Medallion with the Bust of Christ ("The Cumberland Medallion"), from the Guelph Treasure (late 700s): Art, History and Details

Medallion with the Bust of Christ ("The Cumberland Medallion"), from the Guelph Treasure (late 700s) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection.

The work and its context

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

This medallion may have originally served as a sacerdotal brooch and is the earliest object from the Guelph Treasure, the ecclesiastical treasure of Germany’s Braunschweig (Brunswick) Cathedral.

Object facts

• Title: Medallion with the Bust of Christ ("The Cumberland Medallion"), from the Guelph Treasure
• Date: late 700s
• Culture: Germany, Weserraum, Migration period, late 8th century
• Type: Enamel
• Technique: cloisonné enamel and gold on copper
• Dimensions: Diameter: 5.1 x 0.2 cm (2 x 1/16 in.)
• Collection: MED - Migration Period
• Department: Medieval Art
• Accession number: 1930.504

Collection credit

Purchase from the J. H. Wade Fund

Further reading listed by the museum

• New York, Goldschmidt and Reinhardt Galleries: "The Guelph Treasure,"
• W. M. M. “The Acquisition of Six Objects from the Guelph Treasure for the Cleveland Museum of Art: Foreword.” The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 17, no. 9 (November 1930): 163–165.
• W. M. M. “The Acquisition of Six Objects from the Guelph Treasure for the Cleveland Museum of Art.” The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 17, no. 9 (November 1930): 165–178, 183.

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.