A PAINTED TRAGEDY

The murder of the Archbishop of Canterbury Thomas Becket in 1170 at the hands of trusted men of King Henry II of England had a huge impact on twelfth-century Europe. Following the events, the figure of Becket achieved great notoriety and his cult spread everywhere, also in the Iberian Peninsula, where we find texts and works of art commemorating his martyrdom and sanctification, like the wall paintings of Santa Maria de Terrassa (c. 1180). A painted tragedy unfolds the dissemination of the Thomas Becket cult and illustrates the relati...[Read more]