Lincoln "Bishops"

[john.margetts]

These pictures come from the Choir Screen in Lincoln Cathedral. The Choir Screen was completed in 1330 and was painted in, to modern eyes, garish colours. Traces of those colours can be seen in these photographs. During the Reformation, the Iconoclasts decapitated the statues in the cathedral, including these four.. The Victorians repaired the statues, assuming they were bishops and added male heads to them. Modern research, and close observation of the details, has found that they are actually female - the cathedral is dedicated to Our Lady Mary and these statues are of her and some female saints - who now sport male (bearded) heads. Or perhaps they are transvestite bishops? They are surrounded by grotesques to remind us that we may have saints to protect us, but they and we are surrounded by evil.

Camera: EOS 80D, lens: 18-135 kit, hand held, natural light.