Head of an Apostle

This is a head carved in limestone, about 43 centimeters tall, or 17 inches. The body is gone, but the face still holds your attention. The head is long and narrow, and the cheeks are lean. The eyes are almond-shaped, like pointed ovals, and they seem to stare right at you. Below them is a prominent mouth with the lips slightly parted. The man has a full beard. The face looks calm and grand, but it shows very little emotion. The nose is missing, and that damage is the first thing that tells you the head has a long and rough history.

Start with the eyes, in the upper middle of the face. Notice how sharply they are shaped and how they draw you in. Then lower your gaze to the mouth, where the lips part just a little. Next, look at the hair at either side of the face. The locks are carved into cascading waves that fall in smooth, rolling curves. Finally, look at the whole head from straight on. The two sides match closely, a quality called symmetry. That balance adds to the sense of calm and dignity. Last, look at the broken area in the center of the face, where the nose should be.

This head was made in France around 1210, and it is linked to Paris. It most likely shows an apostle, one of the followers of Jesus in the New Testament. Statues of apostles were often carved full length, larger than life, and set on columns or beside doorways in Gothic cathedrals. The style of this head matches sculpture made around 1200 for the west facade of Notre-Dame Cathedral in Paris. The facade is the main front of the building. Scientific testing of the stone shows it came from the same quarry as other Notre-Dame figures and the cathedral at Sens, about seventy-five miles from Paris.

The missing nose may hold a story. The head was allegedly dug up in the mid-1800s, while Paris was being modernized. Revolutionaries might have smashed and buried it about fifty years earlier, because the cathedral had long been tied to the monarchy. But nobody has proven this account. The museum says the sculpture still needs more technical, stylistic, and historical research before its origins can be confirmed. So the head holds a question as well as a face. Look once more at the broken center of the face, and think about what may have happened to it.