Iconography of the Parapet Slab From the Church of St. Thomas in Kuti: New Reflections and Possible Interpretations
Iconography of the Parapet Slab From the Church of St. Thomas in Kuti: New Reflections and Possible Interpretations

Summary/Abstract: In the ruins of the church of St. Thomas in Kuti, in Boka Kotorska, Montenegro, the remains of a stone altar screen were discovered, dated to the last third of the 11th century. The preserved rectangular parapet slab, decorated with the scene of the Adoration of the Cross, belongs to the so-called pre-Romanesque sculptural decoration and represents an exceptional and to this day rare example of a preserved part of the altar partition with the aforementioned theme. In previous research, no great attention has been paid to the iconographic peculiarities of the scene, the origin and development of which researchers have linked to the reign of Emperor Justinian I (527–565) in the 6th century. This paper aims to present new reflections on the iconographic development of the Adoration of the Cross scene in the period of Late Antiquity, while opening the possibility of its earlier origin, most likely at the end of the 4th and the beginning of the 5th century, and provides new interpretations of the meaning of the scene within the sacred space of the pre-Romanesque church of St. Thomas.

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