> The current discussion regarding the frequency of a Cross Nimbus raises,
> for me, an embarrassing confession of ignorance; i.e., exactly what is a
> Cross Nimbus? (I have been unable to locate a photograph or diagram, but
> would assume -- from "nimbus" -- a cross with trefoils at the extremities,
> similiar to a Cross Botontée.)
>
> --Christopher
The Cross Nimbus is a halo, reserved for "God", which has a cross
inscribed in it behind His head (almost any medieval image of Christ
will show you one). It seems to have developed during the 5th
century, when debates and councils were hotly debating Trinitarian
questions. In the mosaics of S. Maria Maggiore in Rome, dating from
432-40, Christ has a small cross just above his forehead within his
halo, and in what's left of the Cotton Genesis, one of the earliest
surviving biblical manuscripts and also dating from the 5th century,
the Logos Creator is depicted with a cross actually extending through
the halo so that the cross arms project slightly. By the early 6th
century, the full conventions of the Cross Nimbus had been
formalized. But there are many instances, it strikes me, where it is
impossible to know whether a figure with a Cross Nimbus is God the
Father or God the Son. Louis Reau, in his Iconographie de l'art
chretien, claims in his New Testament volume that the Cross Nimbus is
reserved solely for Christ, but in his Old Testament volume, he
points out that the Sign of the Cross, in liturgical symbolism, has a
Trinitarian significance. As he has it, one signs first on the
forehead in honour of God the Father, then the umbilicus (super
umbilicum) in honour of God the Son who was incarnated in the
Virgin's belly (descendit temporaliter in ventrem Virginis), and
finally on the shoulders, from left to right, in honour of the Holy
Spirit who proceeds from the Father and the Son at the same time and
serves as a characteristic of their union. This was graphically
depicted in the later Middle Ages, as in the Coronation of the Virgin
altarpiece by Enguerrand Charonton of 1454 (Musee de l'Hospice,
Villeneuve-sur-Avignon), by depicting God the Father and God the Son
side by side (and identical in Charonton's painting) with the dove of
the Holy Spirit between them, the tips of its extended wings falling
on the lips of the two persons to either side. In Charonton's
painting, all three have Cross Nimbi, which are very exactly aligned
and spaced, and of the same size and form, as if to emphasize the
equality of their importances and natures. To my knowledge, however,
the question has not been systematically investigated, and I would
certainly be interested, as well, in further insights on this.
Cheers,
Jim Bugslag
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