UNKNOWN GOLDSMITH, German
(active c. 1020 in Fulda)

Altar frontal

c. 1020
Gold and copper over oaken core
Musée de Cluny, Paris

This rectangular antependium stood in Basel Minster during the Middle Ages. It consists essentially of chased gold panels fixed to an oak core with small nails. The fields contains a series of five semicircular arches framing the following figures: Christ, at whose feet two crowned sovereigns, generally identified as the Emperor Henry II and his wife Kunigunde, are prostrating themselves; St Michael, St Benedict, and lastly the archangels Gabriel and Raphael on Christ's left. This work epitomizes the new Romanesque artistic contest in an Ottonian milieu and the assimilation of the Carolingian past to a newly arisen, firmly monumental style.