Shaping a Saint’s Identity: The Imagery of Thomas Becket in Medieval Italy
By Constanza Cipollaro and Veronika Decker
Transactions of the British Archaeological Association, Vol.35 (2013)
Abstract: This article sets out to trace the visual responses to the sainthood of Thomas of Canterbury outside of his original cultural context, namely in Italy, where his cult was readily received, integrated and modified. At the same time, the veneration of the English martyr stimulated an impulse for the creation of novel concepts of holiness in Italy by providing a more tangible and accessible saint than was hitherto known. Becket’s potential as an identification figure in a specific, genuinely Italian historical framework and the implications of this for the iconography of his martyrdom are discussed. Further, as an antidote to a mere political reading, liturgical aspects of his veneration and the relevance of family bonds for the fortune of his cult are considered.
Introduction: It has long been established that one of the earliest monumental representations of Thomas Becket in art known today is to be found in the apse mosaics of the cathedral of Monreale in Sicily. Probably datable to before 1189, the year of death of the patron William II, the programme presents the English saint among paladins of the early Christian Church only a few years after his canonization by Pope Alexander III in Segni on 21 February 1173. Scholarship has firmly rooted the emergence of the early representations of the Canterbury saint in southern Italy in the dynastic and political affiliations between Norman Sicily and England. Equally, the presence of Becket family members in Sicily may have played a role in the subsequent embracing of the cult of the new saint in Italy. A vivid testimony for the support given to ‘parentes fugitivi […] et quidam familiares ejus’ who were exiled with the archbishop in 1164 — according to Guernes de Pont-Sainte-Maxence more than hundred alone in France — is the correspondence between the archbishop of Canterbury and eminent ecclesiastical and royal dignitaries of the Norman kingdom.
In a letter of December 1167 Becket entrusts Richard Palmer, bishop-elect of Syracuse, with his nephew Gilbert, declaring ‘we shall willingly suffer the shipwreck of exile as long as God pleases, scattered to all the winds with our unfortunate companions, one of whom is bearer of this letter, our sister’s son, Gilbert. We recommend him to you, when he asks for your aid, as confidently as we trust in your affection’. Becket’s appeal was apparently met with sympathy, as he subsequently thanks the queen regent of Sicily, Margaret of Navarre, in an epistle in late 1169 for having given ‘solace to our fellow exiles, outlawed for Christ, in their affliction, and to our own relatives, who fled to your lands before the face of the persecutor’.
This personal allegiance may have facilitated the reception of the saint’s cult, as is suggested by a reliquary pendant preserved today in the Metropolitan Museum. The rectangular gold pendant, which originally covered the relics of Becket’s bloodied garments, shows an engraving on the front: the effigy of a blessing bishop with an episcopal staff faces a crowned female figure opening her hands in a gesture of reception. The inscription framing the scene identifies them as Margaret of Sicily and Reginald Fitz Jocelin, bishop of Bath, who made this gift to the queen in the years of 1174–83. Interestingly, the engraving does not feature an image of the saint or the reliquary itself, but the symbolic act of receiving, thus lending authority to Jocelyn as a privileged agent of the cult. This provides a starting point to consider how personal interests of Becket supporters, familial bonds of exiled family members and aspirations of religious communities intertwined and shaped Becket’s imagery in Italy.
Click here to read this article from the University of Vienna
Shaping a Saint’s Identity: The Imagery of Thomas Becket in Medieval Italy
By Constanza Cipollaro and Veronika Decker
Transactions of the British Archaeological Association, Vol.35 (2013)
Abstract: This article sets out to trace the visual responses to the sainthood of Thomas of Canterbury outside of his original cultural context, namely in Italy, where his cult was readily received, integrated and modified. At the same time, the veneration of the English martyr stimulated an impulse for the creation of novel concepts of holiness in Italy by providing a more tangible and accessible saint than was hitherto known. Becket’s potential as an identification figure in a specific, genuinely Italian historical framework and the implications of this for the iconography of his martyrdom are discussed. Further, as an antidote to a mere political reading, liturgical aspects of his veneration and the relevance of family bonds for the fortune of his cult are considered.
Introduction: It has long been established that one of the earliest monumental representations of Thomas Becket in art known today is to be found in the apse mosaics of the cathedral of Monreale in Sicily. Probably datable to before 1189, the year of death of the patron William II, the programme presents the English saint among paladins of the early Christian Church only a few years after his canonization by Pope Alexander III in Segni on 21 February 1173. Scholarship has firmly rooted the emergence of the early representations of the Canterbury saint in southern Italy in the dynastic and political affiliations between Norman Sicily and England. Equally, the presence of Becket family members in Sicily may have played a role in the subsequent embracing of the cult of the new saint in Italy. A vivid testimony for the support given to ‘parentes fugitivi […] et quidam familiares ejus’ who were exiled with the archbishop in 1164 — according to Guernes de Pont-Sainte-Maxence more than hundred alone in France — is the correspondence between the archbishop of Canterbury and eminent ecclesiastical and royal dignitaries of the Norman kingdom.
In a letter of December 1167 Becket entrusts Richard Palmer, bishop-elect of Syracuse, with his nephew Gilbert, declaring ‘we shall willingly suffer the shipwreck of exile as long as God pleases, scattered to all the winds with our unfortunate companions, one of whom is bearer of this letter, our sister’s son, Gilbert. We recommend him to you, when he asks for your aid, as confidently as we trust in your affection’. Becket’s appeal was apparently met with sympathy, as he subsequently thanks the queen regent of Sicily, Margaret of Navarre, in an epistle in late 1169 for having given ‘solace to our fellow exiles, outlawed for Christ, in their affliction, and to our own relatives, who fled to your lands before the face of the persecutor’.
Click here to read this article from the University of Vienna
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