Fragment of a Processional Cross (c. 1050): Art, History and Details

Fragment of a Processional Cross (c. 1050) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection.

The work and its context

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

Impressively large and elaborately embellished, the cross to which this fragment belonged was likely carried in liturgical processions. The central medallion on its front depicts Christ, flanked by medallions showing the Virgin and Saint John the Baptist. Together they form the Deesis, a powerful Byzantine image formula evoking these saints’ intercession with Christ on behalf of mankind. In the central medallion on the cross’s back is Saint Sabas, founder of an important monastery near Jerusalem, in whose honor the cross was made. He is surrounded by other monastic saints, thus indicating that the cross was likely used by a monastic community.

Object facts

• Title: Fragment of a Processional Cross
• Date: c. 1050
• Culture: Byzantium, Constantinople, Byzantine period
• Type: Metalwork
• Technique: silver gilt, niello
• Dimensions: Overall: 32.3 x 44.8 x 5.7 cm (12 11/16 x 17 5/8 x 2 1/4 in.)
• Collection: MED - Byzantine
• Department: Medieval Art
• Accession number: 1970.36

A detail from the museum

Byzantine processions were a feast for the senses. Imagine the scent of sweet and spicy incense wafting through the air, mingling with the sound of sacred chants as priests carry this cross in a procession during the service.

Collection credit

Leonard C. Hanna Jr. Fund

Further reading listed by the museum

• Evans, Helen C., and William D. Wixom. The Glory of Byzantium: Art and Culture of the Middle Byzantine Era, A.D. 843-1261. New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1997.
• Cleveland Museum of Art, and Holger A. Klein. Sacred Gifts and Worldly Treasures: Medieval Masterworks from the Cleveland Museum of Art. Cleveland, Ohio: Cleveland Museum of Art, 2007.
• Boehm, Barbara Drake and Melanie Hocomb, eds. Jerusalem, 1000-1400: Every People Under Heaven. NY: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2016.

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.