According to tradition, the monastery of Moutiers-Saint-Jean was founded by the first Christian kings of France, Clovis and his son Clothar. They are almost certainly the donors standing at either side, presenting their charters. The small seated figures on either side represent ancestors of the Virgin and Christ, including Moses. The tympanum above shows the Coronation of the Virgin in heaven, one of the most popular subjects in thirteenth-century French art. Despite damage sustained during tumultuous times, the naturalistic rendering of the anatomy, the plant motifs, and the delicate details throughout make this doorway an exemplary testament of the Gothic style.
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acc. nos. 32.147; 40.51.1; 40.51.2
Clovis
Clothar
Artwork Details
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Title:Doorway from Moutiers-Saint-Jean
Date:ca. 1250
Geography:Made in Burgundy, France
Culture:French
Medium:White oolitic limestone with traces of paint
Dimensions:15 ft. 5 in. × 12 ft. 7 in. × 55 in. (469.9 × 383.5 × 139.7 cm) Opening: 110 x 66 in. (379.4 x 167.6 cm)
Classification:Sculpture-Architectural-Stone
Credit Line:The Cloisters Collection, 1932
Accession Number:32.147
From the abbey of Moutiers-Saint-Jean, near Dijon, France; Mlle. Cambillarc, Moutiers-St.-Jean, France ; [ Jean Peslier, Vézelay, France] ; [ Brummer Gallery, Paris and New York (sold 1932)]
De Lanneau, Eugène. "L'Abbaye de Moutier-Saint-Jean." Bulletin de la Société des Sciences Historiques et Naturelles de Semur (Côte-d'Or) 6-7 (1869-1870). p. 66.
Germain, Michel. Monasticon Gallicanum: Collection de 168 planches de vues topographiques représentant les monastères de l'ordre de Saint-Benoît - Congrégation de Saint-Maur, edited by Achille Peigné-Delacourt. Paris, 1871. no. 41, p. 8, pl. 41.
Chabeuf, Henri. "Porte de l'église abbatiale de Moutier-Saint-Jean (Côte d'Or)." Revue de l'Art Chrétien, 5th ser., 42, no. 10 (1899). pp. 6–10.
"Compte rendu des travaux de la Commission Départementale des Antiquités de la Côte d'Or du 15 novembre 1900 au 15 juillet 1901." Mémoires de la Commission des Antiquités de la Côte d'Or 14 (1901). p. xxiv.
Enlart, Camille. "L'Architecture gothique du XIIIe siècle." In Histoire de l'art depuis les premiers temps chrétiens jusqu'à nos jours: Volume 2, Formation, expansion et évolution de l'art gothique. Part 1, edited by André Michel. Paris: Armand Colin et Cie., 1906. p. 109.
Porter, Arthur Kingsley. "Romanesque Capitals." Notes – Fogg Art Museum 1, no. 2 (June 1922). p. 23.
Enlart, Camille. Manuel d'archéologie francaise, depuis les temps merovingiens jusqu'à la Renaissance: Volume II, Période française, dite gothique, style flamboyant, Renaissance. Paris: Editions Auguste Picard, 1929. p. 583, n.1.
David, Henri. De Sluter à Sambin: Essai critique sur la sculpture et le décor monumental en Bourgogne au XVe et au XVIe siècles; Volume 1, La fin du moyen âge. Études d'art et d'archéologie. Paris: Editions Ernest Leroux, 1933. p. 3.
Frankfurter, Alfred M. "The Opening of The Cloisters." Art News 36, no. 7 (May 1938). p. 9.
Rorimer, James J., and Margaret B. Freeman. The Cloisters: The Building and the Collection of Mediaeval Art, in Fort Tryon Park. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1938. pp. 11–14, fig. 7.
Rorimer, James J. "New Acquisitions for the Cloisters." The Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin, n.s., 33, no.5, part 2 (May 1938). pp. 6–8, fig. 4.
Siple, Ella S. "Medieval Art at the New Cloisters and Elsewhere." The Burlington Magazine 73, no. 425 (August 1938). p. 88.
Vittenet, Alfred. L'abbaye de Moutier-Saint-Jean (Côte d'Or): Essai historique. Mâcon: Imprimerie Protat Frères, 1938. pp. 104–5.
Rorimer, James J. "XIII Century Statues of Kings Clovis and Clothar at the Cloisters." The Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin 35, no. 6 (June 1940). p. 122.
Rorimer, James J. "It Was Just Yesterday." In Studies in the History of Art Dedicated to William E. Suida on His Eightieth Birthday, edited by Samuel H. Kress Foundation. London: Phaidon Press, 1959. p. 10, fig. 3, 4.
Quarré, Pierre. "Les sculptures des portails et de la façade de l'Église Notre-Dame de Dijon." Mémoires de la Commission des Antiquités du Département de la Côte-d'Or, n.s., 26 (1963-1969). p. 316.
Rorimer, James J. The Cloisters: The Building and the Collection of Medieval Art in Fort Tryon Park. 3rd revised ed. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1963. pp. 12, 16–19, fig. 1.
Quarré, Pierre. "Le portail de Saint-Thibault et la sculpture bourguignonne du XIIIe siècle." Bulletin Monumental 123, no. 3 (1965). pp. 185, 189–90, fig. 10.
Sauerländer, Willibald. Von Sens bis Strassburg: Ein Beitrag zur kunstgeschichtlichen Stellung der Strassburger Querhausskulpturen. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter & Co., 1966. p. 122, n. 206.
Stoddard, Whitney S. Monastery and Cathedral in France: Medieval Architecture, Sculpture, Stained Glass, Manuscripts, the Art of the Church Treasuries. Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press, 1966. pp. 264–66, fig. 326.
Rorimer, James J. Medieval Monuments at The Cloisters: As They Were and As They Are, edited by Katherine Serrell Rorimer. Revised ed. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1972. pp. 28–31, fig. 22–23.
Schmidt, Gerhard. "Review of Gotische Skulptur in Frankreich 1140-1270 by Willibald Sauerländer." Zeitschrift für Kunstgeschichte 35, no. 1/2 (1972). p. 141, fig. 21, 22.
Verdier, Philippe, Peter Brieger, and Marie Farquhar Montpetit, ed. Art and the Courts: France and England from 1259-1328. Vol. 1. Ottowa: National Gallery of Canada, 1972. p. 158.
Forsyth, William Holmes. "A Gothic Doorway from Moutiers-Saint-Jean." Metropolitan Museum Journal 13 (1978). pp. 33–74, fig. 1,3–6,12,23–28.
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Verdier, Philippe. Le Couronnement de la Vierge: Les Origines et les Premiers Développements d'un Thème Iconographique. Paris: Librairie philosophique J. Vrin, 1980. pp. 22, 114, 173–76, pl. 31–32.
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Shepard, Mary B. Europe in the Middle Ages, edited by Charles T. Little, and Timothy B. Husband. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1987. pp. 13, 90–91, pl. 81.
Little, Charles T. "From Cluny to Moutiers-Saint-Jean: The Origin of a Limestone Fragment of an Angel at The Cloisters." Gesta 27, nos. 1 and 2 (1988). p. 24.
Young, Bonnie. A Walk Through The Cloisters. 5th ed. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1988. pp. 7–10.
Stratford, Neil. "La sculpture médiévale de Moutiers-Saint-Jean." Congrès Archéologique de France 144 (1989). pp. 180–85, fig. 41–43, 46.
Stratford, Neil. "The Moutiers-Saint-Jean Portal in The Cloisters." In The Cloisters: Studies in Honor of the Fiftieth Anniversary, edited by Elizabeth C. Parker. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1992. pp. 260–81, fig. 1.
Howard, Kathleen, ed. The Metropolitan Museum of Art Guide. 2nd ed. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1994. no. 17, p. 400.
Meredith, Jill. "Romancing the Stone: Resolving some Provenance Mysteries of the Brummer Collection at Duke University." Gesta 33, no. 1 (1994). pp. 42–3, fig. 11.
Sandron, Dany. "Premiers résultats d'une programme franco-américaine d'analyses pétrographiques." Bulletin Monumental 153, no. 2 (1995). p. 196.
Williamson, Paul. Gothic Sculpture 1140-1300. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1995. p. 280, n. 77.
Barnet, Peter, and Nancy Y. Wu. The Cloisters: Medieval Art and Architecture. New York and New Haven: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2005. no. 37, pp. 70, 195.
Rauwel, Alain. "La fausse charte de Clovis pour Moutiers-Saint-Jean." Bulletin de la Société des sciences historiques et naturelles de Semur 113 (2005). p. 69, ill. p. 50.
Little, Charles T., ed. Set in Stone: The Face in Medieval Sculpture. New York, New Haven, and London: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2006. pp. 66–67, fig. 52.
Borlée, Denise. La sculpture figurée du XIIIe siècle en Bourgogne. Sciences de l'histoire. Strasbourg: Presses Universitaires de Strasbourg, 2011. pp. 160–68, fig. 131–135.
Barnet, Peter, and Nancy Y. Wu. The Cloisters: Medieval Art and Architecture. 75th Anniversary ed. New York and New Haven: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2012. pp. 68–69.
Husband, Timothy B. "Creating the Cloisters." The Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin, n.s., 70, no. 4 (Spring 2013). pp. 35–36, fig. 72.
Brennan, Christine E. "The Brummer Gallery and the Business of Art." Journal of the History of Collections 27, no. 3 (November 2015). p. 463.
Brennan, Christine, Christel Hollevoet-Force, and Yaëlle Biro, ed. The Brummer Galleries, Paris and New York: Defining Taste from Antiquities to the Avant-Garde. Boston: Brill, 2023. fig. 7.1, p. 325–327, 362.
Nancy Wu and Carol Symes discuss their preparations for a new production of The Play of Adam—the oldest medieval drama written in any language—at The Met Cloisters on December 17 and 18.
Although theatrical plays had been presented at the original Cloisters museum at 699 Fort Washington Avenue until its closing in February 1936, it was not until the performance of The Miracle of Theophilus at The Cloisters' current home in January 1942 that a medieval drama was produced for the first time. Envisioned and organized by the curatorial staff, with a text translated from the original French into English by Curator James Rorimer—later director of The Metropolitan Museum of Art—and costumes designed by Associate Curator Margaret Freeman, the thirteenth-century play was enjoyed by a group of Museum members on the Feast of the Epiphany. Thus began a tradition of medieval theatrical performances at The Cloisters.
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