Image: Tombstone for Leonas Sapiega01(js)

Description: The Church and the Convent of St. Archangel Michael in Vilnius - the Church Heritage Museum. The largest group tombstone for Leonas Sapiega and his wives Dorota Firlej (†1591) and Elžbieta Radvilaitė (†1611), made from marble and the only one of its kind surviving in Lithuania, is spectacular by its size and abundance of decor. The tombstone is surmounted with a sculpture of the Resurrected Christ symbolizing eternal life, and under the sculpture, a relief representing sleeping soldiers is set up. The sculptures of the patron saints of both wives – St. Elisabeth and St. Dorothea – on both sides of the relief refer to divine protection. Below, allegoric personifications of Christian virtues – Faith and Hope – rest on the coats-of-arms of their families. The tombstone was created approximately in the second quarter of the 17th c. according to the innovatory principles of composition of architectural tombstones, but three earlier images of Sapiega and his wives in relief, executed in a more primitive manner, were used in its structure. It is thought that they decorated a tombstone in the Vilnius Cathedral before the Church of St. Archangel Michael was built.
Title: Tombstone for Leonas Sapiega01(js)
Credit: Own work
Author: Jerzy Strzelecki
Usage Terms: Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0
License: CC BY-SA 3.0
License Link: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0
Attribution Required?: Yes