Procession with Reliquary

	Procession with Reliquary

Because of its rarity, its quality, and the ease with which it could be carved, ivory was a coveted material for carving small figures or reliefs in Late Antiquity and in the Middle Ages.

The large relief (about 5.11 x 10.23 in/13 x 26 cm) could have originally served as the decoration of a reliquary. It shows a procession moving from left to right. Two priests sit in a splendidly ornamented, four-wheel wagon drawn by two mules; the priests are bringing a relic shrine into a city.

The pictures depicts the ceremonious transfer of a relic to its destination. Men carrying candles march in front. They are being received by the Empress. Behind her stands a church where the relic is to be enshrined. The workmen were not able to finish the church in time: roofers are still laying tiles on the roof.

The background is taken up by a large structure with numerous men looking out the windows; they are singing hymns and swinging censers. Although the building is reminiscent of the Porta Nigra, and the Empress with the wooden cross recalls Helena, the mother of the Emperor Constantine and the Empress who, according to the legend, donated numerous relics to the Trier Church, the ivory carving displays no references to Trier. The carving from a private collection did not come into the Cathedral Treasury until the 19th century.

The relief, probably carved in Constantinople in the 5th century, counts among the best works of its time, not simply because of the masterful quality of the artist’s work or the many figures carved almost three-dimensionally, but also because of the realistic rendering of the architecture. In addition, because of the minute depiction of the gestures and the garments, it is a key document for Byzantine court ceremony and an important source for forms of relic veneration.

Author: Prof. Dr. Wolfgang Schmid