Last Supper, Agony in the Garden, Carrying of the Cross

An example of a gentry-funded devotional work from Wrocław can be seen in The Carrying of the Cross group from the Krappe family chapel in St Elizabeth’s Church. The chapel was acquired by Johannes Krappe in 1477 and consecrated in 1492. The high relief sculptures were mounted on a wall while the free-standing figures were placed on the floor. This chapel also housed the Crucifixion Polyptych, which complemented its Passion theme.

The Carrying of the Cross, purchased by the Krappe family, most likely has its roots in the Passion plays performed during Holy Week. In those times there would be numerous dioramas of the stations of the cross and Golgotha displayed outside churches and in chapels. Such scenes enabled the faithful to form a clear picture of the events of Christ’s Suffering. They reinforced the Passion piety of the Easter holiday, and acted as backdrops for the processions taking place on Good Friday. The multi-figure arrangements located in the chapels also aided in meditative and contemplative worship, and allowed parishioners to undertake a kind of spiritual pilgrimage along an imagined route, from the Mount of Olives to Golgotha. The first stations of the cross began to appear as early as the 5th century, although the actual processional ceremony connected with them only took shape in the 14th and 15th centuries, mainly under the influence of the Franciscans, who propagated the worship of Christ’s Passion in Europe.