The Virgin Nativity Cathedral
Medallions

The Northwestern Pillar, The Western Facet

Dionisy's frescoes. The Northwestern Pillar, The Western Facet

In the medallion (75 cm in diameter) there is a flower-leaf ornament against a grey-black background. The geometrical pattern is built of a circumference of half the medallion diameter and arcs of the medallion diameter with the foci on the outer circumference dividing it into 12 equal parts. The arcs connect the medallion circumference with the smaller circumference in a clockwise direction. In the smaller circle, the four arcs of the same diameter with the foci on its circumference, dividing it into four equal parts, form a “flower”. In the four “petals” there are yellow (ochre) “pyramids” with concave bases. In between there are fan-shaped “leaves” of the same colour with wavy edges facing the circumference. All the elements have traces of red (?) shading at the bases. Around the central circle are twelve fan-shaped “leaves” with a wavy edge orientated in an anticlockwise direction and a “pea” in the middle of the opposite side. The four bottom “leaves” are greenish-blue (?), the rest are blue (azurite). All the colour elements of the ornament including the wide border (3.5 cm) between the two thin ones have a white outline (white chalk ground). In the centre of the medallion there is a trace of the leg of a compass. Light green cloth folds are painted over the ornament. Condition: a partially strengthened vertical crack (2.5 cm) in the right and left halves of the medallion, strengthened loss of the white chalk ground (the eighth part of the wide border), complete loss of pigments in the central circle, considerable loss of the cloth folds. Conservation: 2000.