Page 139

Ch. III MOSAIC, PAINTING, AND MINOR ARTS 139 
regarded as an ingenious hypothesis. The carving was certainly done under
western influence and, particularly on the David plaque, is of high quality.28
 An interesting group of objects was found in excavations at Bethlehem in
1869. They include some Limoges work, two silver candlesticks (pl. XLIX)
and two brass bowls engraved with scenes from the life of St. Thomas.29 All
these are now preserved in the Franciscan museum of the Flagellation in Jerusalem.
The two bowls, which can be closely paralleled by one in the Louvre and one
in the British Museum dealing with the same subject, are twelfth-century
work; the other pieces are thirteenth-century. They may very probably have
been brought or sent to Bethlehem by Godfrey de' Prefetti, bishop from 1244
to 1253, who attempted to restore the equipment and amenities of the church
after the disastrous rule of his predecessor, John Romano. Both candlesticks
are inscribed "Maledicatur qui me aufert de loco Sce. Nativitatis Bethleem."
A further find at Bethlehem in 1906 was of an even more curious nature: thirteen
small bells arranged as a peal, and one larger bell with an elaborate dragon
mount; the bells are probably thirteenth-century. With them were found some
organ pipes, so they had all probably been buried when Mehmed II after 1452
enforced the prohibition against Christian use of bells. 
 The treasury of the Armenian church of St. James has the head of a pastoral
staff in Limoges work; the treasury of the Greek patriarch, a crystal reliquary,
possibly of local work, containing a relic of the English saint, Oswald.
30 There was a street of goldsmiths in Jerusalem, and Arab jewelers worked
at their traditional craft for Christian overlords. The list of the treasure
and vestments of the cathedral church of St. Peter at Antioch, drawn up in
1 209, contained forty-six items. 31 The treasures with which the patriarch
Heraclius escaped from Jerusalem must have been even costlier and more numerous.
 28. Ch. Cahier and A. Martin, Nouveaux mélanges d'archéologie,
d'histoire et de littérature sur le moyen age; I. Ivofres, miniatures,
émaux (Paris, 1874), pp. 1-14; 0. M. Dalton, Catalogue of the Ivory
Carvings of the Christian Era in the British Museum (London, 1909), pp. 22-26;
A. Goldschmidt and K. Weitzmann, Die byzantinischen Elfenbeinskulpturen des
X.-XIII. Jahrhunderts, II (Berlin, 1934), 79; and Fr. Steenbock, Der kirchliche
Prachteinband im fruhen Mittelalter (Berlin, 1966), no. 90. 
 29. 0. M. Dalton, "On Two Medieval Bronze Bowls in the British Museum,"
Archae ologia, LXXII (1922), 133-160; Enlart, Monuments des croisés,
I, 181-196; and S. de Sandoli, Corpus inscriptionum, pp. 227-23 2. 
30. Vincent and Abel, Jerusalem, II, 667. 
 31. E. G. Rey, Les Colonies franques de Syrie au XIIme et XIII me siècles
(Paris and Geneva, 1883), pp. 228-234. For Syrian crusader glass see D. B.
Harden, Hugh Tait, et al., Masterpieces of Glass (Trustees of the British
Museum, London, 1968), no. 205, pp. 
151-152 [J. F.].