Finding:

1. close

   Golden Madonna of Essen

   The Golden Madonna of Essen is a sculpture with a wooden core covered all over with sheets of thin gold leaf of the Virgin Mary and the infant Jesus. It is part of the treasury of Essen Cathedral, formerly the church of Essen Abbey, in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany, and kept on display at the cathedral.
2. close

   Roman Catholic Marian art

   Golden Madonna of Essen, Essen, Germany
3. close

   Essen

   She reigned for over 40 years, and endowed the abbey's treasury with invaluable objects such as the oldest preserved seven branched candelabrum, and the Golden Madonna of Essen, the oldest known sculpture of the Virgin Mary in the world.
4. close

   Madonna (art)

   Golden Madonna of Essen, c. 980
5. close

   Essen Abbey

   When in 1958 the Bishopric of Essen was created the former collegiate church became Essen Cathedral, to which the treasury (Essener Domschatz), once the abbey's, and including the famous Golden Madonna of Essen, also passed.
6. close

   Art in Roman Catholicism

   The Golden Madonna of Essen and a few smaller reliquary figures are now all that remain of this spectacular tradition, completely outside Byzantine norms.
7. close

   Metal leaf

   Gold leaf has traditionally been most popular and most common in its use as gilding material for the decoration of art including statues like the Chryselephantine sculpture of Ancient Greece or the 10th century Golden Madonna of Essen.
8. close

   Anglo-Saxon art

   In the final century of the period a number of large figures in precious metal are recorded; presumably these were made of thin sheets over a wooden core like the Golden Madonna of Essen, the largest example of this type of Early Medieval figure to survive from anywhere in Europe.
9. close

   Gero Cross

   Earlier large figures of Christ on the Cross appear to have been in metal, or metal on a wooden core; there was said to be one in Charlemagne's Palatine Chapel in Aachen, and the Golden Madonna of Essen is an example of this type.
10. close

    Spearhafoc

    One of the other mentions says that a different figure was made of thin gold and silver sheets supported by a wooden core, presumably in a similar fashion to the Golden Madonna of Essen, and some other Continental survivals.

Explore the following pages on Powerset:

• Golden Madonna of Essen,
• Roman Catholic Marian art,
• Essen,
• Madonna (art),
• Essen Abbey,
• Art in Roman Catholicism,
• Metal leaf,
• Anglo-Saxon art,
• Gero Cross,
• Spearhafoc