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Thanks for this, most informative; I knew nothing about these portrayals of the crucifixion.

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Please forgive the pedant in me, but the Italian word Duecento (two hundred) refers to the twelve hundreds, what we in the West call the Thirteenth Century. The term Trecento refers to what we call the Fourteenth Century. This makes sense when you think that the years 1 to 100 constitute the First century. Today we live in the 21st Century. God alone knows what the Italians call it.

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Aug 19, 2023·edited Aug 19, 2023Author

Yes. I live in Italy. The Italians call it "Duecento" - 1200s, 13th century, and "Trecento" - 1300s, 14th century, quattrocento, 1400, 15th century... etc.

"Duecento" (etc) is short for "milleduecento" - one thousand two hundred (the plural is implied). If you're talking to an Italian about a painting you like, you say, "Una pittura di duecento" and he will know it's a 13th century painting. Telling an Italian what year you were born is a complicated business, "millenovecento sessanta-sei" can be shortened to "millenove sessanta sei" - 1966. It took a while to get used to the idiom. Italians will give you incomprehending blank looks if you try to literally translate "twelve-hundred". They say "milleduecento", one thousand two hundred."

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But come to think of it, I don't know what they would call the 3rd century, since that would also be the "two hundreds". I'll have to ask.

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The foregoing thread on the crucifixes was wonderful and very informative. Thank you. I will never forget the world's response to the Florentine flood of 1966. It renewed your faith in mankind and the love people have for the R C Church.

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In English it is already called "A Disaster." And better yet, spoken at every Mass: "Kyrie Eleison!"

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These 2 crucifixes are among the finest depictions in all of western art. Thank you u for illustrating them.

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which?

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Ducio et Cimabue.

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We've got Cimabue on our list here, but no Duccio, sadly.

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I was musing on this theme, just yesterday, since I have been meditating more recently on the reality of Christ's humanity, & was wondering whether I would ever have been able to be brought to a similar sense of it from looking at icons alone. Thanks for the wonderful reminders of those images which captured my heart so many years ago!

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