Note to Anon Líkn 36^VII

[All]: Like other images in this catalogue of Cross figures (sts 31-7), the idea of the Cross as scales (skálum, l. 4; vág, l. 5) in which Christ, the ‘price of the world’ (verð heims, l. 1) is weighed, is also found in one of Fortunatus’ hymns, sung in Good Friday liturgy. St. 6 of Vexilla regis, addressed to the Cross, reads: Beata, cuius brachiis / pretium pependit saeculi, / statera facta corporis / praedam tulitque tartari ‘Blessed (tree), on whose branches the price of the world was weighed; [it was] made the scales of [Christ’s] body, and it lifted up the plunder of hell’ (Bulst 1956, 129). Pretium saeculi occurs in Pange lingua 10 as well (Bulst 1956, 128); cf. 1 Cor. VI.20 Empti enim estis pretio magno ‘For you are bought with a great price’. In a passage noted by Paasche 1914a, 130, Alan of Lille (C12th) also articulates this idea in his Distinctiones: Statera ... dicitur crux Christi, in qua ponderatum est pretium nostrae redemptionis, id est corpus Christi ‘The Cross is said to be the scales of Christ, in which has been weighed the price of our redemption, i.e. the body of Christ’ (Alanus de Insulis, col. 955). The phrase statera crucis ‘scales of the Cross’ occurs in liturgy (Manz 1941, 472, no. 942) and in hymns (e.g. AH 53, 193); on the iconography of the image see Wormald 1937-8, 276-80.

References

1. Bibliography
2. AH = Dreves, G. M., C. Blume and H. M. Bannister, eds. 1886-1922. Analecta hymnica medii aeui. 55 vols. Leipzig: Reisland. Rpt. 1961. New York: Johnson.
3. Bulst, Walther, ed. 1956. Hymni latini antiquissimi LXXV, Psalmi III. Heidelberg: Kerle.
4. Wormald, Francis. 1937-8. ‘The Crucifix and the Balance’. Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes 1, 276-80.
5. Manz, Georg. 1941. Ausdrucksformen der lateinischen Liturgiesprache bis ins elfte Jahrhundert. Texte und Arbeiten herausgegeben durch die Erzabtei Beuron. Abteilung I, Beiheft I. Beiträge zur Ergründung des älteren lateinischen christlichen Schrifttums und Gottesdienstes 1. Beuron in Hohenzollern: Beuroner Kunstverlag.
6. Paasche, Fredrik. 1914. Kristendom og kvad: En studie i norrøn middelalder. Christiania (Oslo): Aschehoug. Rpt. in Paasche 1948, 29-212.