Ostrowski, Janusz A.

Propylaeum-DOK

TRAVAUX DU CENTRE D’ARCHEOLOGIE M£DITERRAN£ENNE 
DE L’ACADEMTE POLONAISE DES SCIENCES 
Tome 26
ETUDES et TRAVAUX 
XIII
Janusz A. Ostrowski
Apocryphal and Canonical Scenes. 
Some Remarks on the Iconography 
of the Sarcophagus from the Collection 
of the National Museum in Cracow*
* According to a suggestion offered by Prof. M. L. Bernhard, the author decided to study the whole col­
lection of late antique sarcophagi preserved in the National Museum in Cracow. The author wishes to take the 
opportunity to thank Prof. Bernhard once again. The results of these studies have been published in the follow­
ing: J. Ostrowski, Frammenti sconosciuti di sarcophagi paleocristiani, RendPontAcc. XLIV, 1971-1972, 
pp. 203-207; id., Unknown Fragments of Early Christian Sarcophagi, Meander XXVIII, 1973, pp. 326-331; 
id., An Unknown Fragment of an Early Christian Passion Sarcophagus, Zeszyty Naukowe UJ, Prace Archeo- 
logiczne n° 16, 1974, pp. 63-74 ; id., Jonah on an Early Christian Sarcophagus in the Collection of the National 
Museum in Cracow, Folia Orientalia XXI, 1980, pp. 205-209; id., The Battle Scene on the Sarcophagus in the 
Collection of the National Museum in Cracow, Studia Archeologiczne 3, Warszawa 1982, pp. 119-126. Other 
author’s research has shown also that the Cracow collection represents an interesting group of sarcophagi : 
J. Z i n t e 1, Fragment of Late Antique Sarcophagus in Czartoryski Collection in Cracow, Archeologia VII, 
1955, pp. 173-183 ;R. Gostkowski, Bachants romains sur un sarcophage, Eos 31, 1928, pp. 321-336; 
F. M a t z, Zwei Bruchstiicke Bakchischer Sarkophage in Polen, Melanges offerts 4 Kazimierz Michalowski, 
Warszawa 1966, pp. 527-539 (with mention by R. T u r c a n, Les sarcophages romains a representations dio- 
nysiaques, Paris 1966, p. 548).
20 Etudes et Travaux
Originalveröffentlichung in: Études et travaux 13, 1983, S. 305-309 
306 Janusz A. Ostrowski
Early Christian sarcophagi sculpture developing within the general bounds of Late Antique 
art, after an initial phase when only religious symbols were represented, turned to depict the 
scenes from the Old and New Testaments. The episodes taken from the lives of Christ, Moses, 
Daniel, Jonas and St. Peter were the most popular among them. St. Peter for understandable 
reasons enjoyed particular popularity in Italy. His life was the main theme of many monu­
ments which based on both canonical and those later recognized as apocryphal Books of the 
New Testament.
Such scenes as the miracle at the well (an analogy to Moses’ miracle), and the martyrdom 
and death of the Apostle, were based upon the Acts of Peter. This popular apocryph originated 
in the A.D. 2nd or 3rd c. and formed a particular continuation of the Acts of the Apostles1. 
Among others it contains a story relating to the struggle between St. Peter and the false prophet 
Simon Magus. This story found its plastic vision in representing one of the episodes of this 
rivalry. This is the taming of the dog of Simon Magus by St. Peter. The dog is keeping guard 
over the house of a Roman senator on the orders of its master, while Simon was within teach­
ing. This is a theme which is extremely rare in Early Christian art, and it is not encountered 
in painting or minor arts of this period 2. Till now only three examples of this theme have been 
noted in sarcophagi sculpture. It decorates the lids of sarcophagi in Verona 3 (Fig. 1) and 
Mantua4, and it must have been represented upon a missing sarcophagus which once was in 
France and is known only from an inaccurate drawing5 (Fig. 2).
The author has been able to identify yet another object decorated with this scene (Fig. 3). 
It is an upper part of a sarcophagus preserved in the Department of Ancient Art of the Nation­
al Museum in Cracow6. On it we find the figures of two men standing back to back and a dog 
sitting in the arcade-shaped front door of a building. The arrangement of persons suggests 
that two separate scenes are contained here. The first consists of an effigy of a bearded man, 
whose head is shown from a right profile, and a torso en trois-quarts. The left hand is holding 
the folds od a mantle, while the right hand is bent at the elbow and is pointing in the direction 
of the seating dog. The dog is holding out its right fore-paw to the man. The second only 
partly preserved scene, portrays a youth with long hair that falls over his shoulders. He is dressed 
in a tunic with long sleeves, on which he wears a long mantle. The left hand is holding up 
the folds of an outer garment, while the right open palm is directed aside. Before the youth 
stands a vertical post, to which a slightly widening cross-bar is attached at the top. The cross­
bar features a small plug at the left end. The figures of the men are preserved from the height 
of the knees, and their heads reach as high as the fillet on the upper rim of the lid. The relief
1 Acta Apostolorum Apocrypha, ed. R. A. Lipsius et M. Bonnet, Lipsiae 1891-1903, Actus Petri cum Simone 
c. IX. Cf. G. S t u h 1 f a u t h, Die apokryphen Petrusgeschichte in der altchristlichen Kunst, Leipzig 1925.
2 Scenes with Simon Magus (without the representation of his dog) appeared very seldom during the Middle 
Ages and the Renaissance. In the period of the Counter-Reformation Simon Magus symbolized Martin Luther, 
cf. L. R e a u, Iconographie de Part chretien, III, Paris 1959, pp. 1094-2095.
3 T. W i 1 p e r t, I sarcofagi cristiani antichi, Roma 1929-1936, tav. 150,2.
4 Ibid., tav. 30.
5 E. Le B 1 a n t, Les sarcophages Chretiens de la Gaule, Paris 1886, p. 114, n° 136.
6 Inv. No DMNKCz 2167. H. 0,24 m, L. 0,51 m. Coarse-grained grey marble. From the Potocki Collection 
in Krzeszowice. Cf. O. H i r s c h, The Provenance of the Collection of Antiquities from Krzeszowice, Meander 
XX, 1965, pp. 309-314; ead., Ancient Sculptures from Krzeszowice in the National Museum in Cracow, Roz- 
prawy i Sprawozdania Muzeum Narodowego w Krakowie X, 1970, pp. 111-117.
Apocryphal and Canonical Scenes 307
1. Sarcophagus in S. Giovanni in Valle, Verona (after Grabar, Fig. 283)
2. Design of sarcophagus in France (after Le Blant, p. 114)
is not high, but by portraying the dog against a background of an arcade, the artist tried to 
deliver the impression of dimensional depth. The folds of the clothing are very conventional, 
with a tendency to vary the thickness of the material from which the clothing is made. The 
thicker fabric of the mantles have deeper folds with sharper bends than the shallow and wide 
bends of the thinner tunics. The artist, in sketching the scene, circumscribed the contours of 
the figures with incised lines, well visible near the post, near the beard of the older man, and 
near the dog’s muzzle.
Undoubtedly the first of these scenes illustrates the described episode from the life of St. 
Peter, so rarely found in art. The positioning of the Apostle’s body and the dog’s torso on the 
object in Cracow is almost identical with those noticed on the Italian ones. However, only the
20*
308 Janusz A. Ostrowski
3. Fragment of the lid of the sarcophagus, National Museum in Cracow, inv. no DMNKCz 2167 (phot.
K. K. Pollesch)
sarcophagus from Verona features a similar representation of the walls and arcade, character­
ized by poorer workmanship. These elements of architecture do not appear on the object 
from Mantua7, and, judging by the sketch of the missing sarcophagus from France, only one 
column adhering directly to the wall of the building appears. Having iconography in mind, 
the object in Cracow most closely resembles the scene from the Verona sarcophagus. The method 
of presenting the clothing, gestures, hair styles, working of the eyes and the muzzle of the dog 
are almost identical in both objects. Both the Verona and Mantua sarcophagi are dated to the 
years A.D. 390-400.
Of great aid in determining the sense of the second scene is the fragment located at the 
extreme end. The vertical post with the crossing beam at the top suggests that we have here 
a representation of a well with a windlass to which the rope was wound upon (the small plug 
on the left side would be the axis of this windlass)8. As we have suggested that the first scene 
may be an interpretation of a theme from Christian iconography, so also do we suggest that 
the answer to the riddle of the second scene should be found here, too.
In Early Christian art a well appears only in the scene of Christ and the Samaritan woman 
inspired by the Gospel of St. John (4,1-42), talking about the water of life9. This is a theme
7 It could be that the scene takes place in the interior of the house, as Stuhlfauth suggests, op. cit., p. 5*
8 Wells were thus portrayed in sarcophagi sculpture, cf. F. W. Deichmann, Repertorium der christ- 
lich-antiken Sarkophage, I. Band, 2 vol., Wiesbaden 1967, no 755; R. Garrucci, Storia dell’arte cristiana, 
6 vol., Prato 1873-1881, tav. 334,1; 385,3.
9 A well in Early Christian iconography appears only one more time apart from the scene of Christ and 
the Samaritan woman. This is the scene of Rachel at the well, but because it has no male figure it cannot be 
considered in identifying our fragments.
Apocryphal and Canonical Scenes 309
with few representations, as it appears on sarcophagi and catacomb painting only thirteen 
times10. In these representations Christ is portrayed as a youth whose right hand is pointed 
in the direction of a woman with ajar, standing on the other side of the well11. Undoubtedly 
the Cracow relic preserved only in fragments portrays exactly this scene.
Christ’s hairstyle, the method of working the face, and the almond-shaped eye with the 
large pupil carved in, are all typical for the so-called Theodosian Renaissance (A.D. 380-400). 
A similar portrayal of Christ appears on the chest of the mentioned Verona sarcophagus and 
the insignificant differences may be explained by the state of preservation of the relics and their 
different proportions. On the Veronese object the figure of Christ hides almost all of the post. 
The manner in which Christ is positioned on the object in Cracow may be compared with a sar­
cophagus in the church of S. Pietro in Vincoli in Rome, dated to the end of the A.D. 4th c.12
It is important to note, that all the known representations of St. Peter taming the dog orig­
inate not in Rome, but in Gaul, both Cisalpina (Verona, Mantua) and Transalpina (the missing 
French object). Similar scenes at wells were more popular in Gaul than in Italy13. One might 
logically conclude that the relic from Cracow also originates from the workshops of Gallia 
Cisalpina and was created in the years A.D. 390-400.
The find in the Cracow collections of another sarcophagus featuring such a rare scene, allows 
us to reach some significant conclusions. Firstly it verifies the frequency of the appearance of 
such themes. And it also suggests that apocryphs played a larger role in Christian iconography 
than was heretofore presumed. On the other hand the scene with the Samaritan woman allows 
one to conclude that it was featured not only on the chest of sarcophagi, but on the lid as well. 
The figure of Christ, more often than was heretofore presumed, also appears on the lids of the 
sarcophagi and not only on its chest.
Cracow, 1978
10 P. S t y g e r, Die altchristliche Grabeskunst, Miinchen 1927, p. 7, states that nine sarcophagi sculp­
tures and four paintings on this theme exist. On the other hand W i I p e r t, op. cit., vol. II, pp. 306-307, lists 
fifteen sarcophagi (including some not preserved) decorated with this scene. The earliest known illustration at 
this theme is found in the Baptistery of the Christian House in Doura Europos.
11 In some cases Christ sits on a small hill, cf. W i 1 p e r t, op. cit., tav. 231,2; 233,2.
12 Deichmann, op. cit., no 755.
13 From fifteen sarcophagi listed by Wilpert, only four originate from Rome.


Apocryphal and canonical scenes. Some remarks on the iconography of the sarcophagus in the collection of the National Museum in Cracow

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Apocryphal and canonical scenes. Some remarks on the iconography of the sarcophagus in the collection of the National Museum in Cracow

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