The practice of representing parts of an effigy on pieces of brass or of white stone or marble, was common in the 14th and 10th ceiituries, but no other example of the 12th has, it is believed, been hitherto noticed. It may perhaps have been suggested by the Greek works in bronze inlaid with silver (αγεμινα) which in the 11th and 12th centuries were frequently brought into Italy from Constantinople, or manufactured by Greek workmen at Venice, or elsewhere, for the purpose of adorning the doors of churches.[1]
The figure of the bishop is drawn in a rather full manner, with nothing of the Byzantine stiffness and attenuation, and the folds of the drapery are tolerably free and natural. The effigy is not drawn full-faced, but as turned considerably to the right. A book with an ornamented cover is held in the left hand and a crozier in the right. The head of the latter has a crook of a simple form. The mitre is extremely low. The vestments consist of an alb, a tunic or a dalmatic, a chasuble and a pallium. The alb has no apparels or orfrays. The tunic or dalmatic is not fringed as is usually the case, but has an ornamented border running along the whole of its bottom, The chasuble is large and full, and quite without ornament. The pallium is very long, reaching to the bottom of the dalmatic, a fashion which appears to be characteristic of the 12th century, as in the 13th it was shortened so as scarcely to reach to the end of the chasuble. Five crosses are visible upon it, the place of another being concealed by the right hand. Neither stole nor maniple can be traced. The use of the pallium and the cross, (the peculiar insignia of archbishops,) was granted to St. Otho, bishop of Bamberg, and his successors, by Pope Paschal in 1106.[2] The Bishop of Bamberg ranked as first of the German bishops, and was subject to no archiepiscopal jurisdiction.
The inscription which surrounds the efiigy runs as follows:—Otto presul eram requiem pacem michi veram fratres optate precor ore manuque juvate. The characters in which it is engraved are partly the ordinary Roman and partly Lombardic, the same letters taking sometimes the one and some- times the other form. This is particularly the case with the T's and M's. The forms of the letters appear to agree very well with the supposed date, the close of the 12th century. The inscription is engraved as if it had been an afterthought, the letters being placed where the effigy left room for them, and not being surrounded by any lines.
An inscription has been cut across the lower part of the figure at some modern period; it has been filled up with cement, and is now scarcely legible; it seems to have given the name and quality of the bishop, and the date of his death, which is expressed in Arabic numerals.
Mr. Westwood, referring to the episcopal figure above described, made the following remarks on the pallium, cross and pastoral stuff, as affording indications of the difference in rank of the higher dignitaries of the Church.
The exhibition by Mr. Nesbitt, from his valuable collections of foreign sepulchral effigies, of the incised slab of a Bishop of Bamberg of the twelfth century, represented as invested with the pallium, and also as holding in his hand a curved-headed pastoral staff,[3] together with the statement made by that gentleman that the bishops of that city were entitled
- ↑ Examples are to be found in some of the west doors of St. Mark's, Venice; in those of the church of Atroni, near Amalfi; and others existed until recently in the west doors of the Basilica of St. Paul Fuori delle Mure, at Rome.
- ↑ Acta Sanctorum, St. Otho, 2nd July.
- ↑ I have purposely avoided using the word crozier, since the correctness of its use, to designate the cambuca, or curved pastoral staff, has been called in question.
