Passion of Christ in the context of "Anointing of Jesus"

Julian of Norwich (c. 1343 – after 1416), also known as Juliana of Norwich, the Lady Julian, Dame Julian or Mother Julian, was an English anchoress of the Middle Ages. Her writings, now known as Revelations of Divine Love, are the earliest surviving English-language works attributed to a woman. They are also the only surviving English-language works by an anchoress.

Julian lived in the English city of Norwich in Norfolk, an important centre for commerce that also had a vibrant religious life. During her lifetime, the city suffered the devastating effects of the Black Death of 1348–1350, the Peasants' Revolt (which affected large parts of England in 1381), and the suppression of the Lollards. In 1373, aged 30 and so seriously ill she thought she was on her deathbed, Julian received a series of visions or shewings of the Passion of Christ. She recovered from her illness and wrote two versions of her experiences, the earlier one being completed soon after her recovery—a much longer version, today known as the Long Text, was written many years later.

Nottingham alabaster is a term used to refer to the English sculpture industry, mostly of relatively small religious carvings, which flourished from the fourteenth century until the early sixteenth century. Alabaster carvers were at work in London, York and Burton-on-Trent, and many probably worked very close to the rural mines, but the largest concentration was around Nottingham. This has led to all the English medieval output being referred to as "Nottingham alabaster".

Alabaster, a mineral composed of gypsum and various impurities, is much softer and easier to work than marble and a good material for mass production, though not suitable for outdoor use. Carvings were made as single figures, assemblies for tomb monuments, including full length effigies, but the most common survivals are panels, up to about 20 inches or 50 cm high, from sets for altarpieces, which could be transported relatively easily, and fitted into a locally made architectural surround of stone or wood on arrival at their destination. These were attractive for less wealthy churches, and for the private chapels of the nobility. Some complete ensembles survive, showing varied numbers of panels; the dimensions of the Nativity illustrated are typical. The subjects were the same as in painted altarpieces, often including short cycles of the Life of Christ, especially the Passion of Christ, or the Life of the Virgin. Since the sets were probably generally not made to a specific commission, unlike paintings, there are fewer local or patron saints.

In art a predella (plural predelle) is the lowest part of an altarpiece, sometimes forming a platform or step, and the painting or sculpture along it, at the bottom of an altarpiece, sometimes with a single much larger main scene above, but often (especially in earlier examples), a polyptych or multipanel altarpiece. In late medieval and Renaissance altarpieces, where the main panel consisted of a scene with large figures, it was normal to include a predella below with a number of small-scale narrative paintings depicting events from the life of the dedicatee, whether the Life of Christ, the Life of the Virgin or a saint. Typically there would be three to five small scenes, in a horizontal format. Sometimes a single space shows different scenes in continuous representation.

They are significant in art history, as the artist had more freedom from iconographic conventions than in the main panel as they could only be seen from close up. As the main panels themselves became larger and more dramatic, predellas fell from use around 1510-20 in the High Renaissance, although older or more conservative painters continued to use them, for example Luca Signorelli, by then in his 70s, in about 1521. In this case he is thought to have only done the underdrawing for the main scene, leaving the painting to his workshop assistants. But he is thought to have painted the predella scenes himself.

A calvary, also called calvary hill, Sacred Mount, or Sacred Mountain, is a type of Christian sacred place, built on the slopes of a hill, composed by a set of chapels, usually laid out in the form of a pilgrims' way. It is intended to represent the passion of Jesus Christ and takes its name after Calvary, the hill in Jerusalem where Jesus was crucified.

These function as greatly expanded versions of the Stations of the Cross that are usual in Catholic churches, allowing the devout to follow the progress of the stages of the Passion of Christ along the Via Dolorosa in Jerusalem. Each chapel contains a large image of the scene from the Passion it commemorates, sometimes in sculpture, that may be up to life-size. This kind of shrine was especially popular in the Baroque period when the Holy Land was under Ottoman Turkish rule and it was dangerous and highly difficult to make a pilgrimage to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem.

The Swoon of the Virgin, in Italian Lo Spasimo della Vergine, or Fainting Virgin Mary was an idea developed in the late Middle Ages, that the Virgin Mary had fainted during the Passion of Christ, most often placed while she watched the Crucifixion of Jesus. It was based on mentions in later texts of the apocryphal Gospel of Nicodemus (Acta Pilati), which describe Mary swooning. It was popular in later medieval art and theological literature, but as it was not mentioned in the Canonical Gospels, it became controversial - Protestants rejecting it outright, and from the 16th century discouraged also by many senior Catholic churchmen.

The swoon might be placed during the episode of Christ Carrying the Cross, as on the Via Dolorosa in Jerusalem, but very commonly also during the Crucifixion of Jesus; Nicholas Penny estimates that "about half of the surviving paintings of the Crucifixion made between 1300 and 1500 will be found to include the Virgin fainting". It also appeared in works showing the Deposition from the Cross and Entombment of Christ, as well as the 15th-century novelty of Christ taking leave of his Mother.