Tomb effigy
Statue on top of a tomb / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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A tomb effigy (French: gisant ("lying")) is a sculpted effigy of a deceased person usually shown lying recumbent on a rectangular slab.[1] Although these funerary and commemorative reliefs were first developed in Ancient Egyptian and Etruscan cultures, they appear most numerously in Western Europe tombs from the later 11th century, in a style that continued in use through the Renaissance and early modern period, and are still sometimes used. They typically represent the deceased in a state of "eternal repose", with hands folded in prayer, lying on a pillow, awaiting resurrection. A husband and wife may be depicted lying side by side.
The life-size recumbent effigy was first found in the tombs of royalty and senior clerics, and then spread to the nobility. A particular type of late medieval effigy was the transi, or cadaver monument, in which the effigy is in the macabre form of a decomposing corpse, or such a figure lies on a lower level, beneath a more conventional effigy. Mourning or weeping figures, known as pleurants were added to important tombs below the effigy. Non-recumbent types of effigy became popular during the Renaissance. In the early Modern period, European effigies are often shown as alive, and either kneeling or in a more active pose, especially for military figures. Variations showed the deceased lying on their side as if reading, kneeling in prayer and even standing. The recumbent effigy had something of a revival during the 19th century Gothic revival, especially for bishops and other clerics.
Some of the best-known examples of the form are in Westminster Abbey in London, St Peter’s Basilica in Rome, Santi Giovanni e Paolo, Venice (twenty-five Doges), and the Basilica of Santa Croce, Florence.