The Beheading of St John the Baptist

Yesterday was the feast, depending on your choice of nomenclature of the Beheading, or of the Decollation, or of the Passion of St John the Baptist.

Over the years I have written quite frequently on his two feast days, of his birth and of his death about St John, devotion to him, depictions of him, and churches dedicated to him.

This time I am returning to a topic I wrote about in 2015, that of carved alabaster devotional images, especially for domestic settings, in An English Alabaster of the Head of St John the Baptist

An article from Substack discusses and illustrates examples of these carvings in Art for the Liturgical Year at Saint John the Baptist and the Forgotten Alabaster of Medieval England

Many examples of these face images of St John are in the V&A, and their website gives access to more photographs.

Other good examples dated to about 1450 and now in Aberdeen and in the Burrell collection can be seen at Simon Knott (@SimoninSuffolk)

The number which survive out of what must have been a huge number in late medieval England would suggest that this was an image as popular then as the Sacred Heart, Our Lady of Lourdes or of Fatima or the Divine Mercy in modern Catholic homes.

This prompts me to comment, as I have before along with other historians and theologians, about the decline in devotion to St John the Baptist in modern times.

The martyrdom itself is also depicted in alabaster panels, which were perhaps intended for a reredos.

A good example of this type survives in the V&A and the detailed catalogue entry with illustrations and discussion of the original paintwork can be seen at The Beheading of St John the Baptist | Unknown | V&A Explore The Collections

I have shared this relatively undamaged carving before and am doing so again. It is dated to the 1480s.

 

The martyrdom of St John the Baptist

Image:collections.vam.ac.uk

St John the Baptist pray for us