Off the coast island of Lindisfarne was a major stop on our way through the historic region of Northumbria (modern-day County Northumberland). To reach the island, we needed to cross the causeway that twice a day is covered by the tide. We had checked the tide table before our arrival, as at high tide, the causeway is completely submerged underwater, and the island is cut off. At high tides. it is also possible to reach the island but only using a ferry.
On the following day, we also took a ferry to land on the island. However, at the high tide, almost everything is closed and the island along with its inhabitants seems to fall asleep. At that time, it was difficult to visit its monuments so crossing the causeway is necessary if you are, like us, interested in its history and outstanding remnants of its turbulent past. The island is also accessible on foot, like once for hermits and pilgrims. It takes about two hours to walk to the Island from the causeway. The Pilgrims route is about 5 kilometers long but not advisable at dusk or in poor weather conditions.
Remnants of the Holy Island
Lindisfarne is today a part of the Northumberland Coast, which is said to be an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. The island is situated in the north-east of England, just a few kilometers south of the border with Scotland. Lindisfarne Island, also known as the Holy Island since the Norman times, played an important role in the religious life of England, and it was one of the most significant centers of early English Christianity. The ruins now visible on the island belong to the twelfth-century Priory that claims direct descent from the early monastery. There is also a twelfth-century church dedicated to Saint Mary, and the picturesque silhouette of Lindisfarne Castle, built in the sixteenth century for defensive reasons. The island is relatively small; it measures almost 5 kilometres wide (W-E), and 3 kilometres long (N-S), with hardly 180 inhabitants. This number, however, grows during summer with incoming visitors, especially when the tide is out. Already in June, one can observe a growing number of cars and coaches crossing the causeway.
Monks and Kings
In ancient Celtic times, the island was called by the native Britons Medcaut or Insula Medicata, in Latin, which possibly stands for ‘healing island’, whereas the later name ‘Lindisfarne’ may have derived from the name of a people, called Lindissi or Lincolnshire. Back in the sixth century A.D., the island was long home to religious people, known as the Culdees, who were members of ascetic Christian monastic and eremitical communities of Ireland, Scotland, Wales, and England. Apart from the hermites, there were also native residents, who are known as Islanders. The earliest settlement in the area of Lindisfarne was made by King Ida of the Anglians, one of the predecessors of the Anglo-Saxons. The settlement existed in the sixth century on the other side of the bay from the island. Following the general collapse of the Roman Empire in the fifth century, Britain had fragmented into seven kingdoms, many ruled by Anglo-Saxon warlords, such as descendants of King Ida, who governed Northumbria. Apart from the Kingdom of Northumbria, there were regions of Wessex, Mercia, East England, Essex, Kent and Sussex.
In 547, Ida the ‘Flame-bearer’ seized the Britain Coastal Fortress, later known as Bebbanburg Castle, and founded a kingdom called Bernicia. His grandson Æthelfrith brought the neighbouring Anglian realm of Deira under his domination around 604 AD., creating the unified Kingdom of Northumbria, with the citadel Bebbanburg, the modern-day Bamburgh Castle. Perhaps, the most famous of the kings of Northumbria was Æthelfrith’s son, Saint Oswald. As Bede the Venerable writes, when Æthelfrith was killed in battle in 617 by a rival king, Oswald fled north to seek sanctuary with the Irish of Dalriada. After 17 years, he returned to the Kingdom and retook the throne by force.
Between the East and West
After Saint Columba established the religious center and the island monastery of Iona, in the Kingdom of Dalriada, in 563, (modern-day Argyll), Columba’s family of monasteries came to include Derry, Durrow, and Kells in Ireland, and out of Iona – Lindisfarne, with its own foundtations in England, such as Melrose. On his return from Iona, King Oswald had brought with him Irish monks of the Columban Church, who converted pagan Northumbria’s Anglo-Saxons. Consequently, the conversion was not limited to just a royal household, as it was practiced by missionaries sent to the British Isles by the Roman Church from 597. Eventually, in 635AD. the monastery on the Island of Lindisfarne was founded by Saint Aidan from Iona and his companions to become an important center of medieval Christianity.
The successor to Lindisfarne bishopric was Saint Cuthbert, who had become inspired by Saint Aidan’s life and followed a monastic conduct of the Hiberno-Scottish Church, with a particular taste for emulating the eremitic traditions of the early monks of the eastern and Egyptian deserts. The latter lived like hermits but still were part of monastic communities, which was in contrast with the communal living in Western monasticism. Living in such isolated places as Iona or Lindisfarne (not to mention Skellig Michael), where the former is an island and the second is cut off by tides, Celtic hermits visibly followed the way of Egyptian Fathers’ withdrawing to the desert. As a nominant scholar says, Celtic monks had replaced the desert with the ocean …
Hermit-Like Saint Cuthbert
After Saint Cuthbert’s death, in 687 A.D., miracles attributed to him caused Lindisfarne to become a place of pilgrimage, and the monastery acquired great wealth and status. The cult of Saint Cuthbert also consolidated the monastery’s reputation as a center of Christian learning. One of the results was the production of the early medieval masterpiece of an illuminated book, now known as the Lindisfarne Gospels, which were created on the island in the early eighth century.
Even today, the Holy Island is famous for its two great Bishops, Saint Aidan, who came together with his followers from Iona, invited by King Oswald, in the seventh century, and Saint Cuthbert, who first came to Lindisfarne as a prior in the 70s of the seventh century. Saint Aidan remained the Bishop of Lindisfarne until he died in 651 A.D., and his death had an impact on young Cuthbert, who according to a legend, saw the soul of Saint Aidan being taken by angels to heaven. It was the very moment when he decided to become a monk.
On the Verge of the Viking Age
The growing wealth of the monastery at the end of the seventh century and throughout the eighth century invited some unwanted visitors.
Vikings came to Lindisfarne in 793 in what was the first major attack on Europe. People from Britain had encountered the Vikings yet before their massive raid on Lindisfarne. Yet, it was the first major attack and it was shocking not only in the brutality of it but also the fact that it took place in the heart of Christian Northumbria. Many monks were killed or enslaved, and the event is often regarded as the beginning of the Viking Age.
An Oasis in the Modern World
With its ancient associations, the Castle, and Priory ruins, Lindisfarne remains today a holy site and place of pilgrimage for many. The island is a thriving community with a busy harbour, shops, hotels, and inns. There is much to see on the island: birdwatching, fishing, golf, painting, photography, and, of course, history are just some of the activities to be enjoyed on the Holy Island today.
By Joanna Faculties of English Philology, History of Art and Archaeology. University of Silesia in Katowice, Poland; Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński University in Warsaw, Poland; University College Dublin, Ireland.
BIBLIOGRAPHY:
Brown, M.P., 2004. Painted Labyrinth. The World of the Lindisfarne Gospels. London: The British Library.
Simpson, D. ‘Lindisfarne. Island and causeway’, in England’s North East. (bit.ly/4bpDlVo; accessed 27th June, 2024).
It was a relaxing end to the day as we enjoyed a sunset cruise around the Farne Islands. We departed from Seahouses Village, after very good dinner at Lewis’s Fish Restaurant in the town centre. We were staying nearby, at the White Swan Inn, in Belford, around eight kilometres from Bamburgh Castle. The hotel features sparkle clean facilities and nice, little added extras, and fabulous food in the pub area downsatirs. That evening, the weather was really promising for amazing sunset views, though some clouds were stubbornly wandering in the blue sky.
The Farne Islands and Lindisfarne
The Farne Islands lie off the coast of Northumbland in north-east England. To the north of the Farne Islands and the tidal estuary-like mud flats of Budle Bay lies the Holy Island of Lindisfarne. Though the Holy Island of Lindisfarne lies just to the north of the Farne group of islands, it is argued not to belong to the Archipelago as this is not a true island; it is connected to the mainland for about twelve hours a day by a causeway that is covered and uncovered by the tides.
The modern causeway is about 1.6 kilometres long and reaches the Holy Island at a point called the snook, at the western tip of a long sandy peninsula. Visitors to Lindisfarne should always check the crossing time table to avoid being trapped in a car by the incoming tide. To the south of the causeway used usually by drivers, a series of wooden poles marked out the ancient Pilgrim’s Way across the shifting sand and mud. Modernday pilgrims can still follow it, crossing the way to the Holy Island on foot. It was used in ancient times by contemporary visitors to the religious centre of Lindisfarne. Like the causeway, it can be used only at low tide, as described by Sir Walter Scott:
For with the flow and ebb, its style Varies from continent to isle; Dry shod o’er sands, twice every day, The pilgrims to the shrine find way; Twice every day the waves efface Of staves and sandelled feet the trace.
Sir Walter Scott, 1888, ‘Marmion: A Tale of Flooded Field’, in Simpson, D., ‘Lindisfarne: Less civilised times’, in England’s North East, 1991-2022.
Great Whin Sill Formations
The Farne lsalnds are formed from the rocks of the Whin Sill Complex (or the Great Whin Sill, a tabular layer of the igneous rock dolerite in County Durham, Northumberland and Cumbria in the northeast of England). It also creates the outcrops of rock, which gave the foundations for Bamburgh and Dunstanburgh Castles, and for parts of Hadrian’s Wall. The other outcrop of the Whin Sill Complex on Holy Island is also topped by Lindisfarne Castle. The Farne Islands are an archipelago of between 15 and 20 islands (depending on the height of the tide) lying approximately 8 kilometres north-east of the village of Seahouses.
They form an archipelago, divided into the Inner Group and the Outer Group.If Lindisfarne is excluded, the island of Inner Farne, also known as House Island, is then the largest at 16 acres and is the closest to the mainland. Lindisfarne itself measures almost 5 kilometres west-east and 3 kilometres north-south.
The Heroine from the Farnes
The Farne Islands are associated with the story of Grace Darling and the wreck of the Forfarshire. I saw a plaque commemorating her name and history in the harbor at Seahouses. Grace Darling was the daughter of Longstone lighthouse-keeper, William Darling. On September 7, 1838, when she was 22 years old, she rescued together with her father nine people from the wreck of the Forfarshire, which struck the Harcar Rock in a strong gale and thick fog.
The story of the rescue spread from the Northumberland coast and attracted extraordinary attention throughout Britain, making Grace Darling a heroine who is remembered in British folklore. Grace Darling died of consumption four years later, in 1842, and is buried in the churchyard of the village of Bamburgh, which also houses the Grace Darling Museum; it includes even the coble boat used by Grace in her famous rescue.
Less Heroic Attitudes
There is, however, another account from the seventeenth century, which gives an insight into attitudes of the Islanders, quite different from Grace Darling’s :
“The common people there do pray for ships which they see in danger. They all sit down upon their knees and hold up their hands and say very devotedly, ‘Lord send her to us, God send her to us.’ You seeing them upon their knees, and their hands joined, do think that they are praying for your safety; but their minds are far from that. They pray, not to God to save you, or send you to port, but to send you to them by shipwreck, that they may get the spoil of her. And to show that this is their meaning if the ship come well to port, they get up in anger crying `the Devil stick her, she is away from us.’“
Captain Robin Rugg, the seventeenth century governor of Holy Island, in Simpson, D., ‘Lindisfarne: Less civilised times’, in England’s North East, 1991-2022.
Paradise for Wreck Divers
The Farne Islands extend for over 8 kilometres out into the North Sea and have always been a danger to ships. For this reason, many lighthouses have been built on the islands over the years and two are still in use today. All the operational lighthouses on the Farnes are now automatic and have no resident keepers, although in former years, they did.
Ruins of some of the older lighthouses may be seen, for example on the Brownsman, which used to have two. One of them has its base remains attached to the keeper’s cottage. Earlier, beacons were on several of the islands and a light was once shone from the tower. Despite that, hundreds of ships have been wrecked on the Farnes over the years, providing plenty for wreck divers to explore.
Culdees and Benedictines
The earliest recorded inhabitants of the Farne Islands were various Culdees, some connected with Lindisfarne. This followed the old Celtic Christian tradition of island hermitages, also found in Wales, Cornwall, and Hiberno-Scotland. The islands were used by hermits intermittently from the seventh century. These included Saint Bartholomew of Farne. The last hermit was Thomas De Melsonby, who died on the islands in 1246. Hermits were replaced as elsewhere in Europe by Benedictine monks and a formal monastic cell of Benedictine monks was established on the islands around 1255.
The cell was dependent on Durham Abbey, then changed to Durham Cathedral. A very small cell was usually home to only two monks, although on occasion this rose to as many as six. The cell was dissolved in 1536 as part of King Henry VIII’s Dissolution of the Monasteries. In the course of their turbulent history, the islands had belonged to County Durham till 1844, when they became the part of Northumberland County and are currently owned by the National Trust.
Saints of Northumbria and their Hermitage
The islands are first recorded in 651, when they became home to Saint Aidan, followed by Saint Cuthbert. Despite Saint Cuthbert’s reclusive lifestyle, so characteristic of the Celtic Church that he initially followed, the saint was comonly loved and respected as a caring and peaceful man, existing yet in a violent period of history.
Cuthbert isolated himself on the islands until he was called to the bishopric of Lindisfarne, but after two years, he returned to the solitude of the Inner Farne and died there in 687 but his body was moved back to Lindisfarne. He spent there 9 years, leaving like an eremit on Inner Farne. Saint Cuthbert’s life on Inner Farne was not always one of seclusion, as his reputed gift of healing brought pilgrims to the island from all over the Kingdom of Northumbria. Hence, a suggested meaning for the name of the Farne Islands, ‘Islands of the Pilgrims’, which may have derived from ‘Farena Ealande’. The first structures built by the monks Aidan and Cuthbert on Inner Farne are no longer visible. In Life of St Cuthbert, medieval scholar and monk, Bede the Venerable, gives some clues about these early buildings. After moving to Inner Farne, Saint Cuthbert erected, or rather restored, a hermitage together with a construction of a guesthouse or hospitium, which an answer to crowds of pilgrims. Cuthbert’s cell, first built by Aidan, was made of stone and turf and was – according to Bede – ‘higher than a man’. Another larger structure, a guesthouse or ‘hospitum’, probably stood where the Fishe House is sited today. It is also possible that the cell on Inner Farne in which St Cuthbert lived and died existed on the site occupied now by Saint Cuthbert’s Church (or Chapel).
Documents show that work on a larger structure began in 1369 and the older remains have been incorporated into this later building. By these means, the small chapel was part of a Benedictine cell affiliated to Durham Abbey, then Durham Cathedral. The monks of the House of Farne were wealthy enough to build such structures – they cultivated crops and kept livestock on some of the other islands. Accordingly, the today visited Chapel on Inner Farne was once part of a larger monastic complex, which included another chapel dedicated to Saint Mary, once located just to the north, and surrounding courtyards. Known as Saint Cuthbert’s Chapel, it is described as a “single-cell building of four bays”. The holy community continued to use the chapel until Henry VIII’s Dissolution of the Monasteries in the 16th century. Just to the west of Saint Cuthbert’s chapel stands Prior Castell’s Tower which dates from about 1500. It is a defensive pele tower (a small fortified keep), typical of the Northumberland coast, which was built for the contemporary Prior of Durham Cathedral monastery from 1494 to 1519. The tower initially served as an accommodation for the monks of the Benedictine cell but this was closed during the Dissolution of the Monasteries.
All Real Saints once Faced Some Demons
A legend goes that before Saint Cuthbert inhabited Inner Farne, he banished some ‘demons’ from the island to the nearby isle of Wideopens. Those evils spirits apparently still haunted later inhabitants of Inner Farne, long after Saint Cuthbert’s death. David Simpson provides a record of the demons’ description:
“…..clad in cowls, and riding upon goats, black in complexion, short in stature, their countenances most hideous, their heads long – the appearance of the whole group horrible. Like soldiers they brandished in their hands lances, which they darted after in the fashion of war. At first the sight of the cross was sufficient to repel their attacks, but the only protection in the end was the circumvaliation of straws, signed with the cross, and fixed in the sands, around which the devils galloped for a while, and then retired, leaving the brethren to enjoy victory and repose.”
In Simpson, D., ‘The Farne Islands: St Cuthbert and the Farne Devils’, in England’s North East, 1991-2022.
It is thought that these demons were really the spirits of indigenous ancient people who had been once cut off from the mainland.
Another Hermitage Island
Apart from Lindisfarne and Inner Farne, there is also one more tiny island related to Saint Cuthbert’s legendary hagiography. Just offshore from Holy Island Village, is the small Island of Hobthrush, or St Cuthbert’s Isle, where the saint was said to have crafted the legendary beads, known as Saint Cuthbert’s or ‘Cuddy’s Beads’. Sometimes, they can be noticed by more arrentive visitors washed up on the shores of Holy Island.
But fain St Hilda’s nuns would learn If on a rock by Lindisfarne St Cuthbert sits and toils to frame The sea borne beads that bear his name. Such tales had Whitby’s fishers told, And said they might his shape behold, And here his anvil sound: A deadened clang – a huge dim form Seen but and heart when gathering storm And night were closing round. But this, a tale of idle fame, The nuns of Lindisfarne disclaim.
Sir Walter Scott, 1888, ‘Marmion: A Tale of Flooded Field’, in Simpson, D., ‘Lindisfarne: Hobthrush and St Cuthbert’s beads‘, in England’s North East, 1991-2022.
Cuddy’s beads are in fact the fossilized remains of tiny sea creatures, which inhabited the ocean depths in prehistoric times. As their surface is marked with the shape of the cross, they may have been once used as Rosary beads.
Cuddy’s Eider Ducks and Other Animal-Brothers
Today the Farne Islands are still an important nature reserve for wildlife and are the home to many species of sea birds, including Puffins, Eider Ducks, Razorbills, Guillemots, Terns, Kittiwakes, Shags and Cormorants. During the breeding season from May to the end of July there are thousands of nesting birds at the Farne Islands. For these reasons, summer visitors to Inner Farne are strongly advised to wear hats due to Arctic terns dive bombing to protect their chicks. There are also an estimated 3 to 4 thousand Grey Seals at the Farne Islands and large numbers can be counted basking on the rocks, especially at low water when more of the Islands are exposed. Saint Cuthbert was also known to have had a great love of nature and especially of birds and seals, who were often his only companions in his lonelines on Inner Farne. Saint Cuthbert had, like Hiberno-Scottish monks, and much later Franciscan monks, friendly attitude to animals, whom he treated like his brothers. Thus, he is claimed by some to be one of the first ever nature conservationists. Among other acts, Cuthbert introduced special laws in 676 protecting the eider ducks, and other seabirds nesting on the islands; these are thought to be the earliest bird-protection laws anywhere in the world. And to commemorate Saint Cuthbert’s care for birds, the eider ducks have become known as St. Cuthbert’s ducks or Cuddy’s ducks
Following your cruise around the Farne Islands, we continue to sail along our beautiful coastline to enjoy scenic sunset views as the sun was setting behind the magnificent Bamburgh Castle, with the occasional visit from local dolphins. The Farne Islands are popular with bird watchers, and as scuba diving locations, with a variety of sites suitable for all levels of divers, for the seals and wrecks.
By Joanna Faculties of English Philology, History of Art and Archaeology. University of Silesia in Katowice, Poland; Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński University in Warsaw, Poland; University College Dublin, Ireland.
BIBLIOGRAPHY:
Hannaford, L., ‘The Farne Islands and Holy Island, Northumberland’, in British Geological Survey, 2023. (https://www.bgs.ac.uk/discovering-geology/maps-and-resources/office-geology/the-farne-islands-and-holy-island-northumberland/#:~:text=To%20the%20north%20of%20the,and%20uncovered%20by%20the%20tides; accessed 2nd September, 2023).
Lewis, N., [No Date], ‘History of the Farne Islands’ buildings’, in Collections & House Officer, National Trust. (https://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/visit/north-east/farne-islands/history-of-the-farne-islands-buildings; accessed 2nd September, 2023).
Simpson, D., ‘Lindisfarne’, in England’s North East, 1991-2022. (https://englandsnortheast.co.uk/lindisfarne-holy-island/,2022; accessed 31st August, 2023).
Simpson, D., ‘The Farne Islands’, in England’s North East, 1991-2022. (https://englandsnortheast.co.uk/the-farne-islands/,2022; accessed 31st August, 2023).
We are heading to ancient lands of Northumbria, one of the seven Anglo-Saxon kingdoms. It was what is now northern England and south-east Scotland. After taking a ferry from Ireland, we are first traveling along the Solway Coast in Scotland to see Northumbrian high crosses of Ruthwell and Bewastle, just at the border with England.
One of the Finest Northumbrian High Crosses
At Bewcastle in North Cumbria, there’s a parish church dedicated to Saint Cuthbert, as are most churches in Northumbria, and the shaft of an early medieval monumental cross. Bewcastle Cross with its counterpart at Ruthwell are both Northumbrian crosses, and are located on the Solway Coast, at the border with Scotland, and in close vicinity to the Roman Wall. They are probably the finest to survive from Anglo-Saxon Britain.
Both crosses are around 57 kilometers from each other and have similar programs and figure types. Their style and iconography look to Northumbria, and beyond there to Rome, Ravenna, the Eastern Mediterranean, including Christian Syria and Egypt. They are likely to date from after 675 when this area had come under Northumbrian rule, and when Benedict Biscop brought masons and artists from the Continent to work at the so-called Twin Monastery at Monkwearmouth and Jarrow. The Middle Eastern links are not so surprising: many monks and craftsmen fled persecution and went to the British-Isles, producing strong artistic and theological links between those two remote Christian traditions. At that time, many Syrian monks found their sanctuary in Rome, producing five Popes and great missionaries sent to the British Isles by the Apostolic Capital. Among them there was a successor of Saint Augustine of Cantenbury, Theodore of Tarsus (from modern day Turkey), who was appointed in 667 as the Archibishop of Cantenbury. Together with the Abbot, Hadrian, who himself came from northern Africa, they both created one of the greatest schools of learning and so produces outstanding scholars, like Aldhelm, Abbot of Malmesbury Abbey, and Bede the Venerable, who worked at the Monastery of Jarrow. Among Theodore’s proteges were the Northumbrian nobles who became clerics acting in favour of the Roman Church, Benedict Biscop, Ceolfirth and Wilfrid.
The Message of the Cross
Unlike Ruthwell Cross, the Cross in Bewcastle still stands unprotected under the open sky, and so is exposed to elements. Consequently, its top has been destroyed and the surface of the stones is badly weathered, but on a bright day the sculpture is still most impressive. On three of its sides, the Cross has only an ornamental decoration but on the fourth there are four panels. In one is a runic worn inscription. Its meaning is now not certain. Possibly, the inscription was to commemorate King Alchfrith of Deira (southern Northumbria), who died after 664, and his wife, Cyneburh. The memorial thus may have been ascribed to his half-sister Abbess Ælfflæd of Whitby (died in 714). Yet, such a theory is the realm of speculation.
Each of the other three panels of the that Cross’ side contains a monumental figure. The three figures on the cross are crucial to its significance. In the center is Christ in Majesty, standing over two beasts at His feet who are recognizing him as their God. At the top, there’s Saint John the Baptist with the Lamb, and finally, at the base, a famous and controversial figure of a man with a falcon or eagle on a perch beside him. Most possibly, it is Saint John the Evangelist holding a pen. The two first figures are the same as on Ruthwell Cross, though different stylistically. The Bewcastle master’s figures are long and square, without round or bulging forms typical of Ruthwell Cross. Christ standing over the beasts is a subject from Psalm 91, Verses 11-13, which are mostly interpreted in relation to the Gospel according to Saint Mark, Chapter 1st, Verse 13, when Jesus is in the desert together with wild animals, metaphorically compared to demons, and serving him angels, and Verse 24, where demons recognize Him as the Son of God.
For he will command his angels concerning you to guard you in all your ways; they will lift you up in their hands, so that you will not strike your foot against a stone. You will tread on the lion and the cobra; you will trample the great lion and the serpent.
Psalm 91:11-13
… and he was in the wilderness forty days, being tempted by Satan. He was with the wild animals, and angels attended him.
Mark 1:13
“What do you want with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are—the Holy One of God!”
Mark 1:24
The scene was usually depicted in Eastern Mediterranean art, where the beasts were a lion and a snake or a dragon. Here is a Northrumbrian variant, where the wild animals look rather like swine, and their attitude also differs from a common Mediterranean examplum. Possibly, Northumbrian artists used an imported ivory or metal relief as a model for their sculpture and adopted it to their own tradition. Saint John the Evangelist is also on Ruthwell Cross but smaller and possibly together with the three other Gospel writers. At Bewcastle, he is singled out and represented on the same monumental scale as Christ and Saint John the Baptist. Like at Ruthwell High Cross, Saint John is shown with his symbol of the eagle. Recent reserach has revealed that a similar representation can be found in a Syrian manuscript; although Saint John is shown there in a seated position, his pose with a lamp on a stand, with the latter mistaken as the eagle, does not differ much from Saint John carved on Bewcastle Cross.
But what is the connection between Saint John the Evangelist and Saint John the Baptist? The Gospel according to Saint John starts with the description of the Logos which became the foundation of all medieval theology. Saint John the Evangelist mentions Saint John the Baptist in the sentence: “There was a man sent from God, whose name was John” (John 1:6) and then follows an account of the mission of the Babtist with the verse referring to the Lamb: “The next day John saw Jesus coming toward him and said, ‘Look, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!'” (John 1:29). Hence, Saint John the Baptist is the prophet of the Logos, prophet of the Lamb and prophet of the Baptism, so he is like a predecessor of Christ and of those times where Christ appears in history and in the Bible. In turn, Saint John the Evangelist has been considered by medieval Church as the highest of the four Gospel writers. Both parts of the Gospel according to Saint John, Chapter 1, were read within the same week in the Roman Church, the part about the Babtist in the week before Christmas, and the beginning on Christmas Day.
Melting Pot of Christian Traditions
Regarding the decoration of the Cross on the remaining three sides, there are multiple and various interlaces, as well a kind of floral elements, together with possibly some animal elements as well. A style the crosses in Bewcastle and Ruthwell was inspired by Christian art of Rome and the Mediterranean but as much as the contemporaneous iconology of Hiberno-Scotland, that of Northumbria was also influenced by Oriental Churches of Syria and Egypt. International artistic links are very visible in an ornamental decoration of the crosses. On Bewcastle Cross there are all the motives from different parts of the the Christian world, so it’s the Mediterranean, Continent, Southern Europe and, of course, the prevalent Celtic element. Eyecatching are birds, some beautifully ornamented plants, possibly flowers. Foliage patttern and animal designs enclosed in medallions and braided patterns may have derived from Coptic sources, possibly from Coptic textiles and manuscripts brought to the British Isles by Eastern artists themselves. Various representations visible on high crosses of Northumbria thus originated from a melting pot of many different elemnts coming to one decoration, complex system used by Christian masters.
Bewcastle Cross is possibly earlier than the Cross in Ruthwell. It may be because Bewcastle Cross is simple and more precise than Ruthwell Cross. Moreover, it seems mild and its forms less sophisticated. The both have been assigned to the second half of the seventh century. Yet, their age is still being discussed. They are likely to date from after 675 when Benedict Biscop and Ceolfirth brought masons, glaziers and metal workers from abroud (mostly from Gaul) to work in building their new monastery, the likely base from which the team came to carve Bewcastle Cross. They were filled win an ardour for Rome, Benedict visiting it five times. They were so fascinated with the culture of the Continent so they brought back books and such artifacts as icons, paintings, sculptued objects, so models for their creations on the British Isles. By these means, they followed the Continental art and fasion to adorn their churches, which included Biscop’s Monkwearmouth and Jarrow, founded respectively in 674 and 681, and Wilfrid’s Ripon and Hexam, said to be the largest church north of the Alps. So the Anglo-Saxon clerics brought back books but they also created books here in Northumbria in the so-called Twin Monastery.
Accordingly, Monkwearmouth & Jarrow, were very romanized; they accumulated great models, illuminated books, manuscripts, created there at the scriptorium, which were yet modeled on the Continental artifacts. And this Monastery was also very important because in Jarrow there was a historian of the English history, Bede the Venerable. So, he created a very important historical account of the Anglo-Saxons, the so-called Ecclesiastical History of the Anglo-Saxons, which was biased, still it gives today a great insight especially in the eighth century. Bede died in 731. He actually spent all his lifetime in Jarrow from nine years old till his death in the eighth century but still he had a lot of information from around.
From Cumbria to Northumberland
After leaving behind County Durham and legendary lands of Prince Bishops, we resumed our journey northward, along the Northumberland Coastline, designated as an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty and, finally, we arrived to Norham, with another medieval church dedicated to Saint Cuthbert and the twelfth century Castle of Prince Bishops, whose power once reached even there, furthest to the north, at the border with Scotland.
By Joanna Faculties of English Philology, History of Art and Archaeology. University of Silesia in Katowice, Poland; Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński University in Warsaw, Poland; University College Dublin, Ireland.
BIBLIOGRAPHY:
Brown, M. P. 2003. ‘Painted Labyrinth. The World of the Lindisfarne Gospels. (London, The British Library).
Lethaby, W. R., 1912. ‘The Ruthwell Cross’, in The Burlington Magazine for Connoisseurs, June, 1912, Vol. 21, No. 111, pp. 145-146.
Saxl, F., 1943. ‘The Ruthwell Cross’, in Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld institutes, Vol. 6, pp. 1-19.
Thomson, Dr D., [date uknown]. ‘Bewcastle Cross’, in Bewcastle [Official Website] (https://www.bewcastle.com/bewcastle-cross; accessed 19th May, 2023).
The Tring Tiles are today remarkable survivals, witnessing the devotional curiosity of the Middle Ages with the Christ’s childhood (Robinson et al. 2008:118) and a clear reflection of “the resurgence in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries of Christianity’s focus on the humanity of Christ” (Casey 2007:2).
Christian lore of medieval dominoes
“The scenes [on the tiles] are arranged in pairs [except for one of the canonical character], in a composition that resembles a modern-day comic strip” (Robinson et al. 2008:118). There are more traditional Christian miracles, such as a multiplication of food (Casey 2007:1): “planting a single grain of wheat, which immediately produces an entire crop for the poor to harvest” (Ibid.:1). There is equally a scene showing “healing the lame and the injured” (Ibid.:1).
The four other Tring Tiles preserved by the British Museum; Room 40 in the Medieval Gallery. Image cropped and colours intensified. Photo source: Priory Tiles (2021). “The Tring Tiles”. In: Priory Tiles.
Christ is obviously the driving force of all these miracles. Still He is also the hero of more humoristic but confrontational scenes while He is depicted “at play, [often resulting in fatal accidents], working in the fields or in the carpenter’s workshop, at school, and, occasionally, in trouble” (Robinson et al. 2008:118). On the whole, the “[stories] told by the tiles are drawn from the ordinary activities of children, though enriched by a miraculous element” (The British Museum II 2021), which, on the other hand, “struggle [to show] the notion of a child at once human and divine”(Robinson et al. 2008:118).
Consequently, the angelic face of the Child Jesus, as drawn on holy pictures in the Church, as much as in the Tring Tiles (Casey 2007:2) “may belie the strangeness of his actions” (Ibid.:2); the Christ Child behaves as an average boy but granted with supernatural powers that he openly uses not only in good intentions but also for his own, rather selfish purposes; if the author of the Apocrypha “was to humanize the Christ Child, he went to such [extremes in Jesus’ behaviour] that centuries of Popes, Church Fathers, theologians and scholars have dismissed the stories as incorrect, […] exaggerated [and even heretic, as they declare] the [Child] Jesus to be rude, vindictive, unruly, and ‘non-Christian’” (Ibid.:3).
Mediation of the Virgin Mary
Such an attitude of the Church is not surprising; in the apocryphal legends, also illustrated on the Tring Tiles, Jesus transforms other boys into pigs and even kills his colleagues and a Jewish teacher for offending Him, after which, however, He restores them either to the previous state or even to life, especially on the initiative of His Mother, Saint Mary, who asks Him for mercy on behalf of the people and, in every instance, the intercession of the Virgin Mary sees the return to normality (Robinson et al. 2008:118; Casey 2007:1; Munday 2018).
The image of the Virgin Mary with Jesus Child in one of the illuminations decorating the Infancy Gospels in Bodleian MS. Selden Supra 38.8, fol. 027v (detail) (c. 1315-1325). Apocryphal Childhood of Christ. Written in French. Image source: Bodleian Library (2021) “Bodleian MS. Selden Supra 38, pt. 1”. In: Digital Bodleian; Bodleian Libraries, University of Oxford.
Sometimes, the Virgin is represented as if She rebuked Her Son for His bad behaviour towards humans (Casey 2007:15) or even as if “it was the Virgin, not [Her Son], who restores order after a death or some other catastrophe” (Munday 2018). Such an illustration of the Jesus’s Mother shows the cult of the Virgin Mary at its height and underlines Her increasing, almost godlike power in the Christian tradition (Munday 2018; Casey 2007:15). Despite the negative reaction of the Church officials’ towards the Infancy Gospels, the Church simultaneously remained quite tolerant when it comes to a growing popularity of such stories among the lay Christian populace, and while they were being consecutively repeated in multiplying images created by artists in religious art, like those depicted on the Tring Tiles (Casey 2007:3).
Starting with a miracle
I decided to start analyzing the objects from up down; consequently, I looked up at the uppermost tile in the showcase covered with glass. It displays two, rather unrelated scenes; the first one shows a cart drawn by one horse and two peasants harvesting a field of wheat, miraculously grown from the one grain which Jesus has planted (Fig.1A) (Casey 2007:27,39). In Pseudo-Matthew and Selden Supra 38 the grain is barley (Ibid.:27). The tile with the preceding scene of Christ sowing and multiplying His Mother’s grain is lost. Missing scenes obviously disturb the continuity of the story represented on the Tring Tiles. Although they can be easily complemented and retold by means of the written versions of the Infancy Gospels, the tile showing the reaping of wheat miraculously multiplied to a vast amount still remains combined with an unconnected accident, namely Fathers and Jesusat oven (Fig.1B) (Ibid.:39).
‘Unpleasant’ transformation
The latter scene (Fig.1B) shows three parents of Jesus’ colleagues who “are reluctant for their children to play with Jesus [and thus] often [implement] extreme measures to prevent [His] contact with [their children]” (Robinson et al. 2008:118). In the scene, they are standing with Jesus Child in front of an oven, pointing to it.
Fig. 1A “Harvesting” and Fig. 1B “Fathers and Jesus at oven”, represented in one of the Tring Tiles. First quarter of the fourteenth century, England. The British Museum; Room 40 of the Medieval Galleries. Image cropped. Photo source: Priory Tiles (2021). “The Tring Tiles”. In: Priory Tiles.
The medieval Infancy Gospels say that the parents have just hid their children in the oven away from Jesus only to find them later transformed by Him into pigs, when they finally open it (Robinson et al. 2008:118). “Missing from the extant Tring Tiles is the pig-children’s culminating escape from the oven, but this dramatic scene would undoubtedly have been part of the original tile series” (Casey 2007:38). The story is not a part of Greek and Latin texts of the apocryphal Gospels of Thomas or Pseudo-Matthew (Ibid.: 38). Yet it may have originally been included in one of the early versions of Gospels of Thomas, from which it was removed for being too ‘unpleasant’ (Ibid.:38). Anyway, it reappears in early apocryphal literature of the Arabic Infancy Gospel but the boys there are transformed not into pigs but into goats (Ibid.:38). “The exchange of the pigs for goats has been attributed to a […] Jewish aversion to pork, a restriction shared with Islam” (Ibid.:40).
Another reason may be the historic antisemitic association of Jews with pigs or an Islamic notion (Casey 2007:40), according to which “Jews [and] Christians were once punished by being transformed into pigs and apes” (Ibid.:40). Nevertheless, the story with the boys transformed into pigs already appears in medieval Christian manuscripts and so must equally have been included in the lost model for the Tring Tiles (Ibid.:38-39).
Privileged animals, a miracle, and the Crown for the Virgin Mary
In the lower row, there are two tiles; one from the left portrays jumping and apparently happy lion cubs, accompanied by Child Jesus, His Mother Mary and Joseph, and two Jews further behind them (Fig.2A) (Austin Date Unknown). The scene is to express the fact that in contrast to Jews, animals are able to recognize Jesus as the Son of God (Ibid.). In the scene, “Mary’s appearance reflects the evolution of the Cult of the Virgin by the early fourteenth century as she is portrayed in elegant Gothic dress, wearing the crown of the Queen of Heaven, as opposed to her depiction in Selden Supra 38, where she is seated, holding a book, with a shawl over her head” (Casey 2007:15).
Fig. 2A “Lion cubs” and Fig. 2B “Broken plough”, represented in one of the Tring Tiles. First quarter of the fourteenth century, England. The British Museum; Room 40 of the Medieval Galleries. Image cropped. Photo source: Wendy Austin (Date unknown; accessed on 23rd January, 2021) The Mystery of the Tring Tiles.
Next scene on the same tile (Fig.2B) is the first of the three (two more are shown on the next tile in the same row: Fig.3A&B) illustrating Christ’s miracle of mending the broken plough. In the first scene (Fig.2B), a workmen is scolded by his master for breaking or cutting a plough beam too short (Priory Tiles 2021). Jesus observes the incident and eagerly helps to fix the tool; He miraculously repairs the beam (Fig.3A), which can be successfully applied again in ploughing the fields (Fig.3B).
Culmination of the story in the middle
Below the second row, there is only one tile in the middle, which actually should be the culmination of the series (Fig.4: feature image) (Robinson et al. 2008:118). It is the only scene which occupies a full tile, which stands for its significance, and illustrates Christ’s first official miracle at the wedding feast at Cana, where Jesus changes water to wine (John 2:1-11) (Robinson et al. 2008:118; Casey 2007:46).
Fig. 3A and Fig. 3B “Christ’s miracle of mending the broken plough”, represented in one of the Tring Tiles. First quarter of the fourteenth century, England. The British Museum; Room 40 of the Medieval Galleries. Image cropped. Photo source: Wendy Austin (Date unknown; accessed on 23rd January, 2021) The Mystery of the Tring Tiles.
By these means, the ‘unofficial’ life of Christ naturally complements the canonical version (Casey 2007:46). Moreover, including the biblical scene in the series of formally rejected stories also “[lends] an air of legitimacy to the marginalized apocryphal Infancy Gospels“ (Casey 2007:46).
Death and resurrection
The successive row of the tiles below again displays two of them with four related scenes. Starting from the episode on the left (Fig.5A), Child Jesus is shown playing alone a “game of making pools on the banks of the river Jordan, which is [suddenly] disturbed by a [bad Jewish boy] who destroys them: the bully promptly falls down dead” (Robinson et al. 2008:118; see Casey 2007:46). “Likewise, [in the first scene on the right side tile (Fig.6A)], when a fellow pupil jumps on Christ’s back in a playful attack, he is struck down, [in front of seated Zacharias]. In both cases instant dead is shown by the figures being flipped upside down” (Robinson et al. 2008:118).
Fig. 5A “Jesus building pools; dead boy” and Fig. 5B “Mary, Jesus reviving dead boy.”, represented in one of the Tring Tiles. First quarter of the fourteenth century, England. The British Museum; Room 40 of the Medieval Galleries. Image cropped. Photo source: Wendy Austin (Date unknown; accessed on 23rd January, 2021) The Mystery of the Tring Tiles.
In the second scene of the first tile (Fig.5B), Saint Mary with the crown on Her head admonishes Jesus for killing the boy (Casey 2007:15). She puts “her hand on Jesus’ back, encouraging him to rejuvenate the dead boy” (Ibid.:15). Although Jesus still curses the Jewish colleague, He revives the boy, yet underlying that he does so only for Her Mother’s sake (Ibid.:15).
Caricatured faces
In the second tile, in the left side scene (Fig.6A), “Zacharias is hieratically seated on an elevated bench, holding a book […], his head capped with a stalked beret, a style seen frequently on Jewish scholars. He looks beyond Jesus to exchange gestures and glances with the Bad Boy, implying a possible collusion between the teacher and the boy, and reminding viewers of the Christian assertion that the Jews were blind to Christ [as it is also underlined in the scene showing lion cubs]. The exaggerated, yet comical, antisemitic caricature of Zacharias’ visage does not suggest a man of wisdom” (Casey 2007:20).
Fig. 6A “Zacharias, boy and Jesus; dead boy” and Fig. 6B “Joseph and parents; Jesus reviving boy”, represented in one of the Tring Tiles. First quarter of the fourteenth century, England. The British Museum; Room 40 of the Medieval Galleries. Image cropped. Photo source: Wendy Austin (Date unknown; accessed on 23rd January, 2021) The Mystery of the Tring Tiles.
Written versions of the Infancy Gospels also adds that “Jesus starts lecturing [Zacharias], pointing out the teacher’s ignorance, in contrast to Jesus’ superior knowledge” (Ibid.:20). The compression of the two successive events in a single scene, with Jesus and the boy jumping on His back, and the Bad Boy seen again upside down behind the first group was a typical artistic practice in the medieval art, also observed in a comic strip. Having killed the boy, Jesus again appeared in the right scene accompanied by Joseph who is standing in front of the Bad Boy’s annoyed parents, trying to calm them down (Ibid.:17,19). Meantime, Jesus restores their son back to life (Casey 2007:17; Robinson et al. 2008:118).
Castle tower
At the bottom of the showcase there is the last row of the two tiles; “[they] continue the polemic between Christianity and Judaism” (Casey 2007:36). The one on the right side shows in the first scene (Fig.7A), a father who has just locked his son in a tower with a huge key, “to protect him from the ‘accidents’ which seemed to occur when children play with Jesus” (Ibid.:36). However, already in the second scene (Fig.7B) “Christ miraculously pulls the boy through the lock” (Robinson et al. 2008:118).
Fig. 7A “Father locks son in tower” and Fig. 7B “Jesus pulls boy from tower”, represented in one of the Tring Tiles. First quarter of the fourteenth century, England. The British Museum; Room 40 of the Medieval Galleries. Image cropped. Photo source: Wendy Austin (Date unknown; accessed on 23rd January, 2021) The Mystery of the Tring Tiles.
The symbol of a tower seems significant as it used to be an important feature of medieval Anglo-Jewish co-existence (Casey 2007:37). In England, the tower was a place of refuge for Jews or, like the Tower of London, it was used to imprison and execute them (Ibid.:37). “At times, Jews saved their lives by converting [to Christianity] while they were imprisoned […]” (Ibid.:37-38). The tile illustrating the tower may metaphorically symbolize such a conversion of the released boy, who was eventually set free by Jesus Himself.
Again in school
“Following an interlude of [those two Tring Tile scenes, in the left side scene of the second tile], Jesus appears [again in school (Fig.8A). He is standing in front of] a second teacher, a bearded Levi, seated on a bench with his legs crossed. This teacher also attempts to instruct Jesus, but Jesus rejects the teacher’s instructions, exhibiting his knowledge […] and […] the extent of his wisdom” (Casey 2007:20). As a result, “the teacher scolds him for his insolence, and slaps him” (Ibid.:21). In this scene, there also appears the mentioned practice of duplicating the same character in order to present it at a later stage of events, being the aftermath of the previous one.
Fig. 8A “Levi slaps Jesus; Jesus scolding” and Fig. 8B “Teachers, Jesus; lame persons”, represented in one of the Tring Tiles. First quarter of the fourteenth century, England. The British Museum; Room 40 of the Medieval Galleries. Image cropped. Photo source: Wendy Austin (Date unknown; accessed on 23rd January, 2021) The Mystery of the Tring Tiles.
Consequently, behind the ‘first’ representation of the Christ Child, “[the] second figure of Jesus shows [Him again] responding to the teacher, as he in turn, scolds the Hebrew master” (Casey 2007:21). The right side of the same tile (Fig.8B) further illustrates Jesus who is still engaged in preaching but this time there are two teachers seated in front of him (Ibid.:31). Behind Jesus, there are two lame people whom only Jesus, and not the teachers, can heal. “The compositional placement of the teacher [or teachers] seated on the left and Jesus standing on the right appears [in all such scenes and may be symbolically related to the right side associated with good, and the left with evil]”(Ibid.:20).
Difficult relations
By observing and analysing the artefacts behind the glass, I understood that the Tring Tiles not only illustrate the apocryphal Infancy Gospels to fill in the gaps in the biblical stories, but also to reflect tense and difficult Jewish-Christian relations in medieval England, where there was the supremacy of Christianity over Judaism, especially because Jews reminded blind to Jesus’ teaching; “the stories [represented on the tiles], sometimes not so subtly, reflect the conflicts that existed between Jews and Christians [already] in the early years of the new faith when both groups proclaimed the predominance and superiority of their beliefs, while competing over converts. The stereotypical, [even caricatured, depictions] of the Jewish figures, [usually featuring huge noses and bulging eyes] in the scenes on the Tring Tiles, reminds […] that these conflicts still existed in the minds of the fourteenth century English, even though King Edward [the First] had expelled all Jews from England in 1290” (Casey 2007:1-2).
Two other tiles
In the Middle Ages, “from the Jewish perspective, the fathers in both the tower and the oven stories would have recognized the need to hide their children from Jesus, not just for their physical safety, but to protect them from the threat of medieval Christians who attempted to convert [Jews] to Christianity” (Casey 2007:41).
Tring Tile on the left: Fig. 9A “Jesus and kneeling boys”. Fig. 9B “Jesus and boys at well”. Tring Tile on the right: Fig. 10A “Joseph and angry parents”. Fig. 10B “Jesus and kneeling boys”. First quarter of the fourteenth century, England. Preserved by the Victoria and Albert Museum, London. Photo source: Mary F. Casey (2007). “The Fourteenth-Century Tring Tiles: A Fresh Look at Their Origin and the Hebraic Aspects of the Child Jesus’ Actions”, p. 42. In: Peregrinations: Journal of Medieval Art and Architecture, Vol. 2, Issue 2, pp. 1-53.
Images depicted on the two missing Tring Tiles, displayed at the Victoria and Albert Museum illustrate such conversions among Jewish children (Casey 2007:41-42). The first tile (Fig.9A) shows kneeling boys and Jesus preaching or blessing them in the first scene (Ibid.:41). The same composition reappears on the second tile, on its right side (Fig.10B) (Ibid.:41-42). “These images show [obedient] children, as Jesus’ blessing gesture suggests that he is fulfilling his mission and converting the children” (Ibid.:41); moreover, the “repetition of [the] image of kneeling children (Fig.9A and 10B) suggests a special emphasis on conversion” (Ibid.:42). The Infancy Gospels also read that Child Jesus “revives and blesses his playmates, after they accidentally fall while attempting to follow him as he jumped from hill to hill and slid down a sunbeam” (Ibid.:41). This underlines “the importance of Jesus’ life-saving power, even though following his lead can be difficult” (Ibid.:42).
The well
The second scene on the first tile (Fig.9B) is also related to the theme of conversion. Jesus and boys are at well (Casey 2007:42); while one figure is using a pitcher to draw water from it, others carry the pitchers, already full or empty, on their shoulders.
This is probably a reference to the baptism following the conversion. It also brings to mind the Gospel scene in which the adult Jesus talks by a well with a Samaritan woman who consequently experiences conversion (John 4: 5-42). Jesus then said to her, “If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water.” (John 4:10).
‘Convert or die’ threat
The first scene of the second tile (Fig.10A) shows in turn Joseph and the children’s parents who have just witnessed Jesus’ ability to revive their dead children (Casey 2007:41-42). The one standing just in front of Joseph seems angry, yet others behind them look like wondering at Jesus’ miraculous powers (Ibid.:41).
Although those tile scenes show that the miraculously restored to life Jewish children were converted, in contemporary England, it was also “a reminder of the ‘convert or die’ threat often faced by Jews. […] In reality, the attempted conversion failed after a two-century effort which ended in [their] expulsion of 1290” (Casey 2007:42).
The Humanity of God
It was almost one hour, I was squatting on the floor in front of the tiles. The scenes drawn on them were both, informative and touching; not only do they portray politics, ethnic and religious conflicts in medieval England but also a strong desire of contemporary people to approach their God closer in His Humanity by observing Him as a human Child with miraculous powers, yet with flaws typical of common children. I also understood that the ten preserved Tring Tiles of the whole larger series would not give all the answers to the questions posed without the written versions of the Infancy Gospels, in turn, filling gaps in the missing stories expressed in art. And although apocrypha does not deepen the canonical knowledge of God’s Child as represented on the Tring Tiles (Rops 1944:115), they do reveal mankind’s desire to find human nature, with all of its aspects, in the Divine.
Nazareth, old postcard by Fadil Saba. Uploaded by TheRealHuldra in 2008. Public domain. {{PD-Israel-Photo}}. Photo source: “Nazareth” (2021). In: Wikipedia. The Free Encyclopedia.
So deep in my thoughts I hardly noticed there was a group of visitors gathering in the Room 40 and trying to approach the object of my study. I quickly gathered my notes from the floor, stood up and sent my last glance at the red tiles. ‘To be continued during the lecture’, I thought.
By Joanna Faculties of English Philology, History of Art and Archaeology. University of Silesia in Katowice, Poland; Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński University in Warsaw, Poland; University College Dublin, Ireland.
BIBLIOGRAPHY:
“Nazareth” (2021). In: Wikipedia. The Free Encyclopedia. Available at <https://bit.ly/3cf8mAx>. [Accessed 27th January, 2021].
Austin W. (Date unknown). The Mystery of the Tring Tiles. Available at <https://bit.ly/3iEdbol>. [Accessed 23rd January, 2021].
Bodleian Library (2021). “Bodleian MS. Selden Supra 38, pt. 1”. In: Digital Bodleian; Bodleian Libraries, University of Oxford. Available at <https://bit.ly/39n0pHK>. [Accessed 27th January, 2021].
Casey M. F. (2007). “The Fourteenth-Century Tring Tiles: A Fresh Look at Their Origin and the Hebraic Aspects of the Child Jesus’ Actions”. In: Peregrinations: Journal of Medieval Art and Architecture, Vol. 2, Issue 2, pp. 1-53. Available at <https://digital.kenyon.edu/perejournal/vol2/iss2/1>. [Accessed 22nd January, 2021].
Munday A. (2018). “The British Museum in Thirteen Objects – The Tring Tiles”. In: A Writer’s Perspective. Available at <https://bit.ly/39VmJY9>. [Accessed 23rd January, 2021].
Priory Tiles (2021). “The Tring Tiles”. In: Priory Tiles. Available at <https://bit.ly/2NvIeaf>. [Accessed 27th January, 2021].
Robinson et al. (2008). “The Tring Tiles”. In: Masterpieces. Medieval Art. pp. 118-119. London: The British Museum Press.
Rops D. (1944). Dzieje Chrystusa [Histoire Sainte – Jesus et Son Temps]. Starowiejska-Morstinowa Z. trans. Warszawa: Instytut Wydawniczy Pax.
The British Museum II (2021). “The Tring Tiles; museum number 1922,0412.1.CR.” In: The British Museum. Available at <https://bit.ly/367iAiw>. [Accessed 23rd January, 2021].
The British Museum (drawing) (2021). Asset number: 191480001. Photo source: The British Museum (2021). Available at <https://bit.ly/3weMtIa>. [Accessed 3rd July, 2021].
Once again I found myself among the finest artefacts gathered by the British Museum; I felt as if I had been in the middle of piled or scattered volumes, surrounding me and calling for being opened and read. Walking up and down between all the museal objects, without paying them enough attention, would be like skipping pages of those books and missing their stories. It is worth thus choosing one and read it from cover to cover.
Room 40 in the British Museum
At that time, the Room 40 of the Medieval Europe galleries was my destination for homework; I was studying one of the core modules of Medieval Cultures at Birkbeck College and was analysing medieval artefacts preserved by the Museum for the following class. There were just few people around so I decided to squat on the floor and making my notes in front of ‘my homework’. Those were eight red clay tiles resembling large domino blocks of 33 centimetres long and 16 centimetres wide, but without black dots (The British Museum I 2021).
Instead, there were intriguing medieval representations of apocrypha scenes related to the unknown events of Jesus Christ’s lifetime, which is not recorded in the canonical Bible (Robinson et al. 2008:118; Casey 2007:1). Such artistic documents do not only seem uncommon in traditional representations of the Christ but may be also provocative in their interpretations (Casey 2007:1). First of all, the official image of Jesus known from the writings and art stand here in sharp contrast to the illustration of Christ provided by the tiles, especially because they depict and regard Him as a Child at the age between five and twelve (Ibid.:1). Such images, however, do not belong to a canonical tradition of the Gospels but are taken possibly from the anonymous second century’s Apocryphal Infancy of Christ Gospels, translated into art in the form of the earthenware rectangular tiles in the fourteenth century AD., precisely circa 1330 (Casey 2007:1; The British Museum I 2021).
Biblical story of the Child Jesus
The four Gospels written by tradition by the Evangelists, Saint Matthew, Mark, Luke and John are the only recognized source of Christ’s life and ministry (Robinson et al. 2008:118).
Nazareth as depicted on a Byzantine mosaic (Chora Church, Constantinople) (created between 1315-1320). Meister der Kahriye-Cami-Kirche in Istanbul – The Yorck Project (2002) 10.000 Meisterwerke der Malerei (DVD-ROM), distributed by DIRECTMEDIA Publishing GmbH. ISBN: 3936122202. Public domain.Colours intensified, Image source: “Nazareth” (2021). In: Wikipedia. The Free Encyclopedia.
Marble sculpture of “Christ as the Teacher” (Cristo docente) by anonymous early Christian Roman sculptor (the fourth century AD.) Museo Nazionale Romano, Rome. Photo source: Weitzmann, K., ed. (1979). “Age of Spirituality: Late Antique and Early Christian Art, Third to Seventh Century:”, p. 524; statue: 469. In: MET Publications.
According to the Evangelists, Saint Luke and Saint Matthew, the Holy Family, after their stay in Egypt, returned to Nazareth in Galilee (Rops 1944:109). Little Christ’s homeland was just that little town, white and green, situated on the slope of the rolling hills that enclose the Jezreel Valley to the north (Ibid.:111). The streets and houses of Nazareth are like all the streets and houses of the East (Ibid.:111). The city is only distinguished by the number of its churches, monasteries and bell towers; it is surrounded by a semi-circle of gently rolling hills dotted with villages with houses made of white clay (Rops 1944:111). Among the olives, the vineyards and grain fields, bullets of black cypress trees shoot up into the sky (Ibid.:111). The gardens of Nazareth are full of lilies and verbenas, and on many walls of its houses, juicy flowers of bougainvillea spread their covers in the colour of episcopal purple (Ibid.:111). It was in this environment that Jesus the Child grew up (Ibid.:111). However, one should not imagine him under the very graceful figure represented by a late antique statue from the fourth century, known as Jesus the Teacher, preserved in the National Museum of Baths of Diocletian in Rome: he is represented there too calm, too well-mannered, and hieratic in his long pleated tunic (Ibid.:111). Rather, it should be assumed that little Jesus looked like one of those lively, nervous kids that one still meets on the roads of Palestine, lightly dressed, barefoot, with an expression of great intelligence on passionate and serious faces (Ibid.:111).
The House of the Holy Family
The life of the Holy Family, whose secrets so many painters wanted to represent, was passing in one of the modest houses of Nazareth, one of those that can still be seen today (Rops 1944:111). There is usually only one room inside them; there is a sweet smell of oil in the air; smoke from the fire often comes out only through the door; in the evening, a clay lamp placed on an iron candle, or on a stone protruding from the wall, casts a dim light (Ibid.:111).
In the modern town of Nazareth, there are plenty of monuments ascribed to the times of Christ Child: the Basilica of Annunciation with said remains of the house of the Virgin Mary, the Mary’s Well or Joseph’s workshop. Based on various archaeological excavations, it is assumed the Holy Family’s house looked like the one in which the Archangel Gabriel announced Mary she would conceive and bear the Son of God (today overbuilt with the walls of the Basilica of the Annunciation); it was probably largely underground, embedded in the soft local limestone; God’s Child was to walk up its rather primitive stairs, in the contemporary Basilica, they are today decorated with mosaics (Rops 1944:111-112).
Bejt-haseter
Jesus received the education that all young Israelites received; it seems that at that time there were whole cycles of studies described by the Talmud (Rops 1944:112). They were dependent on the synagogue, and they were led by a hassan, someone like a sacristan, perhaps the administrator of a venerable place, where the faithful gathered (Ibid.:112). In the bejt-haseter, an elementary school, boys, sitting around the great scroll of the Law, repeated the verses of the Torah in chorus until they had memorized them perfectly (Ibid.:112).
Probably, the adolescent Jesus did not pursue further studies in one of the rabbinical schools that existed near Nazareth (Ibid.:112). This assumption is supported by an openly expressed amazement of Jesus’ family members and acquaintances who heard his wise preaching in God’s matters (Ibid.:112).
Finding in the Temple
Jesus, therefore, grew up in Nazareth living in a modest house with his mother and adoptive father, Joseph, and after his death, He lived in the company of numerous cousins (Rops 1944:113). The canonical messages regarding this period are limited (Ibid.:113): “And the child grew and became strong; he was filled with wisdom, and the grace of God was on him” (Luke 2:40). And only one episode of this time is known from the Bible; namely, the one that happened in the twelfth year of Jesus’ life, when a young Jew was becoming a man and a “son” of the Law (Ibid.:113).
Christ among the Doctors, c. 1560, by Paolo Veronese. Public domain. Colours intensified. Painting source: “Finding in the Temple” (2021). In: Wikipedia. The Free Encyclopedia.
The event in question is the famous scene from the Temple; Mary and Joseph, as devout Jews, went to Jerusalem every year for the Passover (Rops 1944:113). Perhaps for the first time they took the Son with them (Ibid.:113). In the evening of the first day of their journey back, Joseph and Mary were looking for Jesus among their friends and relatives (Ibid.:114). They did not him all day, but assumed that he had joined some group of relatives or friends (Ibid.:114). Extremely worried, they returned to Jerusalem and it took them three days to finally find Him in the Temple (Ibid.:114). In its cloisters, surrounded by a circle of students, the wise men taught; the children squeezed into the crowd of listeners and were sometimes allowed to ask questions (Ibid.:114).
The twelve-year-old Jesus, however, was not among the listeners but sat among the wise men of Israel (Rops 1944:114), and “[everyone] who heard him was amazed at his understanding and his answers” (Luke 2:47). “When his parents saw him, they were astonished. His mother said to him, ‘Son, why have you treated us like this? Your father and I have been anxiously searching for you ‘.’ Why were you searching for me? ‘ [Jesus] asked. ‘Didn’t you know I had to be in my Father’s house?’ “(Luke 2: 48-49). Jesus’ words show that He is fully aware of his mission. There is also the teaching of the Gospel that whoever wants to follow Christ must sever all human ties and bonds (Ibid.:114).
‘Unofficial’ God’s life
This one and only event in Jesus’ childhood, described in detail in the Bible, though so eloquent, has not satisfied yet the curiosity of the crowds since the first centuries of Christianity through the Middle Ages to the present day (Rops 1944:114).
New Testament Apocrypha. First page of the Gospel of Judas (Page 33 of Codex Tchacos). Uploaded by WolfgangRieger (2009).”The Gospel of Judas. Critical Edition”. Washington 2007. Public domain. Photo source: “Infancy gospels” (2021). In: Wikipedia. The Free Encyclopedia.
There are yet other ancient records of Christ’s life but apocryphal, that is to say officially rejected from the standard Bible, though not sanctioned by the Church (Robinson et al. 2008:118). “In everyday conversation ‘apocryphal’ refers to a story of doubtful authenticity, but one that is nevertheless told frequently, perhaps even believed widely. The New Testament apocrypha are books accepted by neither Catholic nor Protestant faiths, although artists and theologians have used them as sources of information and ideas” (Austin “Footnote” Date unknown). Especially in the Middle Ages, the apocrypha was used to elaborate on gaps in the Gospel stories, which were thought fairly sparse in details about the life of Christ (Robinson et al. 2008:118; see Casey 2007; Austin Date unknown). “Apocryphal stories, [such as the one] based on the dream of Pilate’s wife, […] or of the forging of the nails for Christ’s crucifixion were [therefore] incorporated into medieval mystery plays and were an integral part of the imaginative religious experience” (Robinson et al. 2008:118). The light and colour used in the art of churches and cathedrals additionally embellished the words heard from priests during their homilies; by various artistic expressions, people who everyday experienced poor and hard conditions, could admire the splendour and dignity of the image of the mighty and omnipresent God who yet became Man and suffered for the sins of mankind. At the time, when Biblical stories were accessed in paintings and sculpture for the illiterate populace, their main characters were treated similarly to modern celebrities, and like today, common people wished to know more details about their lives than the official version of the Church was able to offer.
Jesus between His years five and twelve
“One of the most frustrating absences in the Gospels is the early years of Christ’s life, [that id to say when He is between five and twelve. In the Bible, “Christ is encountered as an infant and then later as an adolescent disputing with the doctors of the law in the Temple but no mention is made of His upbringing or his relationship with his parents” (Robinson et al. 2008:118).
Nazareth,1842. In the Holy Land Book. Image by David Roberts. Public domain. Photo source: “Christ Child” (2021). In: Wikipedia. The Free Encyclopedia.
In the eyes of contemporary people, this gap had successfully been complemented by the apocryphal Infancy Gospels, believed to have been written anonymously by early Christians from the second century AD., who imaginatively tried to create their own fictional version of what Jesus’ childhood might have been like (Casey 2007:3). Yet these imaginary pictures were quite successfully interwoven with the canonical portrayal of Jesus’ life (Ibid.:3-4). Simultaneously, the apocrypha author built up the stories around their own experiences in the process of the development of Christianity (Ibid.:3; see Elliott ed. 2005).
Anecdotes about the Christ’s Childhood
Surely, the Infancy Gospels had circulated in oral tradition before a series of their written compilations appeared (Casey 2007:4). From the very beginning, however, all of them shared several cohesive narrative elements (Ibid.:4). Central to this genre is the Gospel of Thomas dating back to the second century (Ibid.:4). It “describes the doings of Jesus during his boyhood, no record of which exists in the canonical gospels. According to Thomas, Jesus proved to be an infant prodigy at school, instructing his teachers in the unsuspected mysteries of the alphabet and astonishing his family and friends by the miracles that he performed” (Austin “Footnote” Date unknown). The Infancy Gospels tell a lot of different anecdotes about this unknown period of Christ’ childhood (Rops 1944:114-115). Some of them are famous and charming; Jesus, playing with His companions, makes birds out of clay, and then gives them life, and when He claps his hands, the wonderful creatures start flying in the air (Ibid.:115). Jesus is also playing with the other children at the entrance to the grotto, and then suddenly two huge snakes come out of it; the joyful flock runs away screaming, only Jesus remains and calmly orders the dangerous beasts to place their heads under the feet of His Mother, Mary (Ibid.:115).
Jesus (on the right) animating the clay bird toys of his playmates. Klosterneuburger Evangelienwerk, Germania, 14th century. Public domain. Colours intensified. Photo source: “Nazareth” (2021). In: Wikipedia. The Free Encyclopedia.
The Apocrypha also attributes many miracles to Christ Child (Rops 1944:115). Many of them are modelled on the miracles of the canonical Gospels; they tell that one seed Child Jesus planted is enough to feed an entire city in times of famine (Ibid.:115). Another time, the Apocrypha depict the young worker who is resurrected by Christ (Ibid.:115). Other miracles are rather magical; Jesus, riding the mule, turns the spell on him and the animal becomes a beautiful youth again (Ibid.:115). Another miracle tells that as the little Christ calls out, the salted fish begins to roll and flutter (Ibid.:115). Another time at school, when a teacher starts teaching Jesus the alphabet, the Child proves that he can do it, even though he has not learned it before (Ibid.:115).
Other apocryphal miracles can seem utterly repulsive while being attributed to the Son of God; when the same teacher wants to punish his rebellious Student, he sees at once that his hand is withered (Rops 1944:115). In turn, to show off His power to His playmates, Jesus turns one of them into a ram, another, who poked Him, becomes stroke dead (Ibid.:115).
Apocrypha in art
In the eighth or ninth centuries, the Gospel of Thomas was furthermore compiled with the Protevangelium of James, including the Apocrypha of the Virgin Mary (Casey 2007:4). As such, it formed the Gospel of Pseudo-Matthew (Ibid.:4; see Elliott ed. 2005). And when the cult of the Virgin Mary had grown since the twelfth century, an interest in her Parents’ lives and the Holy Family with the Christ Child in the center also raised, and so did the interest in the Apocrypha, which was mainly reflected through art in the whole Christian world (Robinson et al. 2008:118). As such all these, more or less known apocryphal fairy tales served especially as a source of inspiration for the painters and sculptors of the Middle Ages; paintings and mosaics of small churches and images of Gothic cathedrals are full of memories of these Christian legends (Rops 1944:115).
Saint Anne ( circa ninth century AD). Nubian wall painting. By unknown author. The National Museum in Warsaw. Public domain. Source: “Saint Anne (wall painting)” (2021). In: Wikipedia. The Free Encyclopedia.
It is enough to mention a set of wall paintings created inside the Nubian church of Faras, with the representations known ultimately from the Apocrypha. Among them, there is the eight century’s famous representation of the Virgin Mary’s Mother, Saint Anne with her mysterious gesture of pointing her index finger to the lips (see: Saint Anne of Nubia – “it will make you speechless”.). “Scenes such as these are [also] depicted in the [fourteenth century’s] Tring Tiles” (Austin “Footnote” Date unknown).
Medieval apocryphal writings
With the late twelfth century, an increased fascinations with the humanity of the Christ, especially with His childhood, had further inspired the creation of a large number of manuscripts, which mainly originated from the writings of the Gospel of Pseudo-Matthew, many of which were written in vernacular languages (Casey 2007:4). Such extensive compilation of the Infancy stories, along with the French manuscript Bodleian MS. Selden Supra 38.8 (circa 1325), combined of the Anglo-Norman manuscript, Les Enfaunces de Jesu Crist and an Apocalypse manuscript, were apparently the foundations of the now lost model for the Tring Tiles (Ibid.:4-5). Although the Bodleian MS. Selden Supra 38.8 is the most complete medieval illuminated manuscript with the Infancy Gospel stories, its illustrated simple and miniature figures significantly vary with the style of highly expressive and highly caricatured images on the Tring Tiles (Ibid.:5).
Red clay tiles
The Tring Tiles, ceramic pieces of 3,5 centimetres in thickness, were made in the technique known as sgraffito, an expensive hand-worked process popular especially in France (The British Museum I 2021; Austin Date unknown), which involves “decorating ceramics [where] a substrate, usually ‘slip’, is incised to reveal the contrasting ground underneath” (The British Museum I 2021). Obtained in this way slip-decorated designs on the tiles were additionally lead-glazed (Ibid.). The group of tiles was uncovered during the late Victorian (the mid-nineteenth century) restoration of Tring Parish Church in Hertfordshire, which has given the tiles its name (Casey 2007:7; Austin Date unknown).
Four of the Tring Tiles preserved by the British Museum; Room 40 in the Medieval Gallery. Image cropped and colours intensified.. Photo source: Priory Tiles (2021). “The Tring Tiles”. In: Priory Tiles.
“Although the tiles were, for the most part, found in a curiosity shop in Tring” (Munday 2018), it is not sure if they had originally been laid down in the church or only preserved or applied there after being moved from elsewhere, even from abroad (Austin Date unknown; Munday 2018). “More research into the origins of the tiles needs to be done, for the mystery is still far from solved” (Ibid.). Nevertheless, “the peculiar character of their sgraffito design, may suggest that they were produced in the east of England, where this technique was popular on pottery” (British Museum II 2021).
Having been found, the tiles were continuously passed through many hands before achieving their final place: nowadays, ten complete tiles and a few fragments are known, of which the eight are preserved in the British Museum and the two, saved by a local resident, are displayed in the Victoria and Albert Museum (The British Museum I 2021; Casey 2007:7-8; Austin Date unknown).
Still their number is not complete; the tiles must have been part of a much larger scheme, unfortunately now lost (Robinson et al. 2008:118). Their condition is surprisingly good, and for this reason, it is believed that the tiles had never been walked on in a pavement of the church floor but were possibly used as a frieze set on the walls of the chancel (Austin Date unknown; the British Museum I 2021). What message were they to convey?
Featured image: The Wedding Feast at Cana (Fig.4), represented in one of the Tring Tiles. First quarter of the fourteenth century, England. The British Museum; Room 40 of the Medieval Galleries. Image cropped. Photo source: Wendy Austin (Date unknown; accessed on 23rd January, 2021). The Mystery of the Tring Tiles.
By Joanna Faculties of English Philology, History of Art and Archaeology; University of Silesia in Katowice, Poland; Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński University in Warsaw, Poland; University College Dublin, Ireland.
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