At St. Maurice D'agaune

RECONSIDERING THE CLOISONNÉ MOUNTS ON THE ‘VASE OF SAINT MARTIN’ AT ST. MAURICE D’AGAUNE

D. NOËL ADAMS

The ancient Abbey at St. Maurice d’Agaune in Switzerland holds three key treasures representing the art of early Medieval inlaying – a sardonyx ewer with garnet cloisonné mounts (Fig. 1), a Byzantine enamelled ewer and an eighth-century reliquary decorated with overall garnet cloisonné. The enamelled gold ewer, which has resisted many attempts at dating and interpretation, has been one focus of Csanád Balint’s multi-faceted research.1 I hope that this re-examination of the conventional dating of the cloisonné mounts on its companion piece, the sardonyx ewer known as the ‘Vase of Saint Martin’, will prove convincing and serve as a small tribute to his wide-ranging and inspiring mind. In contrast to the enameled gold ewer, the remarkable gold and cloisonné mounts on the sardonyx ewer, have never been the subject of a study in their own right. This paper reconsiders several key technical and stylis- tic features and challenges the seventh-century date currently accepted in the literature and suggests that the mounts fit more closely with fifth- and early sixth-century goldworking and cloisonné technology. The following visual observations may someday be reinforced or amended by scientific analysis.2

BACKGROUND AND LITERATURE

The royal abbey in the village of St. Maurice d’Agaune in the Vallais, east of Geneva, is situated in a strategic and impregnable position overlooking the Rhône3 and is the oldest functioning monastery in Europe. Excavations have revealed that the first cloister in the form of a group of small rooms was established in the fourth century. A primitive church with a single nave was added to these in the fifth century.4 The first substantial church with a choir and narthex, built in the early sixth century, was dedicated as a monastic foundation by the

1 CS. BÁLINT: A note on the research on the ewer with enamel and 2001. I am very grateful to him for this rare opportunity, for his plaques of St. Maurice d’Agaune. ActaArchHung 57 (2006) 281– kind reception and for providing me with colour photographs of the 289. The literature summarized in D. THURRE: L’aiguière “de Char- ewer. lemagne” au trésor de Saint-Maurice: de l’art à l’idée de pouvoir, 3 The village took its name in the late fourth century from the dossier critique. Vallesia 50 (1995) 197–319. Celtic Acaunum or Agaunum meaning the high rock (AUBERT 1872, 2 This study would not have been possible without the assistance 5, note 1). of G. Stucky, Chancelier abbatial at St. Maurice, who kindly allowed 4 MOOSBRUGGER-LEU 1971, B, 70, Abb. 128. me to examine and photograph the ewer on two occasions in 1999

Burgundian prince Sigismund in AD 515.5 A remarkable practice of ceaseless liturgy or psalmody, later known as the laus perennis, was established at this time; this was later adopted as the model for royal monastic foundations under the Frankish rulers.6 The importance of the abbey is signaled by its treasures, which include the sardonyx ewer, the ‘Vase of Saint Martin’, fitted with a high stand and collar mounts fashioned of precious gems and garnet cloisonné (Fig. 1.1–3).7 The vessel is recorded in the first inventory of the treasures of the monastery, taken when Jean Milès was the abbot of the monastery from 1550–72, as: “Alabastrum ab angelo sancto Martino allatum in Viroleto”.8 This description refers to the visit of St. Martin of Tours (AD 316/17–97) in the late fourth century to a field where members of a “Theban” legion, led by a soldier named Maurice, were supposedly executed by the emperor Dio- cletian (AD 284–305) for refusing to obey his command to kill Christians.9 When Saint Martin dug a piece of earth from the ground as an offering, a fountain of the martyrs’ blood miraculously began to gush forth; he cap- tured the blood in two vessels which he had with him, but as the blood continued to flow, he prayed to God to send him another vase. An angel then appeared from the sky, bringing him another, of inestimable worth, made of black agate carved with figures; he filled it too with precious blood and the angel commanded him to offer it to the chapel where the other relics of Saint Maurice and his companion were kept.10 Whether an actual historical event of the early fourth century, or, more probably, a political fiction of the late fourth, the site of the martyrdom on the plateau of Vèrolliez (Viroleto) some two kilometers from the abbey was already a place of pilgrimage by the late fifth century.11 Numerous interpretations of the scenes carved in cameo around the sardonyx vessel have been suggested,12 these remain uncertain, but it is clear that in form and style it is a work of the early Imperial period.13 Although referred to as a vase, the vessel is a handled ewer14 and it seems likely that in its first centuries in the abbey it func- tioned as a liturgical chalice. At a later date, probably in the 12th century, the vessel was fitted with a parchment cap and transformed into a reliquary.15 In 1923 this was found to contain fragments of early medieval silks.16 The jewelled mounts were of great interest to early students of medieval goldsmithing who correctly placed them in the context of Merovingian gold cloisonné, whose technology and chronology they were begin-

5 Historiae Francorum III, 5. THEURILLAT 1953, 30–84. Sigis- 12 See THURRE 1996, 51 for a review of the extensive literature mund had converted from arianism to catholicism sometime between which includes over fifteen different interpretations of the scenes on AD 501–7, under the tutelage of Avitus, Bishop of Vienne (c. 494– the ewer. Some of the primary ones include Clytemnestra carrying an 523), who preached the dedication sermon at St. Maurice offering to the tomb of Agamennon (Fürtwangler); a funeral scene of (SHANZER–WOOD 2002, 377–381). Sigismund later became notori- Achilles at Troy (Schazmann); Phedre announcing the death of ous as a parricide after arranging the murder of his son by his first Hippolyte (Picard); a scene from Virgil depicting libations at the wife, the daughter of Theodoric the Great; he sought refuge and did tomb of Marcellus (Simon); see also SCHWARZ 1991, 17–31. penance at his monastery at St. Maurice (Historiae Francorum III, 13 SIMON 1957, 64,74, Tafn. 32–34, dated it to the end of the third 6). century BC; more recent commentators agree on an imperial Roman 6 The first system of perpetual liturgy throughout the day and date (M.-L. VOLLENWEIDER: Die Steinschneidekunst und ihre Künst- night was established in the early fifth century in Constantinople and ler in spätrepublikanischer und augusteischer Zeit. Baden-Baden, practiced by an order of monks known as the Acoimetoi (“sleepless 1966, 55; H.-P. BÜHLER: Antike Gefäße aus Edelsteinen. Mainz ones”); this perhaps influenced the endless psalmody invented for 1973, 51–3, No. 35; THEURILLAT 1982, 5; SCHWARZ 1991). the monastery at St. Maurice (THEURILLAT 1954, 104–6; WOOD 14 The shape is characteristic of metal ewers from the first century 1994, 183; ROSENWEIN 2000; SHANZER–WOOD 2002, 378 and 380, BC and first century AD (cf. D. STRONG: Greek and Roman Gold note 1). The common term ‘laus perennis’ is a later Renaissance and Silver Plate. London 1966, 140–41, Fig. 28a). coinage (ROSENWIEN 2000, 42). 15 THURRE 1995, 209–10, fig. 5; the vessel is shown with the cap 7 AUBERT 1872, 151–7, 238–40. in BLAVIGNAC (1853, pl. XIV), who claims that from the time of 8 AUBERT 1872, 83, 239. Bérodi the vase had been hermetically sealed. 9 THURRE 1992, 18–20. 16 Only one of these, a 6th–7th century fragment, can be assigned 10 BLAVGINAC 1853, 151–2, after the 1666 inventory by Bérodi. with certainty to the sardonyx ewer (SCHMEDDING 1978, 152, 158, 11 The first reference to the “Passio Acaunensium martyrum” no. 126); many other fragments were retrieved in 1948 but it is not appears in a letter composed by Eucherius, bishop of Lyons c. 434– entirely clear in which of three objects (the vase, the gold ewer and 50 (WOOD 1994, with older literature). Hymns and poems to the the Teuderigis reliquary) they were found. Some of these can be martyrdom of Maurice are known from the sixth century onwards; dated to the 5th–6th centuries, making them, together with other the topic is covered at length from different perspectives in fragments from Sion and Chur, some of the earliest textiles pre- WERMELINGER et. al. 2005. See also THURRE 1992, 42–47 on the served in context in Europe. spread of the cult of Maurice and the Theban legion in Europe.

Acta Archaeologica Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae 59, 2008