of St. Vitale at Ravenna, wlicic Alul witli a iamb and Melchizedek with a loaf stJinl :is tjjics of Christ on eitlier side of the Christian altar, '-which is draped and has on it a two-handled clialice and two loaves, — and the 7th cent, mosaic at St. Apol- linare in Classe, where Abel, Melchizedek, and Abraham leading Isaac stand round a similar altar.
3. NT types.— The earliest manner of represent- ing our Lord as a solitary figure was under the type wliioh Hi- Iliinsclf liad given— that of the Good Sin /ihriil. Ill its reserve, its tenderness, its gracious l,,:iiiiy, ili,. Hgure of the Good Shepherd was cliariii iiusiir <if the first Christian art, and its subsequent disappearance was also character- istic of mueli.
This figure, which appears first in the Catacomb of Lucina in the early part of the 2nd cent, and became thereafter exceed- ingly common, was in no sense an attempt at portraiture. The Shepherd is always a typical shepherd of the Campagna, a
foundation f net) , m the soul of the I aniple<5 of tin St Domitill 1 piotureb, thir
of tile Guud Shepherd ;e and di^nit\ about the lan subject, though the gh in pagan art {eg "
figure of a sin | I
Hermes kiiupliui js 1 1 mi,
make it both a bulc ind
The theme is \aried in many wa^s occasionally the Good
Shepherd carries a kid, sometimes other sheep or goats stand
lines 1 crook, ind i life —indeed, tlie sheep a ii-bented b\ theiii&eUcs,
1 in the case of
statiK ui ihc id (-LIU will II u IS I un i ill ihe Catacombof St Lalllstus, and now standi, in the Lxtcraii Museum Pictures of the Good Shepherd have become populai a^ain m oui own time, but the> axe attempts at portnituu and \el\ far from the idealistic t} pe — it ma\ almost lie t ailed a s\ inbol — of the eail.\ ages, which represents a shepherd as Christ, and does not attempt to portray Christ as a shepherd.
The symbolism of the Good Shepherd, which had held so prominent a place in the aflections of the Church, disappeared rapidly after the 4th cent. , and was replaced by anotlicr NT type, very ditterent in its meaning, the Afi»ii\ Dei, the mystic
Lam I Divine miiiils Clirisl this IS
milk-u
itist anil iif St. .John the
ill \ \i-\v 1 In- t«'i iili'.is :ii once of |,l,,.,il ■■111.1 ClirisI 11m- l.^unli, though
ril in llir Ciniruniliol .St. DuUlitiUa
III' tlir l,;iiiili lir:iis the crook and n- |i;i-iiii-. 'I'll'' i';iiliest known in- nli-nlilii-.-il iciii oi Clirist with the Lamb is on tlir s|i.inilii'ls ol ilie .sarcophagus of JuniusBassus.w lioilii-il in :i.jU: Christ is represented among the Tliice Cliildrcn, striking water from the Rock, raising Lazarus, multiplying the Loaves, baptized by John, while another spandrel repre- sents the giving of the Law ; and in each case all the characters (with the exception of Lazarus) are represented as lambs. In the Catacomb of SS. Peter and Marcellinus there is a fresco (c. 400) of the Lamb, haloed but with no Cross, standing on r. hillock from which four streams issue. Apoca- lyptic scenes were the favourite subject of the great apsidal mosaics of the 5th and Gth cents., and naturally tlie 'Lamb, standing as though it had been slain,' became more and more the favourite type of Christ. Often the Lamb was accompanied by twelve other lambs issuing from Bethlehem ami Jerusalem, to represent the Apostles, as in the apse of SS. Cosmas and Damianus at Rome, A.U. 530.
There is sometning signilicant in this identification of the Lord with humanity, paralleled as it is by the earlier tendency to represent under the Fish s\'mbol not only Christ Himself, but also the Christian convert. Established as the type was before the end of the 4th cent., it was not till the 5th that the Lamb was pictured with the nimbus and the cross. By e92 this method of representing Christ had so superseded all others, that the Council in Tnillo (liuiiiiscxl) decivtd ' tlmt hLiuiforth
312
CHRIST IN ART
CHRIST IN ART
upon an altar, the blood flowing into a chal «. great company of angels and <
proved
t a most enduring one, in spite of the growing representations of our Lord after the Quinisext C
;, Burrounded by
3, this type has
,„^ growing use of
Quinisext CouQoil.
iii. Portraits of Christ.— 1. Scenes from the Gospels.— The earliest pictures of Christ are not attempts at portraiture, but represent His figure onlj' as occurring in scenes from the Gospels : the figure is needed to explain the subject, uut it is the figure of a man of varying type, and, as in all early Christian art, -without attributes ; the char- acter is determined only by its position and by the fact that Christ, like the Apostles and generally other Kcripture characters, is always represented as wearing the pallium of the philosopher (not the toga), a convention which has survived down to our own time, though realists like Tissot have begun its destruction. It was not till after the Peace of the Church that the head of Christ was distinguished by a nimbus : this custom began in the Catacombs c. 340, and the nimbus was reserved for the figure of Christ tUl the end of the 5th cent., when it was given to the Saints as well, and the nimbus of Christ began to be distinguished by a cross within the circle. Among the earliest in- stances in which the figure of Christ appears are those which represent Him in the same guise as that which was so common in later ages, viz. as an infant in His Mother's arms ; but it was for a different reason, since the Mother and Child are but parts of a complete scene, such as that of the Visit of the Slagi.