Choir Stalls

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

During church services, clerics and monks sat facing one another in choir stalls, or benches, set perpendicular to the altar, behind a screen. Their hinged seats could be turned up, leaving small supports known as misericords (from the Latin misericordia, or mercy) upon which to rest during long periods of standing. Misericords commonly feature grotesque, imaginative, and even obscene figures. Some believe that such figures embodied the perils of the world, others that they reflect commentary on scripture and theology, yet others that they reflect the medieval sense of humor and love of the imaginary.

Medieval Art and The Cloisters

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The Museum's collection of medieval and Byzantine art is among the most comprehensive in the world. Displayed in both The Met Fifth Avenue and in the Museum's branch in northern Manhattan, The Met Cloisters, the collection encompasses the art of the Mediterranean and Europe from the fall of Rome in the fourth century to the beginning of the Renaissance in the early sixteenth century. It also includes pre-medieval European works of art created during the Bronze Age and early Iron Age.

Metropolitan Museum of Art