ENGLISH, EARLY 14TH CENTURY | ST. JOHN THE EVANGELIST

Sotheby's London, 4 July 1991, lot 25;

Replica Shoes 's London, 12 December 2003, lot 127

This finely cast, elegant figure of St. John would originally have flanked the Crucifixion as part of a small devotional shrine or would have been attached to a processional cross. Only two other 14th century examples are recorded, one excavated on the Isle of Sheppy in Kent in 1991, now in the British Museum (inv.no.1991, 5-5,1). Another English figure with similar drapery, although less detailed, was excavated at Marks Tey near Colchester, Essex in 2001 and is now at the Castle Museum, Colchester. For an earlier French stylistic comparison see the Northeast French standing angel in the Metropolitan Museum, New York, dating to circa 1275 (inv.no.1991.309), (Mirror of the Medieval World, exhibition catalogue, Metropolitan Museum, New York, March-July 1999, no. 129, p. 108).