1 M. Proust (ed. and transl.) La Bible d'Amiens par John Ruskin, Paris 1986, Preface. This work originally appeared in the Mercure de France in 1903. J. Ruskin, "The Bible of Amiens," Our Fathers Have Told Us. Sketches in the History of Christendom for Boys and Girls who have been held at its Fonts, Orpington, 1884, published in Collected Works, XXXIII, London, 1908. On the intellectual encounter between Proust and Ruskin, see A. CrŽpin, "Ruskin, Proust et la cathŽdrale d'Amiens," Trav. Acad. Amiens, 1975.

2 M. Proust (ed. and transl.) La Bible, 44-45, "Voici terminŽ l'enseignement que les hommes du XIIIe. sicle allaient chercher ˆ la cathŽdrale et que, par une luxe inutile et bizarre, elle continue ˆ donner en une sorte de livre ouvert, Žcrit dans un langage solennel o chaque caractre est une oeuvre d'art, et que personne ne comprend plus." There is, in this statement, a glorious combination of censure and wistfulness

3 G. Deleuze, Proust et les signes, Paris, 1970, 195, "Il n'y a pas de Logos, il n'y a que les hiŽroglyphes."

4 On the ideographic axis, A. Katzenellenbogen, The Sculptural Programs of Chartres Cathedral, New York, 1959, 9-22. On the Beau Dieu, W. Schlink, Der Beau Dieu von Amiens, Das Christusbild der gotischen Kathedrale, Frankfurt-am-Main, 1991, esp. 82.

5 Revelation, 1, 7, "Behold, he cometh with clouds; and every eye shall see him, and they also that pierced him; and all kindreds of the earth shall wail because of him." Revelation, I, 16, ".... and out of his mouth went a sharp two-edged sword...." All texts are taken from the King James Bible.

6 On the links between Last Judgement and Eucharist, see G. Wainwright, Eucharist and Eschatology, New York, 1981. More will be said of this later.

7 On Transubstantion see E. Vollert, New Catholic Encyclopaedia., XIV, 259-261. On the problems of definition peculiar to the years of construction of Amiens Cathedral see M. Rubin, Corpus Christi. The Eucharist in Late Medieval Culture, Cambridge, 1991, especially 1-35, "At the centre of the whole religious system of the later Middle Ages lay a ritual which turned bread into flesh--a fragile small wheaten disk into God."

8 W. Schlink, Der Beau Dieu, 96, has reminded us of the alternative tradition of Mary and John Baptist as intercessors.

9 On the resurrection of the body see especially Saint Augustine, The City of God (de Civitate Dei), transl. J. Healey, ed. R. V. G. Tasker, 2 vols, Everyman, London 1962; also conveniently available in one volume (abridged) transl. G. Walsh, D. Zema, G. Monahan and D. Honan, ed. V. Bourke, New York, 1958, esp. 485. "On that day, we shall see plainly the true fullness of the felicity of all the saints and only of the saints, as we shall see the supreme and deserved misery of the wicked and of the wicked alone." The Last Judgement will end the terms of the two cities: of God and of the Devil. I am most grateful to Caroline Bynum who kindly shared with me her unpublished manuscript, "Bodily Miracles and the Resurrection of the Body in the High Middle Ages," Belief In History, ed. T. Kselman, Notre Dame, 1991, 68-106; see also idem, "Material Continuity, Personal Survival and the Resurrection of the Body: A Scholastic Discussion in Its Medieval and Modern Contexts," Fragmentation and Redemption. Essays on Gender and the Human Body in Medieval Religion, New York, 1991

10 The devil's head is the work of the restorer, Caudron, who, subject to the scathing criticism of Didron, insisted that he had simply put back what had already been there.

11 The head of Ecclesia has been restored.

12 Matthew, 24, 29-31. We cannot hope here to provide a comprehensive survey of scholarship of the Last Judgement in Gothic art. The theme has been addressed recently by P. Gerson, "Suger as Iconographer: The Central Portal of the West Facade of Saint-Denis," Abbot Suger and Saint-Denis, A Symposium, New York, 1980, 183-198 and C. Rudolph, Artistic Change at St-Denis. Abbot Suger's Program and the Early Twelfth-Century Controversy over Art, Princeton, 1990. See also the very useful pages of M. L. ThŽrel, Le triomphe de la Vierge-Eglise: l'origine du dŽcor du portail occidental de Notre-Dame de Senlis, Paris, 1984, esp. 266-284 ; Y. Christe, La vision de Matthieu (Matth. XXIV-XXV). Origines et developpement d'une image de la seconde Parousia, Paris, 1973; B. Brenk, Tradition und Neuerung in der Christlichen Kunst des ersten Jahrtausends. Studien zur Geschichte des Weltgerichtsbilds, Vienna, 1966. The older literature includes G. Voss, Das JŸngste Gericht in der bildenen Kunst des frŸhen Mittelalters, Leipzig, 1884; A. Bouillet, Le jugement dernier dans l'art aux douze premiers sicles, Paris, 1894; W. H. von der MŸlbe, Die Darstellung des JŸngsten Gerichts in den romanischen und gotischen Kirchenportalen Frankreichs, Leipzig, 1911.

13 A sinister reference to the mastication of the Host.

14 These scenes, like their benign counterparts on the other side, are carved, for the most part, from seperate blocks of stone and set in front of the concave field of the voussoir. W. Schlink has suggested that we see these scenes not as hell, but as purgatory, Der Beau Dieu, 91. See also J. Le Goff, Le naissance du purgatoire, Paris, 1981. The scenes from the innermost voussoir to the outermost include the following. 1. A large male devil grasps a naked female by the neck. To the front a crouching naked figure is weighed down by a heavy object slung around the neck and in the background anguish is expressed through the wringing of hands. 2. A male figure is strangled by a large devil and a second figure is forced to the ground by a second devil while a third figure expresses consternation. 3. The boiling cauldron of hell is tended by two devils one of whom offers a red hot poker to an occupant of the cauldron. A male is held up with legs asplay as a devil snuffles his groin and another devil defecates on the group. 4. A blindfolded (female ?) horseman with two swords stabs a naked man seated behind him in the stomach. 5. A naked apocalyptic horseman with scales. 6. A cockatrice.

15 W. Schlink, Der Beau Dieu, 132.

16 As did Abbot Suger and W. de Brailes.

17 Matthew, 25. The parable introduces the idea of the wedding feast to which we are invited. The Eucharist is, of course, that feast, see G. Wainwright, Eucharist and Eschatology, "Antepast of Heaven," 18-59.

18 W. Schlink, Der Beau Dieu, 143, credits John Ruskin (1883) with the popularization of the term "Beau Dieu," as applied to the central trumeau figure at Amiens. The Amiens statue probably follows a decade or so after the prototype in the south transept center portal of Chartres Cathedral (where Christ also tramples beasts) and is more or less contemporaneous with the equivalent figure on the Reims Cathedral north transept. The Amiens figure seems much more dynamic than either of these counterparts.

19 Thus, the lilies on the flank of the Amiens trumeau may refer to Song of Songs, 2, 1: "I am the rose of Sharon and the lily of the valley."

20 Honorius of Autun, P.L., 172, col. 913-914, "Super aspidem et basiliscum ambulabis et conculcabis leonem et draconem." See also E. M‰le, The Gothic Image, New York, 1958, 43-44. The image of the triumphant figure trampling and impaling his enemy was derived from Roman imperial art, mediated by Constantinian Christian programs, see C. Ihm, Die Programme der christlichen Apsismalerei vom vierten Jahrhundert bis zur Mitte des achten Jahrhunderts, Wiesbaden, 1960, 32-33 where the author cites Eusebius's description of an image in Constantine's palace of the triumphant emperor impaling with a cross staff Licinius, the antiquus serpens . See also A. Grabar, L'Empereur dans l'art byzantin, Paris, 1936, and K. M. Openshaw, "Weapons in the Daily Battle: Images of the Conquest of Evil in the Early Medieval Psalter, Art Bull., LXXV, 1993, 17-38. Ivory book covers and panels provided the means by which this type of image penetrated the west. Thus, in the so-called Genoels-Elderen Ivory the link between the triumphant Christ is holding a book and a small cross and trampling the beasts and Psalm 91 is made explicit in the verses around the frame, see C. L. Neuman de Vegvar, "The Origin of the Genoels-Elderen Ivories, " Gesta, XXIX, 1990, 8-25. The use of figurative consoles that appeared tentatively in the Chartres west portals was systematized in the transept portals of the same cathedral between around 1200 and the 1220s.

21 Schlink, Der Beau Dieu, 130, explained the unusual placement of Peter to Christ's left in conection with Early Christian mosaic programs. In the Chartres south transept central portal Peter is placed to Christ's right. Dean Jean d'Abbeville of Amiens held Saint Paul in special esteem--this is indicated by the dean's establishment of a chapel dedicated to the Conversion of Saint Paul.

22 D. Bell, The Image and Likeness. The Augustinian Spirituality of William of St Thierry, Cistercian Publications, Kalamazoo, 1984, esp. 115, quoting William of St Thierry, "There [in heaven] to be like God will be to see God or to know (cognoscere ) him. He who knows him or sees him does so insofar as he is like him, and to the extent that he is like him, so much he knows or sees him. For there, to see or know God is to be like God, and to be like him is to see or know him." At Amiens the Apostles in the jambs of the central portal face inwards toward the Beau Dieu of the trumeau. See also C. Bynum, "Did the Twelfth Century Discover the Individual?" Jesus as Mother: Studies in the Spirituality of the High Middle Ages, Berkeley, 1982, 82-109

23 A. Katzenellenbogen, Allegories of the Virtues and Vices in Medieval Art, London, 1939, esp. 79 where the author notes that the twelve-figure system was derived from the writings of Hugh of Saint-Victor; J. O'Reilly, Studies in the Iconography of the Virtues and Vices in the Middle Ages, New York and London, 1983, esp. 83 links the Virtues and Vices with penitance and the the necessity for confession enjoined by the 1215 Lateran Council. See also M. Rubin, Corpus Christi, 102.

24 This seal-like quality is particularly significant given the fact that likeness (that is proximity to Christ) was often described as being "impressed," see D. Bell, The Image and Likeness, 36, 42. Hugh of St. Victor applied the seal metaphor directly to way that virtue is imprinted upon the life of the saint, see C. Bynum, "Did the Twelfth Century Discover the Individual?" 97-98.

25 On the theme of the triumphant Virgin Mary see P. Verdier, Le couronnement de la vierge: les origines et les premiers dŽveloppements d'un thme iconographique, MontrŽal, 1980; M.-L. ThŽrel, Le triomphe . On Amiens see M. Rickard, "The Iconography of the Virgin Portal at Amiens," Gesta, XXII, 1983, 147-157. Verdier, Le couronnement, 113-152, notes the popularity of Marian portals in the north of France, particularly in the area around Amiens--one thinks of the portals at the abbey church of Corbie, LongprŽ-les-Corps-Saints, Laon Cathedral and Saint-Nicolas of Amiens.

26 E. Guldan, Eva und Maria. Eine Antithese als Bildmotiv, Graz-Cologne, 1966, esp. 124-128.

27 On the significance of the Tabernacle as a premonition of the Church, see A. Prache, Saint-Remi de Reims, and O. von Simson, The Gothic Cathedral, New York, 1956.

28 J. Foucart-Borville, "Les tabernacles eucharistiques dans la France au Moyen-Age," Bull. mon., CXLVIII, 1990, 349-381.

29 Hebrews 9 provides the most explicit exploration of the interaction between the First Covenant symbolized by the Tabernacle and the Ark that contained manna, the tablets of the law and Aaron's rod and the New Covenant wrought through the incarnation, crucifixion and resurrection of Christ and his Second Coming.

30 Similar seated patriarchs are found in the Coronation of the Virgin portal to the north of the west faade of Notre-Dame of Paris.

31 On the early apocryphal accounts of the Dormition ("transitus sanctae Mariae") see M.-L. Therel, Le triomphe, 18-30. Such accounts began to circulate in written form in the first centuries of Christianity but the Church hesitated before accepting them. Therel indicates that the general acceptance of the Feast of the Assumption (August 15) was delayed until the eleventh and twelfth centuries in the West.

32 Jacobus de Voragine, The Golden Legend, transl. G. Ryan and H.

Ripperger, New York, 1969, 451.

33 The sources and development of this image are discussed by Verdier, Le couronnement, and Therel, Le triomphe. The most important literary source was the Song of Solomon where the sponsa and sponsus (bride and groom) of the Song are seen as as types of Mary and Christ. The wedding feast was a type of Eucharistic feast.

34 M.-L. Therel, Le triomphe, 200, "Notre Reine nous a precŽdŽs et a reu un accueil si glorieux que nous, ses petits serviteurs suivons avec confiance les traces de notre souveraine en nous Žcriant: "entra”nez-nous ˆ votre suite, nous courons ˆ l'odeur de vos parfums."

35 This text was used in the liturgy for the dedication of churches, see O. von Simson, The Gothic Cathedral, 8n.

36 Including Isaiah in the central portal and Sainte Ulphe in the north portal.

37 Laon Cathedral provides a precedent for such insistance upon signs of virgin birth, see W. SauerlŠnder, Gothic Sculpture.

38 The quatrefoil image of Sheba recalls an ancient Venus--I am grateful to Eunice McGuire who brought this association to my attention.

39 M. Rickard, "The Iconography," 151, suggests that the emphasis upon Herod's agency was derived from the liturgical plays performed at Epiphany that became increasingly popular after the discovery of the relics of the Three Kings in 1158 and their translation to Cologne.

40 W. SauerlŠnder, Gothic Sculpture, 146. On the base of the trumeau, now heavily eroded, were scenes from the life of the evangelist: his arrival in Amiens; his execution; the miraculous discovery of his body; the participation of citizens from neighboring towns; the triumphal procession back to Amiens; the healing of the Seigneur of Beaugency.

41 On the world of tombs, see P. Brown, Relics and Social Status in the Age of Gregory of Tours, The Stenton Lecture, Reading, 1977; idem The Cult of Saints: Its Rise and Function in Latin Christianity, Chicago, 1981.

42 Acta Sanctorum, Septembris, VII, 34, "With indescribable terror he [Bishop Sauve] saw as if a ray of light coming from a lofty throne lighting the place where Saint Firmin lay. Grateful for this great sign of divine mercy he began quickly, and in great reverence, to dig, and to open the tomb of the gentle martyr. Straight away a wonderful odor emanated--as if all kinds of colors and scents were crushed together, and the countryside was alive with the beauty of various flowers. He [Bishop Sauve] raised him up from the sepulchre and started home, the people bringing with them the holy martyr to the city. Crowds of people rushed up on the way throwing their clothes on the road and crying in a loud voice, 'Hosanna in the highest, blessed is he who comes in the nave of the Lord.' The most blessed Bishop Sauve placed [the relic] in the eastern crypt of the splendid church that he had constructed in honor of the said martyrs and buried him with respect and with honor decorating the tomb nobly with gold and with gems."

On the prospecting for saints' relics and the wonderful odors that characteristically attended the invention see P. Brown, Relics, 13.

43 Idem, 34, "And the entire multitude from the cities of ThŽrouanne, Cambrai, Noyon and Beauvais, satiated at that time by the sweetness and delicacy of that wonderful odor thought that it had come to the delights of paradise. And all the priests and clergy and the populance of both sexes from the afore-mentioned cities rushed ahead with candles and with palms, singing hymns and psalms, gaining speed on their way to Amiens, each following his own headlong rush." P. Brown, Relics, 15 also deals with the social and political implications of the triumphal reception of relics, "The arrival of a relic was an occasion for a skilfully enacted dialogue between relic and bishop, in which the secure holiness of one high-lighted and orchestrated the personal and, so, fragile holiness of the other." See also idem, The Cult of Saints, 92.

44 Ibid, 34, "And when the venerable Bishop Sauve and the religious, priests of Christ, raised Firmin from his tomb, the substance of all the elements was changed, and such boiling heat came into the world that all the people present, in a state of ecstacy, were amazed."

45 G. Durand, "Le grand portail." C. Salmon, "Iconographie," proposes as different identification: left side from the door outwards, Firmin, Angel, Fuscien, Victoric, Angel, Ulphe. Right side HonorŽ, Domice, Sauve, Genrien, Unknown, Unknown.

46 See R. Javelet, Image et ressemblance au douziŽme sicle, 2 vols, Paris, 1967, esp. I, 120, where the author discusses the predestination of the elect that results from the discovery of the internal image of Christ. The purpose of this predestination, according to Hugh of Saint Victor, was the praise of God by men associated with angels. This praise consists of nothing other than the spitirual happiness that results from perfect conformity to the divine model.

47 On Sainte Ulphe and Saint Domice see J. Corblet, Hagiographie du diocse d'Amiens, 5 vols, Amiens, 1868-1875, esp. III, 536-581. Ulphe is remembered partly on account of the unusual miracle of the frogs (see the picture hanging in a chapel of the cathedral choir). In her solitary existence the saint faced an unexpected difficulty of an ecological kind. The hermitage was in the middle of a swamp that was filled with frogs that were as energetic as they were vociferous. After a sleepless night filled with the croakings of her companions, Ulphe was unable to arouse herself for matins. As a result of her prayers the unfortunate creatures were placed under interdict. The nineteenth-century compiler of the hagiographies of the diocese of Amiens noted that the frogs in the area around Saint Ulphe's oratory were, indeed, very quiet, but if they were taken elsewhere they quickly became boisterous.

48 The importance of Sainte Ulphe in the thirteenth century is reflected by the fact that her physical remembrance was ensured by a chapel in immediate proximity to the treasury where John Baptist's head was kept on the north flank of the choir and the spring where she lived was in the north choir aisle. Her ch‰sse was on the relic altar.

49 In the left portal of the west faade of Notre-Dame in Paris the (nineteenth-century) Saint Denis is also accompanied by angels.

50 According to some sources these two evangelists were Greeks, sent to Gaul by a disciple of Polycarp. An alternative tradition represents both saints as local figures, executed at the end of the third century, and In the seventh century the relics of the saints were all transferred into the city to the church then called Saints Peter and Paul, later to be known as Saint Firmin the Confessor. It should be noted that Corblet, Hagiographie, I, 339, identifies these two figures as Fuscien and Victoric.

51 For Saint HonorŽ see J. Corblet, Hagiographie, III, 38-77.

52 Ibid, II, 189-216.

53 Ibid, III, 463-487.

54 Ibid, 182-185.

55 It would obviously be a mistake to be too dogmatic about the identity of such figures. The two last-mentioned may have been carved as prophets and later deployed as saints.

56 S. Nichols, Romanesque Signs, Early Medieval Narrative and Iconography, New Haven, 1983, has much to say about the power of the repeating patterns of historia.

57 A. Katzenellenbogen, "The Prophets;" M. Aubert, "Les prophtes."

58 Particularly useful is the short article, "ProphŽtisme," Dictionnaire de SpiritualitŽ, XII, Paris, 1986, 2410-2446.

59 Durandus

60 W. Schlink, Der Beau Dieu, 129, suggested that the right-to-left ordering was intended to follow the reading sequence of Hebraic script. It seems more likely, however, that the intention was to match the themes of the prophecies with the program of each portal.

61 B. Smalley, The Study of the Bible in the Middle Ages, Notre-Dame, 1970, 265.

62 P. R. House, The Unity of the Twelve, Sheffield, 1990.

63 A. Katzenellenbogen, "The Prophets," 11.

64 Why was the local saints portal placed on this, the north side, and the portal of the Mre de Dieu on the south where it could be understood as lying to the left of the central Christ and hence on the side of the damned? The arrangement may have been intended to echo the arrangement of the churches of the former episcopal group where the church of Saint-Firmin the Confessor lay to the north and Notre-Dame to the south.

65 L. von Matt and G. Bovini, Ravenna, Cologne, 1971, 75-101. The Amiens apostles bear a strong resemblence to the Ravennate prophets (middle level of the Sant'Apollinare mosaics) both in stance and drapery.

66 W. Medding and W. Schlink also commented on the connection to Italo-Byzantine art.

67 We know that the members of this council participated in the rededication of the church of S. Maria in Trastevere on November 15 in 1215. The description of the procession suggests that it turned into a type of Triumphal entry with the boys of Rome bearing the branches of trees and crying, "Kyrieleyson, Christeleyson," see S. Kuttner and A. Garcia y Garcia, A New Eyewitness Account of the Fourth Lateran Council," Traditio, XX, 1964, 115-178. For the mosaics of S. Maria in Trastevere, see W. Oakshott, The Mosaics of Rome, New York, 1967, 243-256. Certain elements of the mosaic program at S. Maria are of obvious relevance for Amiens--particularly the Wise and Foolish Virgins inside the faade and the Coronation of the Virgin in the apse. The lines of nearly identical Apostles flanking the central Christ (with Peter to his right) strongly recall Early Christian apse mosaics such as those in the oratory at Monte della Guistizia or the church of S. Agata dei Goti in Rome (C. Ihm, Die Programme der Christlichen Apsismalerei, 16; Fig. IV, 1). Ihm (pp.124-126) reminds us that the apse was a kind of door (porta triumphalis ) opening into a heavenly realm: Parousia . For the concept of Parousia, the coming of the glorified Christ as the climax of salvation history, see the article by C. P. Ceroke and S. J. Duffy in New Catholic Encyclopaedia , X, 1032-1039.

68 The late Byzantine commentary on the Eucharist by Nicholas Cabasilas (died 1363) evokes this shimmering quality in describing the way the Eucharist anticipates the vision of Christ in Paradise, "'when he shall gird himself and make them [the elect] to sit down, and he will come forth and serve them'; he will come resplendent upon the clouds, and he will make the just to shine like the sun."

69 The Venerable Bede, Operum, II, P.L. XCI, cols. 779-780; Richard of Saint-Victor, Exegetica in Apocalypsis Johanem, P.L., CXCVI, col. 736. I am grateful to Sergio van Asch La Porta for sharing with me the results of his research on Biblical columns.

70 E. Panofsky, Abbot Suger on the Abbey Church of St-Denis and its Art Treasures, Princeton, 1979, 105, "The midst of the edifice, however, we raised aloft by twelve columns representing the number of the Twelve Apostles and, secondarily, by as many columns in the side-aisles signifying the number of the [minor] Prophets...."

71 R. Javelet, Image et Ressemblance, 248.

72 John, 10, 9, I am the door: by me if any man enter in, he shall be saved, and shall go in and out and find pasture. In Matthew, 25, 10, the foolish virgins had the door closed to them.

73 Logos is divine reason or wisdom understood by means of the human intellect in the natural forms (including man) which mirror the perfection of an ideal world. The concept has its roots in the use of the Aramaic word memra to safeguard the transcendence of the divine name; in Platonism; in the Joannine writings of the New Testament, and in the Church Fathers, especially in the tradition of Saint Augustine, see the articles by C. J. Peter and D. M. Crossan in the New Catholic Encyclopaedia, VIII, 967-972.

74 A. C. Esmeijer, Divina Quaternitas. A Preliminary Study of the Method and Application of Visual Exegesis, Amsterdam, 1970, deals with this kind of non-verbal exegesis: see especially Fig. 83, fol. 7vo from Munich, Staatsbibl. Clm. 13002, "Microcosmos," for the central image of man set in a square-root-of-two rectangle. I base my conclusions on the three west portals at Amiens upon the recent and highly accurate photogrammetric rendering of the faade.

75 M. Rubin deals with the formation of clusters of images as a means of preparing the laity for the mass, Corpus Christi, 105. Within Rubin's intellectual framework the formulation of images like those in the portals at Amiens are part of the clergy's attempt to ensure correct reception of the Eucharist.

76 The Amiens Beau Dieu, the Man of Sorrows and the Apocalyptic Christ of the tympanum resemble Thomas of C”teaux's three images of Christ that are stamped upon the human recipient: see Thomas's commentary on the Song of Songs, P. L. 206, 809.

77 On the appearance of the resurrected body, see Saint Augustine, City of God, XXII, ed. V. Bourke, 530, "And what a body, too, we shall have, a body utterly subject to our spirit and one so kept alive by spirit that there will be no need of any other food. For, it will be a spiritual body, no longer merely animal, one composed, indeed, of flesh, but free from every corruption of the flesh." The little puff of clouds at the feet of each of the column figures strengthens the argument for the heavenly topos.

78 See note 22 above. It might be objected that such "sameness" applies only to the inner self, the soul, not the body, for it is the soul that is "ad imaginem Dei." However, there is much evidence to suggest that twelfth and thirteenth century theologians considered the relation of the body to the soul as analagous to the relationship between man and God. The corporeal image is mediated by Christ; see the chapter, "Nature et corps, vestige de dieu," in R. Javelet, Image et ressemblance, 224-236, especially 234.

79 W. Schlink, Der Beau Dieu, 43-57. For the temptation of Christ, see Matthew 4, 1-11. This was the Gospel reading for the first Sunday in Lent. Particularly powerful are the words of Petrus Lombardus (cited by Schlink, 52-53), "This [Psalm 91] is the psalm with which the devil dared to tempt our lord, Jesus Christ. But the temptation of Christ provides our doctrine. Just as Christ was once tempted and overcame the temptation through humility, so he teaches us to triumph over the devil, and he gave us the means of overcoming, if only we will truly imitate Christ. This should not be done in pride and arrogance, as with the first human couple, but in humility like that of him who calls to us, 'learn from me, for I am meek and lowly of heart [Matthew 12, 29]." But whoever imitates Christ in this way, he will enter through the door. The door is Christ, who says, 'I am the door; by me if any man enter in, he shall be saved, and shall go in and out and find pasture [ Matthew, 10,9]. To enter the doorway is to enter through Christ. To enter through him means to imitate him, to become like him, not in glory and in marvels, but as I have already said, in lowliness and modesty, so that in following him we may overcome the devil through him. The psalm is about this triumph--of Christ and his followers...it is a hymn: the triumph of Christ over the demons."

80 For the idea of the forming form, see Javelet, Image et ressemblance, 107-110. For architectual metaphors of Christ (derived from Saint Paul), see M. Carruthers, "The Poet as Master-Builder," 890.

81 On the medieval understanding of predestination see Ibid, 118-124. The idea of the pre-established elect is already expressed in Romans, 5, 17, "For if by one man's offence death reigneth by one; much more they which receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness shall reign in life by one, Jesus Christ [my italics]."

82 G. Wainwright, Eucharist and Eschatology, 61, citing I Corinthians, 11, 26, "For as often as ye eat this bread, and drink this cup, ye do show the Lord's death until he come [my italics]." The idea of judgement is associated with the self-examination undertaken by each participant in the Eucharist, ibid, 27-34. Matthew's account (Matthew 26, 28) of the Last Supper suggests that through the Eucharist sins may be forgiven and final damnation avoided, "For this is my blood of the new testament which is shed for many for the remission of sins." And John, 6, "... he that eateth of this bread shall live for ever," The Eucharist was both a memorial of the first coming of Christ and a prayer for the Second Coming, the Parousia. At that second coming, "the penitant believer is justified, acquitted; and at every eucharist the divine acquittal is pronounced that will be heard at the last assize, see Wainwright, Eucharist, 67; 83. Particularly interesting, in the context of the Statutes of Coventry (1224/7), was the comparison of the bell sounded at the moment of the elevation of the host with the "gentle trumpet announding the arrival of a judge, indeed the saviour," see M. Rubin, Corpus Christi, 58.

83 Brown deals with the power of the adventus --the triumphal arrival of the relics in the city, memorialized in annual festivals--as a means of creating social consensus, see Relics, 20. M. Fassler, "Liturgy and Sacred History in the Twelfth-Century Tympana at Chartres," Art Bull. LXXV, 1993, 499-520 develops the theme with specific references to the liturgical sources. Fassler's emphasis upon the the diachronic character of the twelfth-century sculptural program at Chartres (time before Christ; Christ's coming; the end of time) corresponds very much with the reading of the Amiens sculpture proposed in these pages.

84 Bibl. nat., Collection de Picardie, 14, Notes of canon Willeman, esp 51; J. Baron, Description, 227-228; C. Salmon, Histoire de Saint-Firmin, 153-154; C. Calippe, Les "bones gens" d'Amiens," 32-35, where it is noted that the visit of the Green Man was one of several physical re-enactments of critical events of the liturgical year. For example, on Easter morning white-robed "women" (played by chaplains) would appear to discover the tomb empty. At Pentecost burning wicks and flower petals were released from the high vaults and at the Purification of the Virgin an image of the virgin-queen was placed in the nave. The idea of the Green Man is obviously a very rich one with many ramifications and enormous significance for our understanding of Gothic architectural forms that have always been understood in relation to forests and foliage. Gothic architecture of the thirteenth century brings multiple references to naturalistic flowers and leaves sometimes personified in the form of leaf masks, see, for example, Villard de Honnecourt's rendering, H. Hahnloser, Villard de Honnecourt, Plate 10. This kind of "Green Man" has been discussed by W. Anderson, "The Green Man," Parabola, Myth and the Quest for Life, XIV, 1989, 26-33.

85 The practice was suppressed in 1737, see C. Salmon, Histoire de Saint Firmin, 155 and canon Willeman, 51. The canons claimed that the event had become baudy. Willeman thought that the event served merely as a "divertissement au menu peuple;" Calippe, on the other hand, saw the termination of these practices and the triumph of "reason" as the final rupture of spiritual unity and social equilibrium that set the stage for Revolution and Disestablishment.

86 Peggy Brown and Phyllis Roberts have both been most generous in their advice and suggestions on the subject of medieval sermons. It would be impossible here to provide a comprehensive bibliography on the subject of medieval sermons. The starting point is still provided by A. Lecoy de la Marche, La chaire franaise au moyen ‰ge, Paris, 1886, reprint, Geneva, 1974. Jean Longre, La prŽdication mŽdiŽvale, Paris, 1983, provides a modern survey, and P. B. Roberts, Studies in the Sermons of Stephen Langton, Toronto, 1968, provides an excellent introduction to the study of sermons and brings the discussion close to the time and place of Amiens. An overview of sermon historiography is found in M. Briscoe and B. H. Jaye, Artes praedicandi; Artes Orandi, Brepols, Turnhout, 1992. For recent work on the Late Gothic material, see L. Taylor, Soldiers of Christ, New York and Oxford, 1992 and H. Martin, Le mŽtier du prŽdicateur en France septentrionale ˆ la fin du moyen ‰ge (1350-1520), Paris, 1988. For a discussion of the possible interaction between preaching and programs of Gothic sculpture (with bibliography), see M.-L. Therel, Le triomphe, 317-321.

87 A. Crampon, "Un sermon prchŽ dans la cathŽdrale d'Amiens vers l'an 1260." See Bibl nat., Collection de Picardie, 158, fol. 131 for a late-thirteenth century transcript of the sermon and idem, 14, fol. 64 for an eighteenth-century copy. A. Lecoy de la Marche deals extensively with the sermon, emphasizing its unique character, see La chaire franaise, 185-188. This author saw the sermon as aimed at pilgrims in order to raise money for the unfinished cathedral, noting the promise of a forty-day remission to be gained for coming to church and contributing to its completion ("par attendre la besoigne le douce madame sainte Marie que ele soit aconsomŽe....") He puts the sermon before 1269, the date normally accepted for the "completion" of the cathedral. However, it might be pointed out that the cathedral never was completely finished. The handwriting points to a date towards 1300.

88 Ibid, 556, "Pechierres, fait N.S., lˆ u ge te trouverai, lˆ te jugerai."

The strategy of the preacher was a common one. L. Taylor, Soldiers of Christ, 86, expresses it thus: "A pessimistic anthropology was therefore balanced by an optimistic soteriology in which, thanks to God, everything was possible for the repentant sinner." On the interaction between sermons and images see especially H. Martin, Le mŽtier du prŽdicateur, 585-592. Martin reinforces the position taken by Miri Rubin that images, like sermons, prepare the devout communicant for the proper reception of the host: "visus, auditus, gustus."

89 A. Crampon, "Un sermon," 567, "La douce mere Diu sainte Marie d'Amiens, ele est vostre dame seur totes dames; c'est la dame du monde; c'est la roine des glorieus chieus; c'est l'avoir as pecheeurs et as pecheris; ce est la sauveresse des ames; ce est espouse N. S; ele est mere Jhesu-Crist; ele est temples du Saint Esperit. Ceste dame rapele les foliaus; elle redreche les cheus; ceste dame, c'est secours as ca•tis. Ele conforte les dolereus, elle relieve les foibles; elle prie por le puile; elle maintient les honteus; elle deffent les fames. SachiŽs bien, maus entra el monde par fame, et bien revint el monde par fame."

90 Ibid, 569, "Bele douce gent, la mere Diu sainte Marie d'Amiens vous aporte pardon, par foi voirement [vraiment] perdu[rable],"

91 Ibid, 579 "Que sachiŽs entierement que ds icele eure que li premiers quarriaus de ceste eglise fu asis, et li premiers enfes baptisŽs et regenerŽs en sains fons, et li premiers entendemens et li primiers sacramens N.S. i fu celebrŽs,--si Dex ait part en l'‰me de moi! li diables li anemis ne fu si tormentŽs comme il iert au jor d'ui. Et savŽs vous por coi il si tormentŽs iert? Si me face Dex pardon! que ce est por les haus pardons et pors les hautes orisons que on vous aporte entre vous bons crestiens qui bien crŽes en pardons."

92 Ibid, 579, "Bele douce gent, a vous tous ensanle et a cascun par soi qui vourŽs reconnoistre la mere Deu S. Marie d'Amiens, qui est votre mere eglise, dont li bien vous vienent; car il vous en vient ole, cresme, baptesme, enoliement, enterrement, noches, mariages, li beneois sacremens en est fais en sainte eglise. Li sires li Žvesques d'Amiens qui est nostre pere espiritueus est tenus a vous conduire et mener en paradis, en la benoite compaignie d'angles, d'arcangles, de martirs, de confs et bones eureuses virges, qui ont deservi le regne de paradis par martire de lor cors et par espandemens de lor sanc."

93 Ibid, 590-591, where the listener is invited to think of Christ's head,

pierced by the crown of thorns; his heart, pierced by the spear of Longinus; his shoulders; his palms, feet, blood, and flesh. This is the image of the suffering sacramental Christ as we see it in the central tympanum.

94 P. Janelle, "Le voyage de Martin Bucer et Paul Fagius de Strasbourg en Angleterre en 1549," Revue d'Histoire et de Philosophie religieuses, 1928, 162-177. This travelogue is one of a considerable body of such material including, for example, A. Eeckman, "Un voyage en Flandre, Artois et Picardie en 1714 publiŽ d'aprs le manuscrit du Sieur Nomis par Alex. Eeckman," Annales du ComitŽ flamand de France, XXII, 1895, 336-572; P. Grosnet, La louenge et description de plusieurs bonnes villes et citŽz du noble royaume de France, 1533, Paris, 1807; Comte de Marsy (ed.) "Les voyages d'un Lillois en Picardie, 1690-1697," Bull. Soc. Ant. Pic., XVII, 1889-1891, 534; A. Morel, "Journal d'un voyage en Normandie, Picardie, France et Champagne, 1677," Bull. Soc. Ant. Pic., XXIV, 1909-1910, 95-103; R. Rodire (ed). "Le voyage de Roland de la Platire en Normandie et en Picardie, Bulletin de la SociŽtŽ d'Emulation d'Abbeville, XI, 1918-1921, 152-189;" A. Rostand, Les descriptions anciennes;"

P. Tamizey de Larroque (ed.), Lettres de Peiresc [1608] publiŽs par Philippe Tamizey de Larroque, Paris, 1896; Amiens, Bibl. mun., MS 2250 A., Relation ou Journal historique d'un voyage fait ˆ Dunkerque par une sociŽtŽ d'Amis dans le courant de septembre 1750. From some of these accounts we can gain an idea of the importance of the cult of John Baptist, whose head was kept in an upstairs treasury to the north of the choir, see Anthoine Morel (1677): "Le lendemain jeudy apres desjeuner accompagnes dudit sr Milet fusmes a la grande Eglise y entendismes la messe et eusmes lhonneur de baiser le chef de St Jean dans une chapelle en haut a costŽ gauche du coeur et y fismes toucher des petits chefs d'argent que nous avions acheptŽ pour cet effet." Particularly graphic is the account of Hieronimus Monetarius of a visit in 1494. The opening of the precious shrine containing the head of John Baptist in the upstairs chamber caused the pilgrim's heart to thump: "percussit hec facies corda nostra; et quasi stupidos et attonitos fecit," see P. Goldschmidt (ed), "Hieronimus Monetarius et ses voyages ˆ travers la France (1494-1495)," Humanisme et Renaissance, VI, 1939, 55-77 and 324-348. This most precious relic was received in Amiens only a few years before the start of work on the Gothic Cathedral--yet the designers of the west faade sculptural program did not chose to emphasize the role of the Precursor. Perhaps this was left to the experience of the pilgrim who passed by the minor and major prophets of the frontispiece to encounter the greatest prophet only after entrance to the cathedral.

95 H. Martin notes the lack of specificity about the attributes of the saints as a general characteristic of late medieval sermons, Le metier de prŽdicateur, 594.

96 I am most grateful to Mary Jane Chase for sharing with me aspects of her research on "Popular Piety in Sixteenth-Century Picardy" undertaken as a PhD dissertation at Columbia University and continued in the N.E.H. Summer Seminar, "Gothic in the Ile-de-France," Paris, 1993.

97 See especially A. Katzenellenbogen, "Tympanum and Archivolts," and D. Kimpel and R. Suckale, "Die Skulpturenwerkstatt."

98 The body of the crucified Christ was entirely replaced in the nineteenth century.

99 E. Berger, Saint Louis et Innocent , 248. The choice of images in the Saint HonorŽ tympanum may also be understood as part of the clergy's attempt to prepare the laity for the Eucharist, see "Teaching the Eucharist with Miracles," M. Rubin, Corpus Christi, 108-129.

100 Saint HonorŽ, was the patron saint of bakers. On his feast day, the Sunday after Ascension, his ch‰sse was carried out by the local bakers and pastry cooks.

101 On the Vierge dorŽe most recently see M. C. Chinn, La vierge dorŽe. Etude technique, prŽparation aux travaux de restauration, unpublished manuscript, Paris, 1985 and V. Brunelle, "La vierge dorŽe," Architecture et dŽcors peints, 99-100. W. SauerlŠnder places the figure in a loose relationship with Paris and with Reims and dates it around 1260, see Gothic Sculpture, 175.

102 See S. de Blaauw, "The Solitary Celebration of the Supreme Pontiff. The Lateran Basilica in the Medieval Liturgy of Maundy Thursday," Omnes Circumadstantes: Contributions towards a History of the Role of the People in the Liturgy, eds. C. Caspers and M. Schneiders, Vitgeversmaatschapij, 1990. I am grateful to Thomas Dale who brought this reference to my attention. The Lateran Basilica as the New Temple in the Medieval Liturgy of Maundy Thursday," where the author deals with the role of the relics of the table of the Last Supper and the remains of the Ark of the Covenant in the Maundy Thursday liturgy that projected the Lateran Basilica as the Temple of the New Covenant. It is significant to note the first recension of the Ordo incorporating various older elements dates from the pontificate of Innocent III (1198-1216). In a sermon preached by this pope for the feast of the dedication of the Lateran basilica at a date somewhere between 1200 and 1220 explicit parallels are drawn between the Lateran wooden altar and the portable furniture of the ancient Jews.

103 The author can only beg the reader's indulgence for the introduction here, at the end of the last chapter, of a complex topic that cannot be completely resolved in these pages. This material will be explored more fully in my forthcoming book on the Amiens sculpture and its relation to exegetical literature, sermons and liturgical practices. Jean d'Abbeville, dean of the chapter of Amiens Cathedral is dealt with fleetingly in a number of secondary works, but there has never, to the best of my knowledge, been a systematic study. See especially H. M. Feret, La facultŽ de thŽologie et ses docteurs les plus cŽlbres: moyen ‰ge et Žpoque moderne, Paris, 1896, 228-231; P. Glorieux, RŽpertoire des ma”tres de thŽologie de Paris, I, Paris, 1933, 272-273; Histoire littŽraire de la France, XVIII, Paris, 1835, 162-166; A. Lecoy de la Marche, La chaire, 60-64; J. Longre, La prŽdication mŽdiŽvale, 90; W. Newman, "Le personnel," 34; J. Ribaillier, in Dictionnaire de SpiritualitŽ, VIII, Paris, 1974, 249-255; B. Smalley, The Study of the Bible, 265 and 317; J. B. Schneyer, Repertorium der lateinischen sermones des Mittelalters fŸr die Zeit von 1150-1350, 9 vols., MŸnster, 1969-1980, esp. III, 510-566. reprint. Stuttgart, 1986, col. 916; P. Cole, The Preaching of the Crusades to the Holy Land, 1095-1270, Medieval Academy of America, 98, Cambridge, MA, 1992, 150-156. The intellectual climate that lies behind Jean D'Abbeville's ideas is explored by J. Baldwin, Masters, Princes and Merchants.

104 Histoire littŽraire de la France, XVIII, 165. Proust wanted a statue of Ruskin placed in front of the portal; more appropriate, however, might be a column figure of the dean in the portal.

105 A conclusion already reached by G. Durand and M. Rickard.

106 Henri de Gand's wrote of d'Abbeville, "scripsit sermones tam de dominicis quam de festivitatibus; lectiones evangelicas et apostolicas breviter exposuit, post haec apponens sermones valde prolixos, tot inductis scripturarum sanctarum testimoniis, quod vix possint memoriae commendari." see Feret, La facultŽ, 231. For Henri de Gand (d. 1293) see Histoire littŽraire, XX, Paris, 1842, Kraus reprint, 1971, 144-203.

107 The Chronicle of Alberic of Trois Fontaines mentions, "magister Iohannes de Abbatisvilla, vir honestis moribus preditus et ad predicandum optimus theologus, Ambianensis decanus...." see Monumenta Germaniciae Scriptorum, XXIII, Hannover, 1874. The transcript of the Sermones de tempore of Jean d'Abbeville, Bibl. nat. lat. 2516a, lists the Parisian churches where the sermons were preached, including Saint-Gervais, Saint-Victor, Saint-Anthoine (many times), Saint-Jacques and Saint-Germain-des-PrŽs. Although the sermons were transcribed in Latin several of them are said to have been delivered in French.

108 Bibl. nat. lat. 2516a, 1ro, "non sermone[m] exactum v[e]l subtilem prurientib[us] scolariu[m] auribus p[ro]mittentes s[ed] q[uas]i rudes [h]omelia[s] rudib[us] rudi p[ro]ponendas...." Can we recognize some of these "rudes" amongst the column figures of the south transept portal and in the portal of Saint Firmin? With their simple, sometimes jolly, faces and rough carving, these figures have generally shocked the sophisticated eye and refined sensibilities of the modern art historian.

109 J. Ribaillier, "Jean d'Abbeville, 253," where the author offers an assessment of d'Abbeville's contribution that is very different from Henri de Gand's. D'Abbeville's ideas may be related to those of Peter the Chanter and Stephen Langton. It is intriguing to find sermons by Langton and d'Abbeville side-by-side in Magdalene College MS 168, see P. B. Roberts, Studies in the Sermons of Stephen Langton; F. M. Powicke, Stephen Langton, Oxford, 1928, 170. B. Smalley, The Study of the Bible, 265 also associates d'Abbeville with Langton. The same author (253-254) quotes lines from a Langton sermon that express sentiments very much like those of d'Abbeville, "...a preacher should not always use polished, subtle preaching, like Aod's sword, but sometimes a ploughshare, that is, rude, rustic exhortation." Langton wrote commentaries on the minor prophets that may provide a background for the emphasis upon the prophets at Amiens. The emphasis of the priority of sacerdotium over regnum in the south portal of the west faade of Amiens may be understood partly in terms of the subsequent career of Langton: his role in Magna Carta and as archbishop of Canterbury.

110 Histoire littŽraire, XVIII, 169. See also the sermons of Jean d'Abbeville, Bibl. nat. lat. 2516a where inside the initial "C" ("Cum sacrosancta mater ecclesia, premontrante sancto spiritu....etc.") is an image of a preacher who lifts his eyes towards a hand extended from heaven, while his own outstretched hands express his words to a seated audience, the foremost member of which holds an open book. In this way are linked the written word (scriptores), the spoken word and the inspiration of the Holy Spirit.

111 Bibl. nat. lat 12971, Expositio Johanni [de Abbatisvilla] episcopi Sabiensis super Cantica Canticorum, 43ro. "More prophetie procedit hoc canticum, nam subito mutat personas et subito mutat tempora."

112 Ibid, 41 vo., where d'Abbeville explains the role of the four personae in the Song: Christ, his mother, the angels and the adolescentulae who participate in the narrative.

113 Ibid, 61 ro., "Anima mea liquefacta est ut dilectus locutus est. Ac si dicat: postquam dilectus meus locutus est mihi per angelum, anima mea incaluit et liquefacta est, ut sicut metallum calore liquefactum formam acciperet quam vellet artifex spiritus sanctus." The metaphor of liquification is also used by d'Abbeville in a crusading sermon transcribed by P.Cole, The Preaching of the Crusades, 222-226, esp. 224, "Et ita anima mea pre dolore, scilicet, ad mentis similitudinem cere que liquescit ad ignem, sic et deceret ut nos non solum memores sed memoria memores essemus, memorantes non solum hystoriam sed allegoriam....."