Un cheval patient attend que Sainte-Hélène s'assoit dans sa selle et prenne ses rênes : Détail de la capitale romane sculptée fin 1100s dans le portail nord de la Basilique Saint juste à Valcabrère, Occitanie, France, représentant l'impératrice romaine Helena, mère de l'empereur chrétien Constantine I, se lançant dans son pèlerinage à Jérusalem pour trouver la vraie Croix.
2832 x 2832 px | 24 x 24 cm | 9,4 x 9,4 inches | 300dpi
Date de la prise de vue:
23 décembre 2007
Lieu:
Valcabrère, Occitanie, France.
Informations supplémentaires:
Cette image peut avoir des imperfections car il s’agit d’une image historique ou de reportage.
Valcabrère, Occitanie, France: a horse waits for a Roman Empress to take its reins, as a pointing angel encourages Saint Helena to set out on a mounted pilgrimage to Jerusalem in search of relics of the Crucifixion, in this detail of a Romanesque capital sculpted in the late-1100s. The capital, in the north portal of the French Pyrenean Basilique Saint-Just-de-Valcabrère (Basilica of St Just), is carved on its other face with an image of Helena, mother of first Christian Roman Emperor Constantine the Great, holding a pilgrim’s staff as a bearded servant encourages her to mount the horse. Medieval sculptors included the saint, also known as Helena of Constantinople, amongst statues of early Christian martyrs in the portal because the basilica at Valcabrère is one of the French churches to retain a fragment of the True Cross she brought back from Jerusalem. The austere pillar statue of St Helena below the capital portrays her holding a crucifix, a further reference to her discovery of the cross on which Jesus Christ died. The basilica, a superb example of Romanesque architecture, stands apart from the village of Valcabrère in the Garonne Valley, below and about 1 km east of the village of Saint-Bertrand-de-Comminges with its Romanesque and Gothic former cathedral. The basilica was built on the burial ground of the ancient Roman settlement of Lugdunum Convenarum, with many Gallo-Roman architectural fragments re-used in its construction. D1145.B3673
