Resurrection of a dead man

This medallion represents a young man about to emerge from an open sarcophagus, on a blue background. He is naked, except for a purple shroud draped over his shoulders. His angled left arm points upwards, as does his face and his gaze. Under the sarcophagus, the brown ground is decorated with a few herbs and flowers. The medallion is bordered in red.

Characterised by the intensity of the colours and the finesse of the drapery of the shroud in the style of 1200, at the height of the Romanesque period, this panel was probably part of a rose window representing the Last Judgement. The western façades of 13th century cathedrals, particularly in France, often included representations of this apocalyptic scene in their iconographic programme. This is the case, for example, for the rose window on the west façade of Chartres Cathedral, which dates from 1200-1210. At the centre of the rose, Christ is usually depicted as the Judge. The gaze and movement of the young man in the medallion seem to indicate that he is directing his attention towards the centre. He is thus placed to the right of Christ, the place reserved for saved souls.

All the glass in this panel is medieval. It should be noted, however, that the glass in the young man’s head does not match the rest of the stained glass: it is a filler. The colour of the glass, the different application of the grisaille and the integration of the fragment differ. During a restoration of the panel, which may have come from Braine, the original head, which was then missing or damaged, was replaced by a head taken from a stained glass window from Soissons. The stained glass windows from the collegiate church in Braine were in fact transferred to Soissons in the 19th century, where they were probably reinstalled in the cathedral. The lead came dates from the 19th century.