Title

Reliquary-casket of St Thomas Becket

Limoges workshop

Generic classification

Object

Date

Century

Cultural context / style

Dimensions

Material

Technique

Iconography / Theme

Provenance

Current location

Inventory Number in Current Collection

Object history

This reliquary-casket of St Thomas Becket appeared on the Parisian art market in 1924. On June 12 and 13 of that year, it was sold from the collection of the well-known art dealer and collector Léonce Rosenberg (1879-1947). In the catalogue of the sale, which we have not had the opportunity to consult, it appears with the number 50. Simone Caudron, in the entry dedicated to this piece in the catalogue of the exhibition De Limoges a Silos (Madrid, 2001), refers to the sale as "posthumous", but it is clear that, since Léonce Rosenberg died in 1947, it could not have been so. The interpretation we make is that the piece belonged to his father Alexandre Rosenberg (1845-1913), upon whose death it would pass to his wife, Mathilde Rosenberg (1857-1923), née Jellinek, upon whose death it would pass, in turn, to their first-born son, Léonce Rosenberg, who a few months later would liquidate those objects received from his parents that did not interest him or his siblings, among whom was the also well-known art dealer Paul Rosenberg (1881-1959). Indeed, the Rosenberg, remembered as true champions of avant-garde art, turned their interest in the art world in other directions.

In the 1924 sale, another reliquary-casket of St Thomas Becket was listed under number 49, inside which, according to a later sale (Versteigerung der hinterlassenen Sammlung des Herrn Emil Weinberger, Vienna, 1929, p. 67, no. 265), there was a document stating that it came, along with another reliquary, from the cathedral of Palencia and that both had been sold in 1873 by the chapter of the cathedral of Palencia for 5,000 pesetas. Caudron supposes, correctly, that this 'other reliquary' would be the reliquary-casket of St Thomas Becket that, in the sale of 1924, appeared with the number 50. This one was acquired by the painter and collector of Le Mans Julien Chappée (1862-1957), who lent it for an exhibition celebrated in Nantes in 1933 in whose catalogue specifies its origin in the cathedral of Palencia, indicating that it had been found in a pillar of this cathedral. The two reliquary-caskets of St Thomas Becket from the cathedral of Palencia may have been originally acquired by Alexandre Rosenberg (in no case by his son Léonce, who was not born until 1879).

On Chappée's death in 1957, his casket passed into the hands of the Le Mans collector Claude Vaudecrane (1915-2002), mentioned by Caudron as Chappée's 'spiritual heir'. Offered for sale in Paris on March 19, 1987, it was acquired by the musée de Cluny - musée national du Moyen Âge in Paris (inv. no. Cl. 23296), where it is currently on display. The current whereabouts of the other casket, which, acquired by Emil Weinberger (1852-1929), was sold in Vienna upon his death, is unknown (photographs of it are published on p. 242 of the exhibition catalogue De Limoges a Silos).

Description

This is a copper reliquary-casket with champlevé enamels representative of the Limoges production of the 12th and 13th centuries, which was so widespread throughout the Medieval West. Within this production, it belongs to a large group of reliquary-caskets of about 50 specimens whose iconography is dedicated to St Thomas Becket, archbishop of Canterbury, which may have contained relics of this saint, whose brutal murder in Canterbury Cathedral in 1170, instigated in some way by the King of England Henry II, shocked the whole of Christendom and led to his immediate canonisation, followed by the emergence of a cult that, promoted by Henry II himself, became the most important cult in medieval England. The fact that Alfonso VIII of Castile was married to a daughter of the English monarch (Eleanor of Plantagenet) led to the early introduction of this cult in Castile. Caudron thinks that the two reliquary-caskets sold by the chapter of the cathedral of Palencia in 1873 could have been given to this cathedral by the monarchs themselves.

The reliquary-casket preserved in the musée de Cluny - musée national du Moyen Âge, remarkable for its quality and its good state of preservation, presents the most characteristic shape of this type of pieces: a prism with a rectangular base and a gabled roof. On its front, the Martyrdom of St Thomas Becket is represented on the box, while the Burial of St. Thomas Becket is represented on the lid. According to the iconography that was codified immediately after his death, the martyrdom shows the saint at the foot of an altar (in reality, when he was murdered he was inside the cathedral, but he was not officiating the Eucharist) being struck by a sword blow to the head by one of the two henchmen approaching from the left (in reality, the henchmen were four, but in the Limoges reliquary-caskets their number varies). On the sides of the reliquary-chest, apostles are represented and, on its back face, a geometric decoration is developed.

Locations

• 1873

  cathedral

  Palencia Cathedral, Palencia (Spain)

• 1913

  dealer/antiquarian

  Alexandre Rosenberg, Paris (France) *

• 1924

  dealer/antiquarian

  Léonce Rosenberg, Paris (France) *

• 1924 - 1957

  private collection

  Julien Chappée, Le Mans (France) *

• 1957 - 1987

  private collection

  Claude Vaudecrane, Le Mans (France) *

• 1987 - present

  museum

  Cluny Museum. National Museum of the Middle Ages, Paris (France)