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III.—The Iconography of St. Thomas of Canterbury

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 July 2011

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The materials for a study of the iconography of St. Thomas Becket still exist in great abundance. On the canonization of the saint in 1173, his cult evidently spread all over Europe with lightning speed, and the consequences of this were very soon to be seen in all the arts. Much of the artistic production of different countries and centuries relating to the personality and life of St. Thomas has, of course, perished: and in England, after the de-canonization of ‘Bishop Becket’, decreed by Henry VIII, a veritable war was, in 1538, declared on the innumerable representations of the saint then existing in this country, the proclamation enacting expressly that ‘his images and pictures throughout the whole realm shall be put down and avoided out of all churches and chapels and other places’. Where the destruction was not complete, defacement of varying extent was resorted to, as is clear, for instance, from the many illuminations of manuscripts in which the rendering of St. Thomas Becket has been disfigured or partly obliterated. But even so, as already mentioned, there still exists plenty of documentation on which to base a study of the iconography of St. Thomas Becket; and I have now for some time been gathering material with that end in view. In doing so my endeavour has been to work as systematically as possible, though, as all students of iconography can aver, chance often gives valuable help in the pursuit of our quest. I had an experience of the working of chance only recently when a visit to Salamanca, entirely unconnected with my interest in St. Thomas Becket, suddenly brought me up against an extremely interesting Romanesque church of San Tomás Cantuariense, from which, however, all traces of the representation of the saint had vanished, except a very commonplace figure of a mitred bishop in carved and painted wood of quite recent date. Even though I have kept photographers busy over a wider area of Europe than I could anticipate when first embarking on this task, I dare not hope that I have as yet surveyed my material with anything approaching completeness; but the data I have brought together are, nevertheless, perhaps sufficient to allow certain deductions to be made and certain lines of evolution to be laid down.

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Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © The Society of Antiquaries of London 1929

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References

page 29 note 1 Of previous attempts at surveying the iconographical material relating to St. Thomas Becket, perhaps the most complete is that contained in Notes and Queries, 10 ser, i, June 4, 1904, pp. 450–2,Google Scholar being a symposium in response to an inquiry by Mr. H. Snowden Ward.

page 30 note 1 Cf. The Gentleman's Magazine, Nov. 1848, vol. xxx, N.S., p. 494 Google Scholar (the reproduction accessibly repeated in Green, J. R., A Short History of the English People, illustrated edition, London, 1892, vol. i, p. 201); andGoogle Scholar Way, Albert in Archaeological Journal, vol. xxvi (1869), pp. 84–9,Google Scholar where even the antiquity of the seal with the altered inscription is perhaps somewhat needlessly questioned.

page 31 note 1 See Ludwig, G., in Jahrbuch der königlich preussischen Kunstsammlungen, vol. xxiv, 1903, supplement, p. 18.Google Scholar

page 31 note 2 I am indebted to Mr. A. W. Clapham, F.S.A., for pointing this out to me. In this connexion i t may be noted that the Worshipful Company of Brewers possesses an embroidered pall of the early sixteenth century, containing as part of its scheme of decoration two half-length figures of St. Thomas Becket.

page 32 note 1 Mr. Eric Maclagan has kindly drawn my attention to the fact that on the keystone of one of the arches of the south doorway of the church of Barfreston, Kent (reproduced in Prior, E. S. and Gardner, A., An Account of Medieval Figure Sculpture in England, Cambridge, 1912, fig. 175),Google Scholar there occurs a half-length figure of a bishop which has often been interpreted as representing St. Thomas Becket. As the doorway has been dated as early as about 1170, this identification, if correct, would of course be extremely interesting; but certainty on this point is scarcely attainable.

page 32 note 2 Compare on these pilgrims' signs e.g. Smith, C. Roach in Collectanea Antiqua, vol. i (1848), pp. 8191, vol. ii (1852), pp. 43-50Google Scholar; Hugo, T. in Archaeologia, vol. xxxviii (1860), pp. 128–34;CrossRefGoogle Scholar Cuming, H.Syer in Journal of the British Archaeological Association, vol. xxi (1865), pp. 192–6, xxiv (1868), pp. 219-30.Google Scholar The selection of examples illustrating the present paper has been drawn by Mr. H. C. Whaite, those in the Guildhall Museum being reproduced by kind permission of the Museum authorities. Of individual examples in other collections we may here notice an exceptionally finely modelled bust of St. Thomas between two angels swinging censers, found in the Steelyard, Thames Street, and now in the University Museum of Archaeology and Ethnography in Cambridge, and an ampulla in the York Museum (reproduced by Smith, C. Roach, op. cit., vol. ii, pl. XVII)Google Scholar.

page 34 note 1 Reproduced in Macklin, Herbert W., The Brasses of England, 1913, p. 135 Google Scholar.

page 34 note 2 Compare Stephenson, Mill, A List of Monumental Brasses in the British Isles, 1926, p. 284 Google Scholar and passim, noting additional examples in Hereford Cathedral, at Knebworth (doubtful), and Tattershall (two).

page 34 note 3 For full statistics see Nelson, Philip, Ancient Painted Glass in England, 1913 Google Scholar.

page 34 note 4 Reproduced in Catalogue of the Collection of London Antiquities in the Guildhall Museum, London, 1908, pl. LXXXVII, no. 13 Google Scholar.

page 35 note 1 Reproduced in the Journal of the British Archaeological Association, vol. x (1855), pl. 6,Google Scholar facing p. 74.

page 35 note 2 Compare Hope, St. John in Archaeologia, vol. lix (1904), p. 156 Google Scholar, pl. xxvn; and W. R. Lethaby, ibid., p. 170 sq.

page 36 note 1 Through the kindness of Mr. P. M. Johnston, F.S.A., I am enabled to reproduce this very interesting painting from a pen and ink drawing made about 1866 by an amateur artist, Miss MacGregor. There exists an erroneous statement (repeated in , Keyser's List of Buildings having Mural Decorations, 1883, p. 239)Google Scholar that the church of Stoke d'Abernon contains a painting of the Murder of Becket. This is the painting alluded to. As a curiosity we may here note the representation of St. Thomas as a Bishop with a Lion in a French Book of Hours, 1490-1500, in the Fitzwilliam Museum at Cambridge (see James, M. R., A Descriptive Catalogue of the Manuscripts in the Fitzwilliam Museum, 1895, 119–53)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

page 36 note 2 All the illuminations of this MS. have been published by Sir Warner, George (Queen Mary's Psalter, London, 1912)Google Scholar; the scenes from the life of St. Thomas Becket, which occur on fols. 288 v-98v of the manuscript, are given on pls. 282-94 of the volume of reproductions (cf. also pp. 50 sqq. ofthe letterpress). The series of incidents is as follows: (1) the Saracen princess arrives in London, jeered at by the crowd and recognized by Richard, the servant of Gilbert Becket; (2) baptism of the princess; (3) marriage of the princess and Gilbert Becket; (4) birth of St. Thomas Becket; (5) Henry II hands St. Thomas his letters of appointment as archbishop; (6) St. Thomas consecrated archbishop; (7) St. Thomas and Henry II disputing (the council at Northampton); (8) St. Thomas crossing the Channel; (9) Henry II pronounces sentence of exile on St. Thomas's relations; (10) St. Thomas's kindred crossing the Channel; (11) St. Thomas's kindred travelling on foot; (12) St. Thomas welcoming his kindred; (13) St. Thomas handing to Pope Alexander III his ring and cross; (14) St. Thomas at table with the pope; (15) St. Thomas welcomed by the abbot of Pontigny; (16) St. Thomas has a vision of Christ when praying at an altar; (17) the reconciliation of St. Thomas and Henry II; (18) St. Thomas recrosses the Channel to England; (19) St. Thomas at table, when a messenger announces the arrival of the four knights; (20) the martyrdom of St. Thomas; (21) the burial of St. Thomas; (22) St. Thomas brought kneeling before Christ in heaven.

page 36 note 3 The scenes depicted in these illuminations are as follows, in chronological sequence: (1) fol. I r. (A) Henry II expelling the friends and relations of St. Thomas; (2) (B) St. Thomas lying ill from too much starvation at Pontigny; (3) Iv. The parting of St. Thomas and Pope Alexander III; (4) II r. (A) St. Thomas pronouncing sentence of excommunication; (5) (B) St. Thomas addressing Henry II and Louis VII of France; (6) II v. The parting of St. Thomas and the two kings; (7) III r. (A) Roger of York crowning Henry, the king's son; (8) (B) The Coronation Banquet, Henry II serving his son; (9) IIIv. The news of the coronation reaches St. Thomas and Pope Alexander; (10) IV r. St. Thomas embarking for England at Wissant though warned by Milon, Count of Boulogne; (11) IV v. St. Thomas landing at Sandwich. The story of the priest who would only chant the Mass of the Virgin and was suspended by St. Thomas, but afterwards, through the intervention of the Virgin, reinstated, is illustrated in the Brailes Horae in Mr. Dyson Perrins's collection, in a Bible in the British Museum (1. D. i), and in Queen Mary's Psalter.

page 37 note 1 Compare on this window Harrison, F., The Painted Glass of York, 1927, pp. 52 and 206.Google Scholar For individual panels of stained glass in York Minster relating to St. Thomas Becket, see ibid., pp. 86 sq., 89, 209, 217.

page 38 note 1 On these, compare Knowles, John A. in The Bodleian Quarterly Record, vol. v, no. 52,Google Scholar 4th Quarter, 1926, pp. 100-4.

page 38 note 2 The sequence of subjects in the Sens window (the first in the north ambulatory, date c. 1190) is as follows (proceeding from below to the top, and from left to right): (1) reconciliation effected by King Louis VII of France between St. Thomas and Henry II; (2) St. Thomas landing in England; (3) entry of St. Thomas into Canterbury; (4) St. Thomas received by the clergy; (5) St. Thomas preaching; (6) St. Thomas saying mass; (7) St. Thomas receiving a letter from Henry II; (8) St. Thomas receiving the king's envoys; (9) St. Thomas consecrating a church; (10) St. Thomas confirming; (11) martyrdom of St. Thomas; (12) burial of St. Thomas; (13) Christ receiving the soul of St. Thomas. It will be noticed that the story begins with the departure of St. Thomas from Sens. It has been suggested (see Chartraire, E., La Cathedrale de Sens, Paris, 1928, p. 85,Google Scholar n. 1) that another window originally dealt with the earlier part of St. Thomas's life.

page 38 note 3 The Chartres window dates from about 1206; it was founded by the Corporation of Tanners, and is the fifth window in the Chapelle des Confesseurs on the right-hand side of the north transept. The sequence of episodes is as follows: (1) expulsion of St. Thomas; (2) expulsion of St. Thomas's kindred; (3) St. Thomas before a king; (4) St. Thomas on horseback, accompanied by another person, arriving at a city gate (there now follow three ‘signature’ panels relating to the Corporation of Tanners); (8) consecration of St. Thomas; (9) St. Thomas addressing Henry II, into whose ear a little devil speaks; (10) St. Thomas embarks, leaving England; (11) St. Thomas and Pope Alexander III conversing seated side by side; (12-13) St. Thomas leaves Pontigny; (14) St. Thomas converses with King Louis VII of France; (15) the pope, a king, and St. Thomas (a scene difficult of explanation on strictly historical data); (16) St. Thomas recrosses the channel and arrives at Canterbury; (17) Henry II talking to one of the bishops inimical to St. Thomas; (18) refusal of the young King Henry to receive St. Thomas; (19) St. Thomas conversing with the four knights; (20) St. Thomas entering the cathedral; (21) the four knights waiting for St. Thomas; (22-3) the martyrdom of St. Thomas; (24-5) scenes round the tomb of St. Thomas. In the interpretation of the scenes I have followed the Abbe Y. Delaporte in his volume of text to M. Houvet's photographs of the stained glass at Chartres.

page 38 note 4 The subjects occurring in this window, which is the second of the ambulatory (counting from the north transept) are: St. Thomas before King Henry II; the break between the archbishop and the king; martyrdom of St. Thomas. Cf. Masson, Andrè, L'Église Saint Ouende Rouen, 1927, p. 78 Google Scholar.

page 38 note 5 I have to thank M. Étienne Houvet of Chartres for permission to reproduce these illustrations and plate XVII, fig. 5 from his admirable photographs.

page 39 note 1 The suggestion referred to is the following statement in Mr. , Keyser's List of Buildings having Mural Decorations, 1883, p. 282,Google Scholar under ‘Chapel of the Hospital of St. Cross’: ‘S. transept…E. Wall: within an arched recess, the Crucifixion; and above, under a series of trefoil-headed arches, events in the life, and the martyrdom of St. Thomas a Becket. 13th cent.’

page 39 note 2 An account of these wall-paintings, which were uncovered in 1866, and now, as Mr. P. M. Johnston tells me, are very greatly faded, is given in the Associated Architectural Societies Reports and Papers, 1866, vol. viii, pt. ii, p. 249 Google Scholar sq., together with a woodcut, from which our reproduction is taken.

page 39 note 3 Compare in addition to the wall-paintings in the cathedral, the engraved back of a fourteenth-century reliquary in the Welfenschatz, containing three patron saints of the cathedral, namely, St. John the Baptist, St. Blaise, and St. Thomas Becket (reproduced in Neumann, W. A., Der Reliquienschatz des Hauses Braunschweig-Lüneburg, Vienna, 1891, p. 17)Google Scholar; a silver book-cover of 1326 decorated with bas-reliefs, also in the Welfenschatz, on which St. Thomas Becket is one of five saints surrounding the Virgin and Child (reproduced ibid., p. 241); two statues on the Egydienkirche; the altarpiece in the quire of the Minderenkirche (S. Ulrich); and the seal of the diocese of St. Blasien, of about 1338 (cf. Neumann, W. A., loc. cit.)Google Scholar.

page 40 note 1 In this connexion it may be noted that the early biographers of St. Thomas give an account of the hospitality extended to these exiles, thanks to the intercession of St. Thomas Becket, in various parts of Europe, but notably in Sicily; and indeed all over Italy there exist families claiming descent from St. Thomas Becket's relatives. The inscription on the tomb of a member of the Becchetti family, in the church of S. Tommaso Cantuariense at Verona, is worth quoting in the present context:

Tuo Hoc in Templo | Cantuariensis Antistes, | Thoma Sancte | Agnosce, Et Accipe, | Tuum Certum Genus | Io Baptistam Bechetum Fabrianum, | Honoratiss Hominem | Hieronymus Albertus F. Martyr | Moerentes Filii Moerentes | Fecere | Moerenti Patri Moerenti | Sibique, Suisque

See Cola, G. B., Vita di S. Tomaso Arcivescovo di Cantuaria e Martire, Lucca, 1696, p. 179 Google Scholar.

page 40 note 2 It may be noted that a series of thirteenth-century frescoes in the chapel known as the ‘grotta di San Tommaso’ in the cathedral of Anagni may have illustrated the life of St. Thomas Becket. At least this is the reference to them in paper, Signor Toesca's in Le Gallerie Nazionali Italiane, vol. v (1902), p. 182:Google Scholar ‘Sul muro di fronte sono affrescate alcune storie ora troppo deperite perche se ne possa facilmente riconoscere il soggetto: forse esse si riferiscono a San Tommaso, che nell'ultima scena appaiono soldati irrompenti con le spade sguainate in un tempio mentre la turba del popolo fa gesti d'orrori.’

page 41 note 1 Staphorst, Nicolaus, Historia Ecclesiae Hamburgensis, pt. i, vol. iv (Hamburg 1731), plate facing p. 64.Google Scholar

page 41 note 2 Lichtwark, Alfred, Meister Francke (Hamburg 1899).Google Scholar

page 42 note 1 I have to thank Dr. Buchner of Cologne for drawing my attention to these very notable pictures; they will be found reproduced in Suida, W., Die Landesbildergalerie… in Graz vienna, 1923 Google Scholar.

page 43 note 1 The question whether the life of St. Thomas Becket was represented in sequences of panels on English alabaster retables is one of considerable interest. Though no such retable has survived, there is of course every probability prima facie that retables of this type did exist; and there is also more definite evidence pointing in the same direction —namely the survival of individual panels portraying various scenes from the life of St. Thomas Becket. The martyrdom of St. Thomas Becket is thus represented on four alabaster panels which have come down to us —on this point further details are given below, p. 47. The council at Northampton is represented on an alabaster table in church, Elham, , Kent (see III. Cat. Exhib. English Medieval A lab. Work, Soc. Ant., 1913, no. 39, p1. XVIII; andGoogle Scholar Nelson, P., in Trans. Hist. Soc. Lanes, and Ches., 1917, p. 87 Google Scholar; see pl. VII). There are, moreover, in existence alabaster panels, such as the two in St. Louis-en-1'Isle in Paris, representing the birth and burial of an archbishop (see Nelson, P., loc. cit., p. 89 Google Scholar sq., and pl. ix), one in Dr. Hildburgh's collection, representing the consecration of an archbishop (see the Antiquaries Journal, vol. i, 1921, p. 227 sq.),Google Scholar and one in St. Mary's, Nottingham, representing the meeting of an archbishop and a pope ( Nelson, P. in Archaeological Journal, vol. lxxv, 1918, p. 332,Google Scholar pl. xxiv) all of which might represent scenes from the life of St. Thomas Becket.

page 44 note 1 Without entering in this connexion upon a discussion of the complex subject of the penance of Henry II in art, I may note in passing the interesting suggestion recently made by Mr. Campbell Dodgson (see The Burlington Magazine, vol. liii, Oct. 1928, p. 203)Google Scholar that Dürer's woodcut of 1510 ‘The Penitent’ (B. 119) may represent Henry II doing penance before the shrine of St. Thomas Becket. Unfortunately, however, there is nothing at all to indicate a kingly rank in Dürer's penitent.

page 44 note 2 On these pageants, see Wright, Thomas, ‘On the Municipal Archives ofthe City of Canterbury’, in Archaeologia, vol. xxxi, 1846, pp. 207–9Google Scholar (the date of the earliest pageant mentioned being 1504), and Stanley, Dean, Memorials, p. 223, n. 2Google Scholar.

page 45 note 1 See Birch, W. de G., Catalogue of Seals in the Department of MSS. in the British Museum, vol. i (1887), no. 1187.Google Scholar

page 45 note 2 , Birch, op. cit., no. 1196.Google Scholar

page 45 note 3 Ibid., no. 1201, misinterpreting the horses as ‘shields (?)’. The correct interpretation has been pointed out to me by Mr. H. S. Kingsford, to whom I am much indebted for information regarding seals bearing on the iconography of St. Thomas Becket.

page 45 note 4 Ibid., no. 1202.

page 45 note 5 Ibid., no. 1238.

page 45 note 6 Ibid., no. 1373. The friends of St. Thomas are here misinterpreted as knights.

page 46 note 1 I am indebted to Dr. Haakon Shetelig for supplying me with the photograph from which the reproduction is made, and for drawing my attention to the fact that this chasse and other examples of kindred character in Norway have lately been discussed by Dr. Kielland, Thor, Norsk Gullsmed-kunst i Middelalderen, Oslo, pp. 97115 Google Scholar.

page 46 note 2 Of pewter pilgrims' ampullae containing representations of the murder, five are reproduced in figs. 1, 2 (Guildhall Museum), 7-9 (British Museum). In the Musee de Cluny there is a notable example, from the Victor Gay Collection, showing the murder and another scene with St. Thomas seated, mitred, and addressing some clerics (reproduced in Gay, V., Glossaire archiologique, i, p. 30)Google Scholar.

page 46 note 3 Compare Tynell, Lars, Skånes medeltida dopfuntar (Stockholm, 1913), p. 33 Google Scholar sq. and pl. VIII, 1-2. See also Allen, Romilly in The Reliquary, 1906, pp. 126–31.CrossRefGoogle Scholar The photograph here reproduced has been most kindly placed at my disposal by Professor Otto Rydbeck of Lund.

page 46 note 4 For the excellent photograph from which this reproduction is taken I have to thank Mr. C. J. P. Cave, F.S.A. Mr. H. C. Whaite has drawn my attention to a bas-relief on the double piscinain the chapel of St. Thomas Becket in St. Davids cathedral, which may be a fragment of a representation of the murder.

page 47 note 1 Compare on these the Rev. Falkner, T. Felton in Norfolk Archaeology, vol. xvii (1910), pp. 277 sqqGoogle Scholar.

page 47 note 2 Reproduced in III. Cat. Exhib. Eng. Med. Alab. Work, Soc. Ant., 1913, pl. XXVIII Google Scholar.

page 47 note 3 Reproduced in Nelson, P., ‘Some Unusual English Alabaster Panels’, in Trans. Hist. Soc. Lanes, and Ches., 1917, pp. 80 sqq., pl. VII, 3Google Scholar.

page 47 note 4 Reproduced in Nelson, P., ‘Some Unpublished Alabaster Carvings’, in The Archaeological Journal, vol. lxxxii, pl. x, 1, facing p. 34 Google Scholar.

page 47 note 5 Koechlin, R., Les ivoires gothiques français, 1929, vol. ii, no. 529 ter.Google Scholar

page 47 note 6 Koechlin, R., u.s., no. 346 ter. Google Scholar

page 47 note 7 Koechlin, R., u.s., no. 346 bis.Google Scholar

page 47 note 8 I have to thank Miss M. H. Longhurst, F.S.A., for valuable information bearing on this category of work.

page 47 note 9 Reproduced in Farcy, L. de, La Broderie, pl. 27 (second numbering)Google Scholar.

page 47 note 10 Reproduced in Farcy, L. de, op. cit., pl. 43 Google Scholar.

page 47 note 11 Reproduced by Mrs. Christie, A. H., ‘A Reconstructed Embroidered Cope’, in The Burlington Magazine, vol. xlviii (Feb. 1926), p. 73 Google Scholar.

page 47 note 12 Already Dean Stanley ( Historical Memorials of Canterbury, 7th ed., 1875, P. 230 n.1)Google Scholar has drawn attention to the fact that here above the scene of the murder appears the hand of God between two crescents, and associates this circumstance with the presence of the famous gilded crescent in the roof of Canterbury Cathedral above the shrine of the saint.

page 47 note 13 See Braun, Joseph in Zeitschrift für Christliche Kunst, vol. xix (1906), pp. 291 Google Scholar sqq. (reproduction, p. 298).

page 47 note 14 See Chartraire, E., Inventaire du Trésor de I'Église primatiale de Sens (Sens, 1897), p. 49.Google Scholar In the Sens mitre, as in the one at Munich, the other side shows the martyrdom of St. Stephen.

page 48 note 1 Of other reliquaries connected with St. Thomas Becket we may here note that containing a relic of the Saint's arm and hence shaped as an arm, in silver, which used to be in the cathedral of Gravina in the south of Italy, near Bari (cf. Ughelli, P., Italia Sacra, 1717, vol. vii, col. 117).Google Scholar I have to thank Mr. A. Hamilton Smith, C.B., F.S.A., for this reference, as well as for a photograph of the comparatively recent reliquary which now replaces the old one at Gravina.

page 49 note 1 See Bulletin de la Société Nationale des Antiquaires de France, 1923, pp. 140–5, 151-3.Google Scholar

page 49 note 2 The following is a list of Limoges chasses known to me containing representations of the martyrdom of St. Thomas Becket in which three assailants appear: Guéret, Museum (reproduced , Rupin, L'æuvre de Limoges, pl. XXXVII)Google Scholar; Hereford Cathedral library; London, British Museum (front only); Lyons Museum (from the E. Odiot collection); Paris, late Schevitch collection (sale, Paris, 1910, no. 185), late Spitzer collection, no. 236; Trono church (Sweden); Utrecht, Archiepiscopal Museum, no. 907.

In the following examples two murderers occur: Berlin, Schlossmuseum; Clermont Museum; Escorial (reproduced in Revue de I'Art Chrétien, 1903, p. 299)Google Scholar; Évreux, Doil collection; Hamburg, Museum für Kunst und Gewerbe (from the Bernal, Napier, and Johannes Paul collections); Limoges, Madame Fayette; London, British Museum (1) châsse from Croyland Abbey, (2) châsse, purchased 1854; Victoria and Albert Museum, front of châsse (4041–1856); Munich, A. S. Drey; New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art; Paris, Louvre, Donation Corroyer; M. Martin le Roy (reproduced in vol. i, pl. xix of the illustrated catalogue of the Martin le Roy collection, no. 23); M. A. Daguerre, late Schevitch collection (sale 1910, no. 188), Tollin sale, 1897 (no. 51, reproduced p. 20 of the sale catalogue) (plaque only); Rome, Treasure of the Lateran (reproduced in Bollettino d'arte, vol. iii, 1909, p. 32)Google Scholar; Sigmaringen, late Hohenzollern collection; Vienna, Weinberger collection (sale, Oct. 24, 1929; formerly in the cathedral of Palencia); Zurich, A. Rütschi collection.

page 50 note 1 This chasse is here illustrated from the drawing in , Rupin, L'æuvre de Limoges, p. 397 Google Scholar.

page 51 note 1 For a reproduction of this see James, M. R., ‘The Drawings of Matthew Paris’, in the Walpole Society's fourteenth volume, 1926, pl. III Google Scholar.

page 51 note 2 Reproduced (in reconstruction) by Carter, J., Specimens of Ancient Sculpture and Painting now remaining in England, vol. i, 1786, pp. 56–7.Google Scholar Carter's original water-colour, and also one of the actual condition of the panel, are in the Victoria and Albert Museum.

page 51 note 3 It may be noted that the martyrdom of St. Thomas bears a considerable resemblance to the martyrdom of St. Magnus, as represented for instance in the fresco in the crypt in the cathedral of Anagni (reproduced by , Toesca, loc. cit., pl. VII, facing p. 160)Google Scholar; and to the death of St. Matthew as depicted e. g. by Niccolò di Pietro Gerini in the church of San Francesco at Prato (see Marie, R. van, The Dèvelopment of the Italian Schools of Painting, vol. iii, 1924, fig. 350)Google Scholar.

page 51 note 4 Cola, G. B. (op. cit., p. 145)Google Scholar notes the existence in the seventeenth century of a painting of the martyrdom in the church of St. Nicolas-aux-Fosses at Arras; but, as far as I can make out, the church in question no longer stands. The treasury of Arras Cathedral contains one of the bloodstained garments worn by St. Thomas Becket when he was slain.

page 52 note 1 The following is a survey of the iconographical material bearing on the martyrdom alone supplied by English wall-paintings known to the present writer: Bramley, Hants (see pi. XXII, fig. 3); Burgh St. Peter, Norfolk, subject uncertain, destroyed (Keyser, List); Burlingham St. Edmund, Norfolk (see pi. XXII, fig.2); Canterbury, Eastbridge Hospital(Keyser, List); Easton, Norfolk (Keyser, List); Eaton, Norfolk (Keyser, List, reproduced in Norfolk Archaeology, vi, plate facing p. 165); Faversham, Kent (Keyser, List); Hemblington, Norfolk, All Saints (communication from Miss Bardswell); Hingham. Norfolk (Keyser, List), concealed; Lydiard Tregoze, Wilts. ( Ponting, C. E. in The Wiltshire Archaeological and Natural History Magazine, vol. xxvii, 1911-1912, p. 441 Google Scholar; now very much faded; the mitre of St. Thomas seen on the floor as at Burlingham and Eaton); Mentmore, Bucks. (Keyser, List), concealed; Merstham, Surrey (Keyser, List), subject uncertain, destroyed; Newington, South Oxon. ( , Keyser, Arch. Journ., 1901, p. 54),Google Scholar subject uncertain; Pickering, Yorks., St. Peter's (see pl. XXII, fig. 4); Preston, Sussex (Keyser, List), reproduced Archaeologia, xxiii, pl. xxvi, destroyed; North Stoke, Oxon. (reproduced from a drawing by Prof. Tristram, E. W. in Kendal, Mural Paintings, pl. xiv)Google Scholar; Stone, Kent (thirteenth cent.) tolerably well preserved, drawing by Prof. Tristram at the church and V. and A. Museum; Stoneleigh, Warwick (Keyser, List); Stratford-on-Avon, Chapel of the Trinity, see below, n. 3, concealed; Sulhampstead Abbots, Berks. ( , Keyser, Arch. Journ., 1896, p. 176)Google Scholar; Wellow, Hants. (Keyser, ibid., p. 172); Whaddon, Bucks. (Keyser, List); Winchester, St. John (Keyser, List; reproduced Journal Brit. Arch. Ass., x, pl. 5 Google Scholar; the only case known of a wall-painting showing the severed crown of St. Thomas's head falling to the ground); Winchester, Magdalen Hospital Chapel (Keyser, List), subject uncertain; Wootton Bassett, Wilts. (Keyser, List), destroyed; Yarmouth, Great, Norfolk, St. Nicholas (Keyser, List), subject uncertain.

page 52 note 2 Both this wall-painting and the one at Bramley are reproduced from water-colours kindly made for me by Mr. H. C. Whaite. Closely allied in type to the S. Burlingham painting is the one at Eaton (see above, n. 1).

page 52 note 3 Reproduced in A Series of Antient…Paintings…on the Walls of the Chapel of the Trinity at Stratford-on-Avon, 1836, pl. xiv Google Scholar.

page 53 note 1 See his article ‘Le martyre dans 1'art de la Contre-Reforme’ in Revue de Paris, Feb. 15, 1929, p. 722.Google Scholar Mr. Francis Shutt, of the Venerable English College, Rome, to whom I am indebted for photographs of this picture and the one by Durante Alberti, also kindly informs me that there exist records of a picture of St. Thomas by George Freman (?) painted in 1654, and of another painted for the church of the College in 1675 by Henry Corner (?)—English names evidently, though nothing is known about these artists, who were probably amateurs.

page 54 note 1 An inquirer into a subject of iconography as complicated as that which concerns St. Thomas Becket inevitably places himself under a debt of gratitude in many quarters. In addition to the numerous kind helpers already mentioned, I should here also like to thank M. J. J. Marquet de Vasselot, Hon. F.S.A.; M. Ratouis de Limay; Dr. Philip Nelson, F.S.A.; Dr. W. L. Hildburgh, F.S.A.; Mr. S. C. Cockerell; Mr. Louis C. G. Clarke, F.S.A.; Professor Andreas Lindblom; Dr. Otto von Falke; Dr. Max Sauerlandt; Mr. J. A. Knowles, F.S.A.; Mr. A. F. Kendrick; Mr. Frank Simpson, F.S.A.; Professor A. Goldschmidt; Dr. G. Gronau; Herr Ludwig Stern; Professor Georg Pauli; Mr. H. W. Hull; Dr. Giuseppe Fiocco; Mr. Victor Perowne, F.S.A.; Mr. W. H. Wood-ward; and Dr. H. Bodmer.