20/01/2025
Conserved in the Museum of Santa Giulia in Brescia, the Boethius Diptych is an ivory consular diptych made in 487 A.D. on the occasion of the assumption of the office of consul by Narius Manlius Boethius, father of the philosopher Boethius.
It is a representation of representation, where the consul appears detached from the world, like a sovereign or a saint, fixed and motionless in his sober and restrained gestures.
Over the centuries, this precious artefact has undergone a radical transformation, passing from profane to ecclesiastical use in the liturgy of the Western Church.
The reuse of the diptych in the Christian sphere as a memorial to deceased or living benefactors of the Church is testified by the elegant miniatures of a Christian character and the underlying lists of names from the 7th century, added later.
Donated to the Municipality of Brescia and kept in the Museum of Santa Giulia, the Diptych of Boethius is the protagonist of this volume that reconstructs the events it was a part of through the essays and in-depth studies of important scholars who retrace its dual history as a pagan object reused in the early Middle Ages for devotional purposes.
Translated with DeepL.com (free version)
