Romanesque Virgin Sedes Sapientiae Rhineland Region

Virgin and Child in Majesty known as Sedes Sapientiae from the 12th century. The mother and child are both crowned and present a perfectly frontal position. The Virgin, in a dress with straight pleats, wears a large headdress hemmed in wolf teeth whose sides are joined by a rectangular buckle on the chest. Christ raises his right arm in a sign of blessing and holds the open Book in his left hand. The rectangular throne displays a tall and slender shape typical of Nordic and Germanic productions. The elongated face of the Virgin, the shape of her mouth and the narrow shoulders place this sculpture in the corpus of Germanic Muttergottes of the 12th century with a probable origin around Cologne.