Abbot's Stall (c. 1500–1515): Art, History and Details

Abbot's Stall (c. 1500–1515) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection.

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

This elaborate chair most likely belonged to an abbot, the spiritual head of a monastery. The seat was built high in order to raise the abbot above those surrounding him as a symbol of his rank and authority, while the canopy above accentuated his importance and dignity. The stall would have been likely placed in a monastic chapter house where the entire community of monks would have held their daily meetings and deliberations. The linen-fold panels, the intricate ribbed vaulting, the open work tracery, and the many pinnacles are characteristic of the flamboyant Gothic style at the end of the Middle Ages in France and the Low Countries. The decorative profile heads suggest some knowledge of early Renaissance models. The fine relief on the seat back with the Tree of Jesse shows the ancestry of Christ. The stall has received some replacement parts in recent centuries, but the seat and canopy are entirely original.

Object facts

• Title: Abbot's Stall
• Date: c. 1500–1515
• Culture: France, perhaps Artois or Picardy, early 16th century
• Type: Furniture and woodwork
• Technique: oak
• Dimensions: Overall: 329.6 x 336.3 x 83.8 cm (129 3/4 x 132 3/8 x 33 in.)
• Collection: MED - Gothic
• Department: Medieval Art
• Accession number: 1928.657

Collection credit

Purchase from the J. H. Wade Fund

Further reading listed by the museum

• W. M. M. “A Gothic Abbot’s Stall.” The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 16, no. 1 (January 1929): 4–6.
• The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1966. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1966.
• The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1969. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1969.

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.