The Experience of the Sacred as Place of Social Stratification: the Presbytery of the Basilica of Sant’Ambrogio in Milan during the Carolingian and Ottonian Era
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| Year of publication | 2022 |
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| Description | When looking today to the incredible early medieval monuments preserved in the basilica of Sant’Ambrogio in Milan, the audience remains quite frustrated. It is indeed impossible to access the space of the presbytery, and to thus fully approach and experience the splendid golden altar – embossed during the incumbency of Angilbertus II – as well as the stucco decorations of the tenth-century ciborium. The barrier dividing the space today seems to correspond, more or less, to the original division of the space. The liminal situation created by this stratification of the sacred space, furthermore, induces several different experiences of the two monuments and of the sacred space as such. From the nave and from afar, the golden altar appears as an aniconic reliquary, while the ciborium, representing Christ between Peter and Paul, seems to be a manifest of Roman hegemony in tenth-century Lombardy. A closer look at these objects, accessible only to male elite and to the clergy, reveals a completely different scenario: the golden altar – with its narrative cycles visible only for a person kneeling in front of it – becomes a sophisticated reflection on Milanese identity and on ethnic tensions between the new Carolingian rulers and the defeated Langobards. It is also only from the apse that one can see the backside of the ciborium, where Ambrose is represented – between the two martyrs Gervasius and Protasius – being blessed by the infant Jesus and holding a crown. The two monk-patrons are likewise represented on both sides, worshipping the trio of Milanese saints. But what kind of audience was supposed to access such a vision? Certainly, it was devoted to the monastic community – installed by the Carolingian rule in 778. But very plausibly, the gesture of the saint holding a crown could also be associated with an exceptional ritual which possibly occurred in Milan in the late tenth century: the crowning of Otto II. Accessing the sacred through the gaze and the movement of bodies is thus in Milan a very sophisticated process constructing social groups and identities. Lay people and women will have a specific perspective, from the distance, while the clergy will have access to a completely different experience of the cultic focus of the basilica – the resting place of the relics. Another perspective still is prepared for exceptional moments, when the apse of the church was hosting imperial ceremonies. The vision and the participation to the sacred space is thus a place of social exclusion but also a means through which Milanese society is shaped and constructed. |
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