The smiling Christ Child offers a basket of roses and apples to golden-haired early Christian virgin martyr, Saint Dorothy of Caesarea: late-1300s or early-1400s fresco in medieval cloister beside the Cathedral of Santa Maria Assunta at Bressanone-Brixen, South Tyrol, Trentino-Alto Adige, Italy.
Bressanone-Brixen, South Tyrol, Trentino-Alto Adige, Italy: the Christ Child offers a basket of roses and apples to the golden-haired early Christian virgin martyr Saint Dorothy of Caesarea, in this touching late 14th or early 15th century fresco in the medieval cloister of the Cathedral of Santa Maria Assunta. According to legend, Saint Dorothy, Dorothea or Santa Dorotea was executed at Caesarea Mazaca in Cappadocia, (modern Kayseri, Turkey), in 311 AD, during the last and most severe persecution of Christians by the Romans. As she went to her death, Dorothy was taunted by a pagan scribe named Theophilus to bring him roses and apples from the “Paradise” she believed she would enter. A child then appeared before her bearing a basket of three roses and three apples and Dorothy asked him to take it to Theophilus. When the child did so, Theophilus converted to Christianity. According to one version of the story, Theophilus paid for his conversion with his life. In both Western and Eastern Orthodox religious art, the child was sometimes shown with a cruciform halo, as here, to identify him as Jesus Christ. St. Dorothy was usually depicted with blonde hair and, as with other virgin saints, wearing a dress with a scoop neckline. In the Western Church, Dorothy was venerated from the 7th century AD. The earliest frescoes in the cloister were painted in Late Gothic style around 1390 by a group of artists active throughout this mainly German-speaking region. Later Renaissance frescoes in the cloister are judged to be either solo work by 15th century painter and sculptor Lienhart Scherhauff (also known as Leonhard von Brixen or Leonardo da Bressanone), or are by his studio, which produced fresco cycles for churches throughout South and East Tyrol.
Size: 3791px × 2708px
Location: Cathedral of Santa Maria Assunta, Bressanone-Brixen, South Tyrol, Trentino-Alto Adige, Italy
Photo credit: © Terence Kerr / Alamy / Afripics
License: Royalty Free
Model Released: No
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