Tomb and the Tiara

The first history of tomb sculpture, this book spans the shift of the papacy and college of cardinals from Rome to Avignon. Too often there has been a concentration on the work of individual sculptors, based on more or less tenable attributions, however, Gardner discusses the surviving or documented tombs of popes, cardinals, and important clerics in Rome and central Italy from the viewpoints of style, context, funerary custom, and testamentary wishes. The transference of the papacy to Avignon brought with it radical changes in the personnel, burial traditions, and artistic environment of the papal curia, and Paris, Westminster, and Toulouse became points of reference. Important surviving tombs at Limoges, Montpezat, Toledo, and Prague are brought into the ambit of papal tomb sculpture, and the effect of Roman sculpture with the absence of the papacy is considered, together with the problem of sepulchal portraiture.Gardner, Julian is the author of 'Tomb and the Tiara', published 1992 under ISBN 9780198175100 and ISBN 0198175108.