The Tring Tiles

 If you haven't heard of the Tring Tiles in the British Museum, you are missing out. Here is one of them, illustrating the well-known biblical story about the boy leaping playfully onto the shoulders of the child Jesus and being struck down dead. Haven't heard that one ? (don't worry, Jesus revives him in the next frame). 

So you also haven't heard the one about the father locking up his son in a tower so that he can't play with the lethal Jesus, and Jesus gets around it by pulling the boy out through the keyhole? (see next picture)

The thing is these tiles, which turned up during the Victorian restoration of the parish church in Tring, are extremely old. They are probably from about 1350, and they show stories from the 'apocrypha', stories connected with the Bible but which don't make it into the final version. And their cartoon-like style makes them very attractive and funny to modern eyes. 

My favourite is this sequence below. A carpenter is being criticised harshly because he has cut a plough-beam too short. Then Jesus comes along and helps him by magically stretching the beam to the right length. The last picture shows a smiling farmer using the plough.

The other thing that comes across is that Jesus is a real pest in the stories, accidentally killing people and such. And his mother Mary often turns up with a "What are you like?" expression to make sure he fixes everything. 

Room 40, British Museum, have a look next time you're in town.