Reliquary Châsse

c. 1175/1180

A free-standing, gold, enameled, rectangular box has a triangular top like the roof of a house, and the box rests on a short, square foot in each corner. In this photograph, we look onto one long side and the short side to our right is angled toward us, so we see the panel there, too. Along the long side, five people are shown from the waist up in the upper, roof-like panel and six more line up on the panel below. The skin of every person is gold, and all wear robes and garments in lapis or sky blue, spring green, yellow, and white. The area around the people is also gold, and each panel is encased by a royal-blue band dotted with stylized stars at regular intervals. Each panel is then lined with small, button-like rounded bosses around its edges. In the upper panel, all of the men except the second from the right have beards, and all have halos with wavy bands of blue, green, yellow, and white. The man to our left holds a book and his neighbor a skeleton key the length of his arm. The man at the center holds up a book with his left hand, on our right, and raises the index and middle fingers of his other hand, held up at shoulder height. The two men to our right also hold books. In the panel below, three horses’ heads peek in from the left edge, creating a vertical band, and three crowned men line up, holding gold vessels and looking toward a woman seated in a throne with a child on her lap. The woman has a halo made with a wavy pattern of blue, yellow, green, black, and white. Her throne is flanked by columns, and the area around it is edged with bands of white, light, and dark blue. The baby wears gold, has a halo, holds a book in his lap with his left hand, and raises the first two fingers of his other hand toward the three men. The final person in this panel wears a hat, holds a scepter topped with a fleur-de-lis, and gestures at the woman and baby. The head and shoulders of a haloed person is visible along the short side of the box, which is angled sharply away from us. The gold between all the people and bordering each panel is intricately carved with tiny flowing organic lines and swirls.

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On View

West Building Ground Floor, Gallery G18

Artwork overview

  • Medium

    champlevé enamel on gilded copper with oak core

  • Credit Line

    Widener Collection

  • Dimensions

    overall: 19.1 x 26.7 x 11.5 cm (7 1/2 x 10 1/2 x 4 1/2 in.)

  • Accession

    1942.9.278

Artwork history & notes

Provenance

Thomas Gambier Parry [1816-1888], Highnam Court, Gloucestershire, by 1862;[1] Hubert Parry, 1888-1918; Ernest Gambier-Parry, 1918-1920; sold July 1920 to (Durlacher Brothers, London [?]);[2] sold 1922 to Joseph E. Widener, Elkins Park, Pennsylvania; inheritance from Estate of Peter A.B. Widener by gift through power of appointment of Joseph E. Widener, after purchase by funds of the Estate; gift 1942 to NGA.
[1] Pierre-Édouard Wagner, in his exhibition catalogue entry (Le chemin des reliques: Témoignages précieux et ordinaries de la vie religieuse à Metz au Moyen Age, exh. cat., Musées de la Cour d'Or, Metz, 2000: no. 11, 31-33, repro.), discusses the documentation he discovered that probably places the châsse at the Abby Saint-Arnoul in Metz, France, in the 18th century.
The châsse was listed as lent by Gambier Parry in the Catalogue of the Special Exhibition of Works of Art of the Medieval, Renaissance, and More Recent Periods on Loan at the South Kensington Museum, June, 1862, ed. John Charles Robinson, (London, 1862, rev. ed. 1863), 73, no. 1072. On the artist and collector Thomas Gambier Parry [1816-1888] see "A Great Victorian," and Blunt, Anthony, "The History of Thomas Gambier Parry's Collection," Burlington Magazine 109 (March 1967), 111-112 and 115-116. Blunt indicates that the châsse is listed in an inventory, but it is not certain from his language whether this was dated 1860 or 1875.
[2] See Blunt 1967, 115-116, for the provenance after Gambier-Parry's death; the date of purchase by Widener is recorded in NGA curatorial files. Consultation of the Gambier Parry papers that Blunt examined in 1967 at Highnam (then belonging to Thomas Fenton), may eventually provide further clues to the earlier ownership.

Associated Names

Exhibition History

1862

  • Special Exhibition of Works of Art of the Medieval, Renaissance, and More Recent Periods on Loan at the South Kensington Museum, June, 1862, South Kensington Museum, London, 1862, 73, no. 1072. Rev. ed. 1863.

1995

  • L'Oeuvre de Limoges: Emaux limousins du Moyen Age/Enamels of Limoges 1100-1350", Musée du Louvre, Paris; The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 1995-1996, no. 22, repro.

2000

  • Le chemin des reliques: Témoignages précieux et ordinaires de la vie religieuse à Metz au Moyen âge, Musées de la Cour d'Or, Metz, 2000-2001, no. 11, repro.

Bibliography

1862

  • South Kensington 1862, 73, no. 1072.

1890

  • Rupin, Ernest. L'oeuvre de Limoges. Paris, 1890: 424.

1905

  • Michel, André, ed. Histoire de l'art. 8 vols. in 17. Paris, 1905-1929, 2 (1906): 944 (section on enamels by Jean J. Marquet de Vasselot).

1906

  • Marquet de Vasselot, Jean J. Les émaux limousins à fond vermiculé. Paris, 1906: 11-13, pl. II.

1935

  • Inventory of the Objects d'Art at Lynnewood Hall, Elkins Park, Pennsylvania, The Estate of the Late P.A.B. Widener. Philadelphia, 1935: 29.

1936

  • Hildburgh, Walter H. Medieval Spanish Enamels. London, 1936: 107, n. 4, 120.

1942

  • Works of Art from the Widener Collection. Foreword by David Finley and John Walker. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1942: 9, as Limoges 12th Century, Chasse of champlevé enamel.

1952

  • Christensen, Erwin O. Objects of Medieval Art from the Widener Collection. National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 1952: 10-15, 30, repro.

1963

  • Souchal, Geneviève. "Les émaux de Grandmont au XIIe siècle." Bulletin Monumental 121 (1963): 48, fig. 6, 59-60, n. 1.

1964

  • Gauthier, Marie-Madeleine. "Le goût Plantagenêt et les arts ... France du sud-ouest." Stil und Uberlieferung in der Kunst des Abendlandes. Akten des 21 Inter. Kongresses für Kunstgeschichte: Bonn 1964. Berlin, 1967: 152.

1966

  • Gauthier, Marie-Madeleine. "Une châsse limousine du ... XIIe siècle: ... iconog., comp., et ... chronologie." In Mélanges offerts à René Crozet. eds. Gallais and Riou, 2 vols. Poitiers, 1966: 2:942-945, 947-948, 951, no. C-55.

1967

  • Gauthier, Marie-Madeleine. "A Limoges Champlevé Book-Cover in the Gambier-Parry Collection." The Burlington Magazine 109 (1967): 151-152, 156, fig. 61.

  • Blunt, Anthony. "The History of Thomas Gambier Parry's Collection." The Burlington Magazine 109 (March 1967): 115-116.

1969

  • Ostoia, Vera K. The Middle Ages; Treasures from The Cloisters and The Metropolitan Museum of Art Exh. cat. Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, 1969: 119; Art Institute of Chicago, 1970.

1972

  • Gauthier 1972, 98-99.

1975

  • Walker, John. National Gallery of Art, Washington. New York, 1975: 36, color repro.

1987

  • Gauthier, Marie-Madeleine. Emaux méridionaux; Cat. Int'l. de ... Limoges ... romane, 1100-1190; Innovations mér.. Paris, 1987: 145-146, no. 148, color repros. 458-459, (pl. CXXX), repros. 510-512, (pl. CXXXIX), (pl. CXL).

1993

  • Distelberger, Rudolf, Alison Luchs, Philippe Verdier, and Timonthy H. Wilson. Western Decorative Arts, Part I: Medieval, Renaissance, and Historicizing Styles including Metalwork, Enamels, and Ceramics. The Collections of the National Gallery of Art Systematic Catalogue. Washington, D.C., 1993: 19-24, color fig. 19.

2011

  • Bynum, Caroline Walker. Christian Materiality: An Essay on Religion in Late Medieval Europe. New York, 2011: 70, 73, fig. 16.

Markings

Stickers on interior (back): ON LOAN FROM T. Gambier Parry, Esq. April 19th 1862; on proper right bottom edge: 60.

Wikidata ID

Q62107070

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