Detail of the Effigy of Jean d'Alluye in the Cloisters, Sept. 2007

Tomb Effigy of Jean d'Alluye
From the Cistercian abbey of La Clarte-Dieu, north of Tours, mid-13th century
French, Carved in Touraine, Loire Valley
Limestone

Accession # 25.120.201

Jean d'Alluye was a knight of Philip Augustus and one of the principal nobles of the Loire Valley. His career included a trip to the Holy Land, where he acquired a relic of the True Cross. In 1248 he was entombed at La Clarte-Dieu, the abbey near Tours that he had founded in 1239. This effigy, in an attitude of prayer, was turned upside down and used as a bridge over a nearby stream. Around 1900 it was purchased from a Paris dealer by George Grey Barnard, an American whose collection forms the core of the Cloisters.

Text from the Cloisters label.