The Cleveland Museum of Art
Collection Online as of March 22, 2024
Reliquary Box with Scenes from the Life of John the Baptist
1300s
Overall: 9 x 23.5 x 9 cm (3 9/16 x 9 1/4 x 3 9/16 in.)
Location: 105 Byzantine
Description
John the Baptist--the first person to recognize Christ as the promised savior and the one who baptized him in the Jordan River--was one of the Byzantine Empire’s most revered saints. This box shows four scenes from the saint’s life: John’s martyrdom, Christ’s baptism, John’s birth, and the announcement of his birth to his parents. It probably once housed one of the saint’s relics; several were kept in churches and monasteries in Constantinople, including fragments of his skull and right arm and locks of his blood-clotted hair.- 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. Mentioned and reproduced: P. 90-91, no. 26Bagnoli, Martina. Treasures of heaven: saints, relics, and devotion in medieval Europe. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 2010. Reproduced: cat. no. 52, p. 93
- Treasures of Heaven: Saints, Relics and Devotion in Medieval Europe. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (October 17, 2010-January 17, 2011).Sacred Gifts and Worldly Treasures: Medieval Masterworks from the Cleveland Museum of Art. National Museum of Bavaria, Munich, Germany (May 10-September 16, 2007); J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, CA (October 30, 2007-January 20, 2008); Frist Art Museum, Nashville, TN (February 13-June 7, 2009).Byzantium: Faith and Power (1261-1557). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY (organizer) (March 15-July 5, 2004).The Metropolitan Museum of Art (3/15/2004 - 7/4/2004): "Byzantium: Faith and Power (1261-1557)"
Bavarian Nationalmuseum, Munich (5/10/2007 - 9/16/2007), the J. Paul Getty Musuem, Los Angeles (10/30/2007 - 1/20/2008) and Frist Center for the Visual Arts, Nashville, TN (2/13/2009 - 6/7/2009): "Sacred Gifts and Worldly Treasures: Medieval Masterworks from the Cleveland Museum of Art"
CMA, October 17, 2010 - January 17, 2011, Walters Art Museum February 13 - May 15, 2011: "Treasures of Heaven: Saints, Relics and Devotion in Medieval Europe," cat. no. 52 - {{cite web|title=Reliquary Box with Scenes from the Life of John the Baptist|url=false|author=|year=1300s|access-date=22 March 2024|publisher=Cleveland Museum of Art}}
Source URL:
https://www.clevelandart.org/art/1999.229.a