Provenance

Abbey Church of Saint-Denis

existed in 13th century

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A cup carved from stone is mounted in gold fittings to create a jeweled chalice with handles that curl up each side and a tall, flaring foot below. The stone of the cup is swirled with shell pink and rust brown, and carved to create vertical ridges. The gold rim around the lip flares outward and is set with a band of alternating pairs of small, white pearls and mostly garnet-red stones, though one stone to our right is a muted blue. In this photograph, the handles curve up each side from the base of the stone cup to the gold lip, where the handle divides into two scrolling tendrils on either side of a teardrop shaped center, like curling petals. The base and foot are as tall as the stone cup and gold lip. A knob-like form just below the stone cup is set with deep red and jade green stones around its center, and rows of small pearls around the narrow top and bottom of the knob. The knob is chased to create a pattern of scrolling vines, like tracery. The flaring foot below is also chased with the same pattern, surrounding gold, oval medallions set at regular intervals in the foot. In our view, the medallion to the left shows a bunch of grapes and the center is a portrait of a bearded man with a halo, holding his right hand up with his first two fingers raised. The details on the medallion to our right are difficult to make out but it could be a sheaf of wheat. Small, round jewels are set above and below each medallion, and between each one.
French 12th Century, Alexandrian 2nd Century B.C., Alexandrian 1st Century B.C., Chalice of the Abbot Suger of Saint-Denis, 2nd/1st century B.C. (cup); 1137-1140 (mounting), sardonyx cup with heavily gilded silver mounting, adorned with filigrees set with stones, pearls, glass insets, and opaque white glass pearls, Widener Collection, 1942.9.277

Chalice of the Abbot Suger of Saint-Denis

French 12th Century, Alexandrian 2nd Century B.C., Alexandrian 1st Century B.C. · 2nd/1st century B.C. (cup); 1137-1140 (mounting) · sardonyx cup with heavily gilded silver mounting, adorned with filigrees set with stones, pearls, glass insets, and opaque white glass pearls ·  Accession ID  1942.9.277

Bibliography

1925

  • Vitry, Paul, and Gaston Brière. L'église abbatiale de Saint-Denis et ses tombeaux; notice historique et archéologique. 2nd Ed. Paris, 1925.

1973

  • Montesquiou-Fezensac, Blaise, comte de, and Danielle Gaborit-Chopin. Le trésor de Saint-Denis [includes inventory of 1634 and various documents]. 3 vols. Paris, 1973-1977.

1984

  • Erlande-Brandenburg, Alain. The Abbey Church of Saint-Denis. Translated from L'Église abbatiale de Saint Denis. 2 vols. Paris, 1984.

1985

  • Bruzelius, Caroline Astrid. The 13th-Century Church at St.-Denis. New Haven, Connecticut, 1985.

1987

  • Crosby, Sumner McKnight. The Royal Abbey of Saint-Denis: From Its Beginnings to the Death of Suger, 475-1151. Edited and completed by Pamela Z. Blum. New Haven, Conn., 1987.