The St Nicholas Crozier
Staff Head
ca. 1150-1170 (made)
ca. 1150-1170 (made)
| Artist/Maker | |
| Place of origin |
This so called St Nicholas Crozier shows scenes relating to Christ and St Nicholas. Bishops, and sometimes abbots, carry a crozier as a symbol of office. It resembles a shepherd's crook. At the end of the volute or scroll an angel supports the Lamb of God, a symbolic image of Christ. Its head is now missing. On the other side is the Nativity of Christ. The Annunciation to the Shepherds takes place on one side of the shaft.
The rest of the crozier proper shows three scenes from the Life of St Nicholas. According to tradition, St Nicholas was Bishop of Myra, a town in Asia Minor, in the late Roman period. The first scene depicts his birth. The second shows the infant saint's abstinence from his mother's milk. The Golden Legend, a popular 13th century manual recounting the lives of saints, notes that 'he took the breast only once on Wednesdays and Fridays'. The final scene records the saint's gift of gold to an impoverished and emaciated nobleman of Myra. This was to supply his daughters with a dowry to prevent their being put out on to the streets as prostitutes. The very particular choice of scenes suggests that the crozier was made for a bishop or abbot who was either named after the saint or in charge of a foundation dedicated to him.
This crozier is one of the most sublime achievements of the medieval ivory carver's art. The awkward shape of the volute has been brilliantly transformed into a fantastic landscape for the two separate but interlinked narratives. You can see evidence of the carver's fertile and creative imagination wherever you look. Perhaps the most striking example is the way in which Nicholas's father emerges from inside the surface of the ivory halfway up the crozier. This is a tour de force of technical and creative genius.
The rest of the crozier proper shows three scenes from the Life of St Nicholas. According to tradition, St Nicholas was Bishop of Myra, a town in Asia Minor, in the late Roman period. The first scene depicts his birth. The second shows the infant saint's abstinence from his mother's milk. The Golden Legend, a popular 13th century manual recounting the lives of saints, notes that 'he took the breast only once on Wednesdays and Fridays'. The final scene records the saint's gift of gold to an impoverished and emaciated nobleman of Myra. This was to supply his daughters with a dowry to prevent their being put out on to the streets as prostitutes. The very particular choice of scenes suggests that the crozier was made for a bishop or abbot who was either named after the saint or in charge of a foundation dedicated to him.
This crozier is one of the most sublime achievements of the medieval ivory carver's art. The awkward shape of the volute has been brilliantly transformed into a fantastic landscape for the two separate but interlinked narratives. You can see evidence of the carver's fertile and creative imagination wherever you look. Perhaps the most striking example is the way in which Nicholas's father emerges from inside the surface of the ivory halfway up the crozier. This is a tour de force of technical and creative genius.
Object details
| Categories | |
| Object type | |
| Title | The St Nicholas Crozier (popular title) |
| Materials and techniques | Carved ivory |
| Brief description | Crozier, pastoral staff head, elephant ivory, The St. Nicholas Crozier, England (Winchester?) or French (Ile-de-France), ca. 1150-70 |
| Physical description | The crozier shows three scenes from the Life of St Nicholas, the Agnus Dei, the Nativity of Christ and the Annunciation to the Shepherds: at the end of the volute are, on one side, the Nativity with Christ cradled in a tendril which springs from the stem of the crozier, and on the other side an angel supporting the Lamb of God (the Agnus Dei), now lacking its head. In the Nativity scene the Virgin is shown reclining under a blanket with the Infant Christ swaddled above her. A lamp hangs down between the Virgin and the Infant, behind which an angel supports the Infant. The heads of the ox and ass protrude from the ivory tongue to the right of the Christ Child. The Annunciation to the Shepherds fills one side of the shaft of the crozier, with the angel - marked by the inscription 'Angelus' - flying down above the star to the three Shepherd and their six animals. The remaining scenes are from the life of St. Nicholas: besides the Annunciation to the Shepherds is the Birth of St. Nicholas, and above that is the infant Saint's abstinence from his mother's milk on fast days. The outer curve of the crozier head is filled by the representation of the Saint giving money to the impoverished nobleman of Myra for his three daughters, to prevent their being sold into prostitution. The three daughters are shown asleep and resting at the top of one side, with their semi-naked emaciated father lying beside them, and on the other is the nobleman's wife, also under a blanket, reaching out towards the young Nicholas, who climbs up the curve of the crook to post his bundle of gold. |
| Dimensions |
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| Object history | Formerly in the Webb collection, acquired by the Museum in 1865 for £140. Historical significance: The St Nicholas Crozier - justifiably considered one of the most sublime achievements of the Romanesque period - has since the early 20th century been regarded almost unanimously as an English work A stronger case can be made for a French origin, both on iconographic and stylistic grounds. The awkward shape of the volute has here been brilliantly transformed into a fantastic landscape for the two separate but interlinked narratives, while the creative fertility of the sculptor's imagination is evident throughout. The crozier was a symbol of a bishop's or abbot's responsibilities to those under his charge and as a living representative of Christ, the Good Shepherd. |
| Historical context | Because of its very particular iconography it is assumed that the crozier was made for a high-ranking ecclesiastic either named after the saint or in charge of a foundation dedicated to him. |
| Subjects depicted | |
| Summary | This so called St Nicholas Crozier shows scenes relating to Christ and St Nicholas. Bishops, and sometimes abbots, carry a crozier as a symbol of office. It resembles a shepherd's crook. At the end of the volute or scroll an angel supports the Lamb of God, a symbolic image of Christ. Its head is now missing. On the other side is the Nativity of Christ. The Annunciation to the Shepherds takes place on one side of the shaft. The rest of the crozier proper shows three scenes from the Life of St Nicholas. According to tradition, St Nicholas was Bishop of Myra, a town in Asia Minor, in the late Roman period. The first scene depicts his birth. The second shows the infant saint's abstinence from his mother's milk. The Golden Legend, a popular 13th century manual recounting the lives of saints, notes that 'he took the breast only once on Wednesdays and Fridays'. The final scene records the saint's gift of gold to an impoverished and emaciated nobleman of Myra. This was to supply his daughters with a dowry to prevent their being put out on to the streets as prostitutes. The very particular choice of scenes suggests that the crozier was made for a bishop or abbot who was either named after the saint or in charge of a foundation dedicated to him. This crozier is one of the most sublime achievements of the medieval ivory carver's art. The awkward shape of the volute has been brilliantly transformed into a fantastic landscape for the two separate but interlinked narratives. You can see evidence of the carver's fertile and creative imagination wherever you look. Perhaps the most striking example is the way in which Nicholas's father emerges from inside the surface of the ivory halfway up the crozier. This is a tour de force of technical and creative genius. |
| Bibliographic references |
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| Collection | |
| Accession number | 218-1865 |
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| Record created | November 20, 2002 |
| Record URL |
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