Torba nunnery
Type:
Chapels,
Wall paintings
Date:
ca. 800
Location or Findspot (Modern-Day Country):
Italy
Description:
Around 800, a room inside a fifth- or sixth-century tower was plastered and painted to serve a new function for the nuns of Torba, a Benedictine convent founded in the eighth century and dedicated to the Virgin Mary. The room below contains funerary arcosolia, so this upper room likely served as a chapel, with frescoes that emphasize intercession for the souls of the dead. The defensive tower became a protective space for Torba's nuns. Its paintings are among the best preserved from this period in western Europe.
The east wall depicts Christ enthroned between angels, Mary, and John the Baptist—and expanded Deesis—with apostles on the right. Below the figures is a painted dado decorated with multiple fictive textiles painted with vegetal motifs and crosses or fake marble panels. The north wall is poorly preserved, but a lion holding a jeweled book outside a mandorla suggests that there was a scene of the Maiestas Domini here. This image was popular in Carolingian (and later) book arts.
On the south (entrance) wall, Mary holds the Christ child at the head of a line of saints. She is shown receiving a scroll from a female layperson, perhaps to evoke the monastery's foundation and dedication. The woman's head has a frame, often called a square halo, to show that it is a portrait.
On the west wall, a central window separates male and female saints on the left and right, respectively. Below the male saints are fictive opus sectile panels; below the female saints, and in perfect alignment with them, are eight nuns, who may represent the actual Torba community at the turn of the ninth century. The real nuns may have stood before the painted ones during the liturgy.
The east wall depicts Christ enthroned between angels, Mary, and John the Baptist—and expanded Deesis—with apostles on the right. Below the figures is a painted dado decorated with multiple fictive textiles painted with vegetal motifs and crosses or fake marble panels. The north wall is poorly preserved, but a lion holding a jeweled book outside a mandorla suggests that there was a scene of the Maiestas Domini here. This image was popular in Carolingian (and later) book arts.
On the south (entrance) wall, Mary holds the Christ child at the head of a line of saints. She is shown receiving a scroll from a female layperson, perhaps to evoke the monastery's foundation and dedication. The woman's head has a frame, often called a square halo, to show that it is a portrait.
On the west wall, a central window separates male and female saints on the left and right, respectively. Below the male saints are fictive opus sectile panels; below the female saints, and in perfect alignment with them, are eight nuns, who may represent the actual Torba community at the turn of the ninth century. The real nuns may have stood before the painted ones during the liturgy.
Relevant Textbook Chapter(s):
5
Image Credits:
Linda Safran
