Title

Paten of abbot Pelagius Fernandiz

Anonimous

Generic classification

Date

Century

Cultural context / style

Material

Technique

Iconography / Theme

Provenance

Current location

Inventory Number in Current Collection

Inscriptions / Marks

Inscription in Visigothic script with Carolingian influence, on the edge:

+CARNEM : QVM : GVSTAS : NON : ADTERIT : VLLA : VETVSTAS : PERPETVVS : CIBVS : ET : REGAT : HOC : REVS : AMEN

"The flesh that you take, no old age wears it out [whoever] denies that this food is eternal is guilty. Amen."

Object history

Church of Santiago, Peñalba de Santiago, from the XII to the XIX century.

Collection of the archbishop of Toledo Juan Ignacio Moreno y Maisanove in 1876.

Paris, collection of Charles M. Stein, 1878-1886.

Acquired by the Louvre Museum in 1886.

Description

The paten corresponding to the chalice of Abbot Pelayo Fernández is made of embossed silver and partially gilded, it has a circular shape, with a central part in which there is a medallion framed by a band showing the Agnus Dei nimbus, passing to the left and holding with its right leg a flordelisado cross. The medallion is surrounded by another relief with eight lobes, the piece has a flat raised rim topped by a cylindrical molding. Like the chalice, the piece is partially gilded, highlighting the central medallion with the lamb, finely worked, as well as the edge where the inscription appears.

The piece was made known by Amador de los Ríos, who correctly placed it at the beginning of the 12th century and pointed out that the inscription is written in Leonine verses, Émile Molinier seems not to have known this text since he dates the work in the first half of the 13th century, although he recognizes its Romanesque character based on the fact that "at this time the art of the peninsula was notably behind French art".

The presence of the polylobed medallion has sometimes been related to the Mozarabic rite, supposing that the central zone and the eight lobes would be reserved for the nine fragments in which the consecrated Host was divided, alluding to the Corporatio (Incarnation), Nativitas, Circumcisio, Apparitio (Epiphany), Passio, Mors, Resurrectio, Gloria and Regnum. But the imposition of the Roman rite at the end of the 11th century by Alfonso VI would make this use impossible. It could be thought that perhaps in geographically isolated areas such as the Valle del Silencio the Hispanic liturgy could have been prolonged for some time, but what is certain is that the form of the paten is quite common in the Middle Ages, and similar examples can be found, with a central element framed in a polylobed medallion of six or eight lobes, over a long period of time. Examples include the paten of Santa María la Real de O Cebreiro, of inferior quality, that of the monastery of Santo Domingo de Silos (11th-12th century), or the so-called San Rosendo, from the treasury of the cathedral of Santiago de Compostela, a work from the mid-13th century. Works that appear even in geographically distant areas such as the paten of Núria (13th century) today in the cathedral of La Seo de Urgel, that of Hildesheim, from the beginning of the 13th century (New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art (SL.5.2013.3.3b) and that of San Segundo, from the cathedral of Avila, work of the Sienese Andrea Petrucci c. 1338-1355, from areas where the Mozarabic rite was never practiced.

The inscription that runs along the border has been the most problematic aspect of the piece due to its incorrect spelling, with qvm appearing for qvam, et regat for est qvi negat, something that has caused important differences in the translation.

Amador de los Ríos in 1876 (p. 635) translated the text as "If you taste the flesh [of the Lord] you will live in perennial youth. [She is] eternal food: let not the sinner forget it. Amen." In 1888 he proposed a different reading, arguing that the text lacked meaning so that it was necessary to incorporate words, even altering considerably the text of the second verse by presenting it as "Perpetvvs cibvs en peccatiqve hoc revocamen".

For Caballero Chica the inscription would be translated as "When you taste this meat [of the Lord] you are not affected by any old age. It is the eternal sustenance, I will feed the sinner with it. Amen", without explaining how the sinner can feed on the body of Christ without repentance.

It would be Favreau in 1993 who would relate the insistence of the text on transubstantiation with the heresy of Berengarius of Tours, completed in 1080 when Berengarius would have affirmed that "Constant in altari carnem de pane creari; Ipsa caro Deus est; qui negat hoc reus est", a text that would become popular in the Middle Ages, appearing in different manuscripts and more or less literally and even in a 14th century paten in the church of St. Helena of Götene (Sweden). In fact and as Favreau recalls (p. 42) in a manuscript from the abbey of Saints Cosmas and Damian of Liesborn, today in the Library of the University of Copenhagen, the following poem is included on folio 43v: "Carnem qvam gvstas non atterit vlla venustas [sic] / Perpetvvs cibvs est, qvi negat hoc revs est. / Hec caro, qvam comedis, te salvat, si bene credis, / Vt male si credis, indicivm comedis" which was the one copied by the author of the Leonese paten, surely, as García Lobo and Martín López think, from a text in capital Caroline from which he did not understand the abbreviations, which would explain the errors in the text.

The translation offered by the Louvre Museum and that fits literally to the text is: "The meat that you eat, no old age wears it out [he who] denies that this food is eternal is guilty. Amen."

A copy of the paten was made in 200-2006 by silversmith José Manuel Santos Martínez, and is kept in the Basilica of Nuestra Señora de la Encina in Ponferrada.

Locations

• XII^th c. - XIX^th c.

  church

  Iglesia de Santiago, Peñalba de Santiago (Spain)

• 1876 - 1878

  private collection

  Juan Ignacio Moreno y Maisanove (Spain) *

• 1878 - 1886

  private collection

  Charles M. Stein, Paris (France) *

• 1886 - present

  museum

  Louvre Museum, Paris (France)