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Pelican In Her Piety |
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CONTACT US |
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For
many hundreds of years the depiction of a mother pelican plucking at her own
breast to draw blood and feed her young has been seen in many churches and
cathedrals throughout the world. The "Pelican in her Piety" is an
allegorical depiction of Jesus Christ, representing both His sacrificial love
and his resurrection. The act of piercing its own breast is known as "vulning" from which the modern term vulnerable is
derived. Even to those who were unable to read or write this
images would have been immediately recognisable as a symbol of the Eucarist. Thomas
Aquinas used the allegory in his " Adoro Te Devote" "O loving Pelican, O Jesu Lord Unclean I am but cleanse me in Thy Blood, of which a simple drop for
sinners split, Can purge the entire world from all its guilt" |
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STONE PELICANS |
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St
Michael & All Angels Urchfont Gloucestershire Boss
featuring The Piety of the Pelican who is feeding her young with blood from
her breast |
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STAINED GLASS PELICANS |
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St
Denys Stonton Wyville Leicestershire Stained
glass panel showing the Pelican feeding her young |
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WOODEN PELICANS |
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St Warborough Oxfordshire |
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Aynho Northamptonshire Unusual wooden lecturn featuring
"The Pelican In her Piety" |
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