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In a recent paper delivered at Spoleto,1 Jennifer O’Reilly discussed the image of the Crucifixion in the Durham Gospels2 as an iconographic statement of orthodox belief stated at the Council of Chalcedon concerning the synchronicity of Christ’s humanity and divinity. This is stressed in the miniature’s captions, linking mortality and immortality, and in the inclusion of the seraphim and the apocryphal figures of the sponge and spear-bearers, Stephaton and Longinus. The Durham Gospels are related to the Lindisfarne Gospels stylistically, palaeographically and through a shared near-contemporary glossing hand, and I have suggested that it is probably the product of a house of the Columban monastic familia, such as Melrose or Lindisfarne, made in the generation prior to Bishop Eadfrith’s work on the great Cuthbertine cult book around 710–20.3 A particular feature of this image that has often intrigued me is the way in which the crucified Redeemer’s face is delineated. Rather than wearing either the full beard familiar in the art of the Christian Orient, in works such as the Syriac Rabbula Gospels of 586,4 or the clean-shaven visage of the eighth-century Irish Athlone Crucifixion plaque,5 where the Saviour takes the form of triumphant high priest with clerical Roman tonsure and smooth chin and wears the lorica (breastplate of prayer), Christ sports a discreet close-cut beard more akin to our contemporary ‘designer stubble’. A similar mode of delineation is found on a seventh- or eighth-century metalwork head found near Furness, Lancashire, perhaps originally from a Crucifixion plaque or book or shrine mount,6 which was converted into a weight during the Viking age. The facial similarities are so close that these two artefacts are likely to be related in time and place of production and indicate a distinctive ‘type’. Such a feature might well be a meaningful part of a formulated iconographic scheme,7 given that few features of Insular iconography seem to be Bearded Sages and Beautiful Boys: Insular and Anglo-Saxon Attitudes to the Iconography of the Beard MICHELLE P. BROWN 278 incidental and that many have been shown, not least by Jennifer O’Reilly herself, to represent not only stylistic borrowings from the early Christian cultures of East and West, but also sophisticated responses to scriptural and exegetical writings and to the nuances of socio-historical context. The practice of shaving the male face is thought first to have achieved widespread popularity under Alexander the Great (perhaps under Egyptian influence), who is said to have banished beards from the faces of his troops so that the enemy could not grab them during the fray. Macedonian numismatic ruler portraits certainly favour a clean-shaven profile and from this time onwards beards came to denote the philosopher, giving rise to the ancient Greek proverb, ‘The beard does not make the sage’. Scipio Africanus is attributed with popularizing the habit of shaving in the Roman Republic and it came to be regarded as a visible outward sign of Roman citizenship, save for periods when Greek or barbarian fashions prevailed (for example, under Emperor Hadrian). Short stubble became associated with the countryman or wilderness-dweller, while the beard was grown at times of mourning, of public trauma or personal disgrace. The first shaving of a youth became a public rite of passage from at least the time of Julius Caesar onwards and was usually the time when Roman youths also donned the toga virilis. The barbarian North had its own customs in this respect. Tacitus commented that in a Germanic tribe known as the Catti, a young man was not allowed to shave or cut his hair until he had slain an enemy. The very name of the powerful Lombardic incursors of Italy derived from the length of their beards (Longobards, Langbarten). Numerous examples occur in Scandinavian art, for example, of leaders or gods stroking their beards in a gesture of wise contemplation,8 while the Ottonian emperor Otto the Great made a practice of swearing by his beard whenever emitting important utterances. Scripture, of course, had much to say on the matter.9 Careful maintenance of a full, rounded beard was a necessary adjunct of Jewish religious observance and a sign of manhood: ‘Ye shall not round the corners of your heads, neither shalt thou mar the corners of thy beard’ (Leviticus 19:27). Custom did not allow the beard to be shaved, only trimmed (Leviticus 19:27; 21:5), except in special circumstances...

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