Surveying the images and iconography that made the medieval church a riot of colour, this book brings together many of the best surviving examples of medieval church wall paintings. It uses new technologies to allow us to visualise these works as the artists first intended. Rosewell's text accompanies the images.

The medieval wall paintings that remain in English churches are for the most part shadows of their former selves – the rare fragments of this beautiful art to have survived not only the Reformation but also successive waves of iconoclastic zeal and unsympathetic restoration. The whitewashed walls of most parish churches belie the riot of colour and decoration that once adorned them, but the remnants of paintings tucked into corners or rescued from later layers of paint help us to understand the role of art in medieval religion. Roger Rosewell here offers a guide to the role played by medieval wall paintings, as religious, didactic and commemorative works of art, telling the stories of those who created them and those who used them on a daily basis. He also compares and contrasts religious and domestic wall paintings, using beautiful colour photography throughout.

The medieval wall paintings that remain in English churches are for the most part shadows of their former selves – the rare fragments of this beautiful art to have survived not only the Reformation but also successive waves of iconoclastic zeal and unsympathetic restoration. The whitewashed walls of most parish churches belie the riot of colour and decoration that once adorned them, but the remnants of paintings tucked into corners or rescued from later layers of paint help us to understand the role of art in medieval religion. Roger Rosewell here offers a guide to the role played by medieval wall paintings, as religious, didactic and commemorative works of art, telling the stories of those who created them and those who used them on a daily basis. He also compares and contrasts religious and domestic wall paintings, using beautiful colour photography throughout.

Major interdisciplnary study of medieval church porches, bringing out their importance and significance.

This thesis is a comprehensive reassessment of the role of Saint Christopher wall paintings in English (and Welsh) churches. Although the study focuses primarily on parish churches (where the majority of mural paintings survive), it also considers cathedrals, abbeys and other medieval buildings where such imagery is extant or documented. Welsh churches are also examined where appropriate, though there are only a few surviving Saint Christopher images in this geographical area. The investigation spans the period from the emergence of Saint Christopher representations in illumination (c.1250), to the beginning of the sixteenth century, when wall painting depictions of the saint were at their zenith (c.1500 for sake of convenience). The thesis begins with an examination and assessment of universal image function and reception in medieval church and society. This is a central issue to the study of churches, and it is therefore necessary to dedicate a whole chapter to the subject. Through the examination of individual paintings and documents relating to specific churches, the thesis then goes on to focus on three main themes related to Saint Christopher and his cult. First, it considers the role of Saint Christopher wall paintings (and other types of images where appropriate), secondly, the location of Saint Christopher murals within church buildings, and thirdly, the different methods of patronage associated with the wall paintings. The survey also establishes a long-overdue and revised chronology of the entire corpus of Saint Christopher wall paintings based on an examination of architectural, documentary and visual evidence, and on comparisons with other types of media from England and the Continent (such as sculpture, illumination and woodcuts). Most murals can be dated to within the nearest quarter or third of a century (and to the nearest century if the date of execution is uncertain).

This volume is an interdisciplinary consideration of late medieval art and texts, falling into two parts: first, the iconography and context of the great Doom wall painting over the tower arch at Holy Trinity Church, Coventry, and second, Carthusian studies treating fragmentary wall paintings in the Carthusian monastery near Coventry; the devotional images in the Carthusian Miscellany; and meditation for “simple souls” in the Carthusian Nicholas Love’s Mirror of the Blessed Life of Jesus Christ. Emphasis is on such aspects as memory, participative theology, devotional images, meditative practice, and techniques of constructing patterns of sacred imagery.