Crosier head, gilded copper with champlevé enamel, Limoges, France, ca. 1250

Crozier-head, copper decorated with champleve enamel and gilt. In the crook a figure of Christ in Majesty on one side and a group of the Virgin and Child on the other. The knop is of openwork foliage and rosettes with a cresting of leaves above; the socket has blank spaces for applied figures of an Annunciation group. Set with turquoise pastes. The eyes of the figures are set with jet pastes. The surface of both crook and socket are decorated with foliated scrollwork on a ground of lapis blue enamel.

Given by Mr Montague Yeats-Brown CMG

Received from Mr Yeats Brown Esq. in 1912

The crosier is an ecclesiastical ornament which is conferred on bishops at their consecration and on mitred abbots at their investiture, and which is used by these prelates in performing certain solemn functions. It is sometimes stated that archbishops do not use the crosier. This is not so, the truth being that in addition to the pastoral staff they have also the right to have the archiepiscopal cross borne before them within the territory of their jurisdiction.

According to Watts, the crosier was certainly in use in Gaul in the sixth century. It was in all probability in the first instance an ensign of office or dignity, an emblem of authority; however the predominant idea symbolised by the form of the crosier became that of pastoral care.

The form of the present cross, with the spiral of the crook extending into an elongated curl, appears to have developed in the tenth century. The addition of a well defined knop appears in examples from the beginning of the twelfth-century. The thirteenth-century witnessed the production of a large number of pastoral staves with a variety of subjects depicted in the volute. Limoges was the chief centre for the production of this type.

By the end of the thirteenth-century the popularity of the enamelled crosiers of Limoges appears to have waned, and the more or less stereotyped models which poured from its workshops in large numbers, made way for crosiers of an increased richness and elaborate magnificence.

J.C. Robinson noted that "The Limoges crosier heads were, in fact, a current article of manufacture, and as such, beautiful as they are, are not to be ranked with the splendidly wrought crosiers in more precious metals, which were possessed by the highest orders of the episcopal order. It is most likely, indeed, that they were more particularly designed as sepulchral crosiers...most of the Limoges crosiers now extant have indeed been removed from tombs...The Limoges crosiers are of very uniform types, a few prescriptive models seeming to have been adhered to with great constancy."

Watts, while not subscribing to this statement in its entirety - concurs that where a crosier is found, which has individuality or shows divergence from an established type, it may reasonably be assumed to be for someone special. The present cross shows no such divergence however. Indeed, the commonest decorative scheme on Limoges crosiers occurs on the present example - the staff head is covered with a scale work pattern in dark blue enamel, the outline of the scales being gilt.

A crosier is an ecclesiastical ornament which is conferred on bishops at their consecration and on mitred abbots at their investiture, and which is used by these prelates in performing certain ecclesiastical rituals.

The Limoges crosier heads were produced using relatively cheap materials and although finely crafted, they can be differentiated from splendidly wrought crosiers in more precious metals, which were possessed by the highest episcopal orders. It is possible, that they were more particularly designed as sepulchral crosiers. Many of the Limoges crosiers now extant have indeed been removed from tombs.

M.17-1913