet.co.uk/giorgio.vasari/verrocc/pic1.htm

Arbore monastery church, Soloca (Bucovina), Romania, erected 1502-03 and dedicated to the Beheading of John the Baptist:
English-language accounts:
http://www.rotravel.com/romania/monasteries/arbore.php
http://tinyurl.com/oukgh
http://www.romanianmonasteries.org/bucovina/arbore
Views:
http://www.eliznik.org.uk/RomaniaViews/churches/arbore.jpg
http://tinyurl.com/kvabs7
Two views here (about a third of the way down the page; one is of the interior):
http://tinyurl.com/n44sa6

The decollation and Salome with J.'s head as depicted in glass windows from 1525 (restored, 1870-1871) in the Universitätskapelle of the Münster in Freiburg im Breisgau:
http://tinyurl.com/2657ahp
http://tinyurl.com/26aa336


3)  Portrayals of J. baptising Jesus:

In the ceiling mosaic of the late fifth-century Arian Baptistry in Ravenna:
http://tinyurl.com/26n5e5v
More views here:
http://tinyurl.com/2bqpbay

In the earlier eleventh-century mosaics (restored between 1953 and 1962) in the katholikon of Hosios Loukas near Distomo in Phokis:
http://tinyurl.com/2fsb6ea

In the mid-eleventh-century mosaics of katholikon of the Nea Moni on Chios:
http://tinyurl.com/28a2mkm
http://tinyurl.com/28p5hp4
Detail (J.):
http://tinyurl.com/2cv555q

On a twelfth-century baptismal font in the originally eleventh-/twelfth-century église collégiale Saint-Barthélémy / Sint-Bartholomeuskerk in Liège/Lüttich:
http://tinyurl.com/24b6jbh

On a twelfth-century relief in the originally eleventh- to thirteenth-century pieve di San Prospero in Collecchio (PR) in Emilia-Romagna:
http://tinyurl.com/5a29ao
http://tinyurl.com/n8mezh

On Benedetto Antelami's north portal (ca. 1210), baptistery of Parma:
http://tinyurl.com/286hrwq


4)  J. as angel:

J. with wings in the later thirteenth-century (ca. 1263-1270) frescoes in the parecclesion of St. Nicholas in the monastery church of the Holy Trinity at Sopoćani (Raška dist.) in Serbia:
http://tinyurl.com/259kjq3

J. with wings and holding the Agnus Dei as depicted in a fourteenth-century gradual from an unidentified Dominican house (Karslruhe, Badische Bibliothek, cod. St. Peter perg. 49, fol. 234r):
http://tinyurl.com/28a6npa

J. with wings in the early sixteenth-century frescoes (1502) by the painter Dionisy and sons in the Virgin Nativity cathedral of the St. Ferapont Belozero (Ferapontov Belozersky) Monastery at Ferapontovo in Russia's Vologda Region [a note here explains the image]:
http://www.dionisy.com/eng/museum/118/285/index.shtml


5)  Other portrayals of J.:

J. as portrayed on a thirteenth-century portal of the esglesia/iglesia de Sant Ramón, Plà de Santa Maria (Alt Camp), Catalunya:
http://tinyurl.com/m382rd
Spanish-language page with many expandable views of this church:
http://tinyurl.com/2cafvt

J. as depicted in the later thirteenth-century (ca. 1263-1270) frescoes in the nave in the monastery church of the Holy Trinity at Sopoćani (Raška dist.) in Serbia:
http://tinyurl.com/2vss4wn
http://tinyurl.com/32ua7lb

J. in a thirteenth- or fourteenth-century fresco in the narthex of the originally twelfth-century church of the Panagia Phorbiotissa at Asinou in the Republic of Cyprus:
http://www.gettyimages.com/detail/89175615/De-Agostini
There's a better view in this panorama of the frescoes in the narthex:
http://cyprus.arounder.com/asinou_church/CY000008416.html

J. as depicted (portrait) in the earlier fourteenth-century frescoes (betw. 1335 and 1350) of the nave in the church of the Holy Ascension at the Visoki Dečani monastery near Peć in, depending on one's view of the matter, either the Republic of Kosovo or Serbia's province of Kosovo and Metohija:
http://tinyurl.com/2dlmz57

Expandable views of J.'s preaching as depicted in the earlier fourteenth-century frescoes (betw. 1335 and 1350) of the nave in the church of the Holy Ascension at the Visoki Dečani monastery near Peć in, depending on one's view of the matter, either the Republic of Kosovo or Serbia's province of Kosovo and Metohija:
http://tinyurl.com/2vclfng

J. (at right) as depicted in the mid-fourteenth-century (prob. 1350-1360) of the monastery church of the Nativity of the Theotokos in Mateic (Kumanovo), Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia:
http://tinyurl.com/yasa3fx

A fourteenth-century Byzantine icon of J., now in the State Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg:
http://www.icon-art.info/masterpiece.php?lng=en&mst_id=906

J. holding the Agnus Dei, as depicted with Dominican nuns in a fourteenth-century gradual from Unterlinden (Colmar, Bibliothèque de la Ville, ms. 136, fol. 165v):
http://tinyurl.com/38qzwsy

J. preaching, as depicted in a fourteenth-century gradual from an unidentified Dominican house (Karlsruhe, Badische Bibliothek, cod. St. Peter perg. 49, fol. 233r):
http://tinyurl.com/23794rw

Giovanni del Biondo's Altarpiece of St. John the Baptist (1360-70) in the Contini Bonacossi Collection of Florence's Galleria degli Uffizi:
http://www.wga.hu/art/g/giovanni/biondo/baptist.jpg

J. (at right) in an altarpiece by Taddeo di Bartolo from 1395, now in the Museum of Fine Arts in Budapest:
http://tinyurl.com/ko8os3

Icon of J. (1408) by Andrei Rublev, now in the State Tretyakov Gallery in Moscow:
http://www.icon-art.info/masterpiece.php?lng=en&mst_id=454

Icon of J. (1490s or 1502-03) by Dionisy and sons in the Virgin Nativity cathedral of the St. Ferapont Belozero (Ferapontov Belozersky) Monastery at Ferapontovo in Russia's Vologda Region:
http://www.dionisy.com/eng/dionisy/index_photos.shtml?06


6)  Some baptisteries (mostly in Italy) dedicated to J.:

Napoli (NA), Campania, battistero di San Giovanni in Fonte (4th-cent.):
http://www.duomodinapoli.com/
(Click on 'Battistero' in menu bar at top; click on black arrow at right for plans and views)
More views here (set your browser to find 'Giovanni in Fonte')
http://tinyurl.com/2fvbxed

Ravenna (RV), Emilia-Romagna, battistero di San Giovanni in Fonte (Neonian Baptistery; Orthodox Baptistery; late 4th-/early 5th-cent.):
http://tinyurl.com/fr47s
http://tinyurl.com/jvtoa
http://tinyurl.com/g6tge

Roma (RM), Lazio, battistero di San Giovanni in Fonte (a.k.a. the Lateran Baptistery; originally 5th-cent.):
http://tinyurl.com/3xnn55r
http://www.members.tripod.com/romeartlover/Vasi101.html

Canosa di Puglia (BT), Apulia, battistero di San Giovanni (originally earlier to mid-6th-cent.):
http://www.campidiomedei.it/fr/virtualtour.php?page=5
http://tinyurl.com/2enwu7a
http://tinyurl.com/2dxzwf6
Padula (SA), Campania, battistero di San Giovanni in Fonte (originally 6th-cent.?):
http://tinyurl.com/gguxj
http://www.oneonline.it/cilento/padula.html

Koper, Slovenia, the rotunda Janeza Krstnika / krstilnica Janeza Krstnika / kapela karmelske Matere Božje (originally 10th?-12th? cent.):
http://tinyurl.com/2e5fll8
http://tinyurl.com/38nznv
http://www.buca.si/images/img000001190_3.jpeg

Galliano di Cantù (CO), Lombardy, battistero di San Giovanni Battista (early 11th-cent.; "restored", 19th-/20th-cent.; interior badly degraded):
http://tinyurl.com/27pf9gc
More views lower down on this page:
http://tinyurl.com/yhebdhl

Vigolo Marchese (PC), Emilia-Romagna, battistero di San Giovanni Battista (early 11th-cent.):
http://tinyurl.com/2nvhan
and at bottom here:
http://tinyurl.com/327zyb

Agliate (MZ), Lombardy, battistero di San Giovanni Battista (11th-cent.):
http://tinyurl.com/s966x
More views lower down on this page:
http://tinyurl.com/2ecgek8
Frescoes in this baptistery:
http://tinyurl.com/29ncal9

Firenze (FI), Tuscany, battistero di San Giovanni (ca. 1050-1160; important later decor):
Multipage site from the Opera del Duomo:
http://www.operaduomo.firenze.it/english/luoghi/battistero.asp
Exterior views:
http://www.cord.edu/faculty/andersod/170505_battistero.jpg
http://www.ivanweb.net/images/Mondo/Firenze/Battistero.jpg
Interior views:
http://www.operaduomo.firenze.it/cac/visita_battistero.htm
http://tinyurl.com/2ea8bqf
http://www.italyguides.it/img/med/battistero05.jpg
http://tinyurl.com/39zddz
http://tinyurl.com/2egt6d6

Padova (PD), Veneto, battistero di San Giovanni Battista (11th-cent.; reworked in 13th and 14th):
http://www.photoroma.com/foto.php?City=pd&ID1=20
http://tinyurl.com/2f5tu4y
http://tinyurl.com/25xxs6d
http://tinyurl.com/22oy5vl

Verona (VN), Veneto, chiesa (ex-battistero) di San Giovanni in Fonte (12th-cent.):
Plan of cathedral complex showing location and outline of San Giovanni in Fonte:
http://tinyurl.com/2bqujm8
Italian-language account:
http://tinyurl.com/28hyht
Exterior:
http://tinyurl.com/375hkm
Interior views (expandable):
http://www.cattedralediverona.it/Visita_9.html
Baptismal font, details (expandable):
http://www.cattedralediverona.it/Visita_10.html

Cureggio (NO), Piedmont, battistero di San Giovanni Battista (earlier 12th-cent. over a 5th-cent. predecessor):
http://tinyurl.com/23zuuob
http://tinyurl.com/d9uytx

Agrate Conturbia (NO), Piedmont, battistero di San Giovanni (a 12th-cent. re-building of an earlier 10th-cent. predecessor):
http://tinyurl.com/2a33nhs
http://tinyurl.com/26vrq6k
http://tinyurl.com/c3roks

Lucca (LU), Tuscany, battistero e chiesa dei Sant Giovanni e Raparata (12th-cent. with remains of predecessors):
http://www.toscanaonline.info/monumenti.php?id=33
http://www.museocattedralelucca.it/visita/sgiovanni.aspx
http://www.flickr.com/photos/ramas2k/2591064976/
http://tinyurl.com/387km4m
http://tinyurl.com/32ylkrc
http://www.flickr.com/photos/doroty/293026885/

Ascoli Piceno (AP), The Marche, battistero di San Giovanni (12th-cent.):
http://tinyurl.com/jc6yb
http://www3.chiesacattolica.it/diocesiap/museo/battistero.htm
http://tinyurl.com/2u8wzgx

Pisa (PI), Tuscany, battistero di San Giovanni Battista (1153-1363):
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Battistero_di_Pisa
http://www.stilepisano.it/immagini/Pisa_Battistero.htm

Volterra (PI), Tuscany, battistero di San Giovanni (late 13th-cent.):
http://rete.comuni-italiani.it/foto/2008/110245/view
http://tinyurl.com/3ygtccd
http://tinyurl.com/294o3rh
http://www.flickr.com/photos/jens_everaerdt/4850125337/

Siena (SI), Tuscany, battistero di San Giovanni (betw. 1316 and 1325; built into the cathedral):
http://tinyurl.com/2egr63z
http://tinyurl.com/2d5v76m

Pistoia (PT), Tuscany, battistero di San Giovanni in Corte (14th-cent.):
http://www.comune.pistoia.it/eng/scoperta_34_eng.html
http://digilander.libero.it/pistoia_tour/battistero.htm
http://www.fondazionecrpt.it/interventi/battistero.html
http://www.colonialvoyage.com/viaggi/itapis6.jpg
http://tinyurl.com/2fr6vu7


7)  Other dedications to J.:

The originally eleventh- to fifteenth-century (with eighteenth-century modifications) cathédrale Saint-Jean in Saint-Jean-de-Maurienne (Savoie):
An illustrated, English-language account is here:
http://tinyurl.com/2djj72o
Other views:
http://tinyurl.com/2ffx64c
http://tinyurl.com/2ep2ceh
http://tinyurl.com/2f7bvg4
The cathedral's late fifteenth-century choir stalls:
http://tinyurl.com/27r4vsj
http://tinyurl.com/27rtxg5
http://tinyurl.com/23lx76f
http://tinyurl.com/25odn8b

The originally twelfth-century kostol sv. Jána Krstiteľa at Pomínovec in Slovakia:
http://www.zamky.sk/klastory/pominovec-kostol

The remains of the originally twelfth- and thirteenth-century priory church of St. John the Baptist at Llanthony (Monmouthshire) in Wales:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Llanthony_Priory
http://www.castlewales.com/llantho.html

Familiar to many delegates to the International Medieval Congress, the originally later twelfth-century (1150-1170) church of St John the Baptist in Adel, up the hill from the site of the Congress in the northern reaches of the City of Leeds:
http://tinyurl.com/38z6w4
That view shows neither the crosses that have been incised in each of paving the stones in the walkways to deter theft nor the recently applied strapping around the belfry wall (in which latter cracks have appeared).  A fairly full description and set of detail views is here:
http://www.crsbi.ac.uk/search/location/Adel*/site/ed-yw-adel.html
Information about the church's appeal for funds to assist in its preservation is here:
http://tinyurl.com/lrgblb

The originally later twelfth-century church (ca. 1150-1200) of St John the Baptist, Berkswell (Warks):
http://tinyurl.com/69wsel
http://tinyurl.com/5sf83j  [click on "The Church" in menu at left]
A fairly full description and set of detail views is here:
http://tinyurl.com/kmoufs

The late twelfth- or early thirteenth-century iglesia de San Juan Bautista in Talamanca del Jarama (Madrid):
http://tinyurl.com/2879w7l
http://tinyurl.com/2fxt7mb
http://tinyurl.com/2cz38ay
http://www.flickr.com/photos/ingebrauneis/4913662161/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/ingebrauneis/4913682590/
http://tinyurl.com/399ta4m

The originally twelfth- to early sixteenth-century cathédrale Saint-Jean-Baptiste-Saint-Etienne (a.k.a. primatiale Saint-Jean-Baptiste) in Lyon:
http://cathedrale-lyon.cef.fr/visite_guidee/index.html
http://tinyurl.com/2v3mmy5

The early thirteenth-century church of ag. Iannis Prodromos (St. John the Forerunner) at Kastania in Leftktra municipality (Messinia prefecture) in the Peloponnese:
http://tinyurl.com/2ylf6g
English-language discussion and views (incl. some of the frescoes) on this page:
http://www.zorbas.de/maniguide/kastania.html

The thirteenth-century iglesia de San Juan Bautista in Cerrezo de Arriba (Segovia):
http://tinyurl.com/2a3t82x

The originally thirteenth- and fourteenth-century cerkev sv. Janeza Krstnika at Muta in Spodnja Muta, Slovenia:
Illustrated, English-language accounts:
http://tinyurl.com/25r3ra
http://www.ntz-nta.si/en/default.asp?id=5562
Expandable views here:
http://www.muta.si/podrocje.aspx?id=289

The originally late thirteenth- / early fourteenth-century kostol sv. Jána Krstiteľa in Kremnické Bane, Slovakia, erected in proximity of the geocenter of Europe:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/krempino/2899588250/
http://flog.pravda.sk/janolietac.flog?foto=76236
http://tinyurl.com/3yxfwu5
http://en.tixik.com/image-74038.htm

The mostly thirteenth- and fourteenth-century ex-cathédrale Saint-Jean-Baptiste in Bazas (Gironde):
A brief, French-language account:
http://tinyurl.com/2dejf6h
Views:
http://tinyurl.com/2eaed4t
http://tinyurl.com/2bwdfpk
http://fr.academic.ru/dic.nsf/frwiki/196746
http://tinyurl.com/24tou9k

The originally thirteenth- to early fifteenth-century cathedral of Wrocław (formerly Breslau) is dedicated to John the Baptist.  It was very badly damaged in World War II and has since been rebuilt.
Multiple views:
http://www.skyscrapercity.com/showthread.php?t=225143
http://tinyurl.com/2fw6vu2

The originally late fourteenth- and fifteenth-century cerkev Sv. Janeza Krstnika at Bohinj, Slovenia:
http://www.bohinj.si/?catID=1480
http://tinyurl.com/292neo

Best,
John Dillon
(matter from older posts revised and expanded)

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