Stoning of Saint Etienne frescoes Cahors
by RicardMN Photography
Title
Stoning of Saint Etienne frescoes Cahors
Artist
RicardMN Photography
Medium
Photograph
Description
Cahors Cathedral (French: Cathédrale Saint-Étienne de Cahors) is a Roman Catholic church located in the town of Cahors, Occitanie, France. A national monument, it is an example of the transition between the late Romanesque and Gothic architectural traditions.
The well-illuminated nave is 44 x 20 m wide. The two massive, 32 m-high, domes in Byzantines style, resting on pendentives, are supported by six huge pilasters. Only the Church of Saint Sophia of Constantinople exceeds the breadth of the nave of this cathedral. Unusually, there is no transept.
One of the domes is decorated with 14th-century frescoes, depicting the stoning of St. Stephen as well as eight prophets, each riding an animal, in the fashion of Greek or Hindu deities. The walls have numerous other medieval paintings.
The murals of the western cupola of the Saint-Etienne cathedral of Cahors, made between 1316 and 1324, are one of the rare examples of monumental Gothic painting preserved today in France and in Europe. They testify to the embellishments brought to the Romanesque building, at the end of the 13th and the beginning of the 14th century. This great renovation project ends with the creation of the vast painted decoration whose iconographic program covered all the walls of the cathedral.
In the Western cupola, the sponsors wanted to show the concordance between the Old and New Testaments by linking the great figures of the prophets to Saint Stephen, the first Christian martyr.
In the center of the composition, a medallion presents the saint kneeling in prayer, his eyes turned towards the starry sky, insensitive to the stones that assail him but do not reach him. Around the oculus, thirteen characters participate in the martyrdom of the saint, under the eyes of Saul, the future Saint Paul, enthroned with the sword raised. In this way, medieval society goes by: soldiers, nobles and peasants. This stoning does not emerge from violence or dramatic reality.
Around the scene of the martyrdom, the cupola is divided into eight large compartments of 4.50 meters high, delimited by broad bands adorned with foliage and vine branches, in which take place the figures of seven prophets and King David. The latter, presented as witnesses to Stephen's stoning, stand in Gothic kiosks. Placed on a background painted in a false device that simulates and prolongs the architecture, this decoration refers directly to the art of stained glass, which tends to replace, since the thirteenth century, large sets painted in religious buildings.
Without preeminence of rank, the prophets face each other in pairs: Jeremiah and Isaiah, Ezekiel and Habakkuk, Ezra and Jonah; Daniel is facing King David. They each hold a phylactery on which is inscribed their name in Gothic letters followed by the Latin abbreviation of propheta, and trample on monsters symbolizing the vices denounced by their prophecies. These animals, repainted during the restoration of the dome in the late nineteenth century, were to be a wild beast, a serpent or a dragon (Ps 91, v 13: "on the beast and the viper you will walk, you will trample the lion cub and the Dragon ").
Even beyond their status as mere witnesses, the prophets authenticate and announce as precursors the message of the Christian word, incarnated by the martyrdom of the saint. They attest to the messianic character of Christ. (Description from Wikipedia and citedelarchitecture.fr)
Uploaded
August 10th, 2018
Statistics
Viewed 588 Times - Last Visitor from Fairfield, CT on 04/18/2024 at 5:59 PM
Embed
Share
Sales Sheet