Gniezno Doors - Placing The Origin of The Doors

Placing The Origin of The Doors

Locating the origin of the doors has been the subject of much discussion. It is clear that their style derives from the Mosan area in modern Belgium and France. Their place of manufacture has been argued to be Hildesheim in Saxony, Bohemia, Flanders (perhaps Liege), or locally. Swartzenski says "design and wax model, Liege (?)" but "cast in Gniezno (?)", "soon after 1127", but this date now seems very much a minority view - it was the year when St Adalbert's head was "recovered", not having been with the initial batch of relics. Another possibility is that the artists and craftsmen were imported from further West for the commission, perhaps easier than transporting the single piece of the left door, either in wax or bronze form, across much of Europe. At this time the Polish church had strong links with the Archdiocese of Cologne and the home area of Mosan art, which led Western European metalwork at this date. The question has not been settled by the discovery during restoration work in 1956 of partly effaced inscriptions reading "me fecit me...us", "petrus" and "bovo luitinius/latinus", probably giving the name of the craftsman in charge of the casting. These mean "made by" ... "Peter" ..." of ?", with the "luitinius" location probably referring either one the four Lutins in modern Poland (not all possible candidates at this date), or Lille in northern France not far from the Mosan region, or Lucino near Como in northern Italy. If the reading is "latinus", or "Peter the Latin made me", the meaning is even less clear, but this is regarded as the less likely reading. Neither name is known in any other contexts.