Chair of Saint Peter - Vatican City State - Wikipedia Entries on Waymarking.com

The Chair of Saint Peter, also known as the Throne of Saint Peter, is a relic conserved in St. Peter's Basilica, enclosed in a sculpted gilt bronze casing that was designed by Gian Lorenzo Bernini and executed between 1647 and 1653.

It was once used by the popes. Inside the Chair is a wooden throne, which, according to tradition, was used by Saint Peter. It was, however, actually a gift from Charles the Bald to Pope John VIII in 875.

The cathedra is lofted on splayed scrolling bars that appear to be effortlessly supported by four over-lifesize bronze Doctors of the Church: Western doctors St. Ambrose and St. Augustine of Hippo on the outsides, wearing miters, and Eastern doctors St. John Chrysostom and St. Athanasius on the insides, both bare-headed. The cathedra appears to hover over the altar in the basilica's apse, lit by a central tinted window through which light streams, illuminating the gilded glory of sunrays and sculpted clouds that surrounds the window. Like Bernini's Ecstasy of St Theresa, this is a definitive fusion[3] of the Baroque arts, unifying sculpture and richly polychrome architecture and manipulating effects of light.

Above, on the golden background of the frieze, is the Latin inscription: "O Pastor Ecclesiae, tu omnes Christi pascis agnos et oves" (O pastor of the Church, you feed all Christ's lambs and sheep). On the right is the same writing in Greek.[4] Behind the altar is placed Bernini's monument enclosing the wooden chair, both of which are seen as symbolic of the authority of the Bishop of Rome as Vicar of Christ and successor of Saint Peter.

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