{
"data": {
"id": 141650,
"accession_number": "1965.240",
"share_license_status": "CC0",
"tombstone": "Jonah Praying, 280\u201390 CE. Anatolia, late Roman-early Christian. Marble; overall: 47.5 x 14.8 x 20.3 cm (18 11/16 x 5 13/16 x 8 in.). The Cleveland Museum of Art, John L. Severance Fund, 1965.240",
"current_location": "104 Late Antiquity",
"title": "Jonah Praying",
"creation_date": "280\u201390 CE",
"creation_date_earliest": 280,
"creation_date_latest": 290,
"artists_tags": [],
"culture": [
"Anatolia, late Roman-early Christian"
],
"technique": "marble",
"support_materials": [],
"department": "Medieval Art",
"collection": "MED - Early Christian",
"type": "Sculpture",
"measurements": "Overall: 47.5 x 14.8 x 20.3 cm (18 11/16 x 5 13/16 x 8 in.)",
"dimensions": {
"overall": {
"height": 0.475,
"height_inch": 18,
"height_inch_fraction": 0.6875,
"width": 0.148,
"width_inch": 5,
"width_inch_fraction": 0.8125,
"depth": 0.203,
"depth_inch": 8,
"depth_inch_fraction": 0.0
}
},
"state_of_the_work": null,
"edition_of_the_work": null,
"copyright": null,
"inscriptions": [],
"exhibitions": {
"current": [
{
"id": 300917,
"title": "Golden Anniversary of Acquisitions",
"description": "Golden Anniversary of Acquisitions. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (September 10-October 16, 1966).",
"opening_date": "1966-09-10T04:00:00"
},
{
"id": 443397,
"title": "Early Christian and Byzantine Art in Honor of Professor Ernst Kitzinger",
"description": "Early Christian and Byzantine Art in Honor of Professor Ernst Kitzinger. Fogg Art Museum/Harvard University, Cambridge, MA (organizer) (March 17-April 22, 1979).",
"opening_date": "1979-03-17T05:00:00"
},
{
"id": 180667,
"title": "Sacred Gifts and Worldly Treasures: Medieval Masterworks from the Cleveland Museum of Art",
"description": "Sacred Gifts and Worldly Treasures: Medieval Masterworks from the Cleveland Museum of Art. National Museum of Bavaria, Munich, Germany (May 10-September 16, 2007); J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, CA (October 30, 2007-January 20, 2008); Frist Art Museum, Nashville, TN (February 13-June 7, 2009).",
"opening_date": "2007-05-10T00:00:00"
}
],
"legacy": [
{
"description": "Bavarian Nationalmuseum, Munich (5/10/2007 - 9/16/2007), the J. Paul Getty Musuem, Los Angeles (10/30/2007 - 1/20/2008) and Frist Center for the Visual Arts, Nashville, TN (2/13/2009 - 6/7/2009): \"Sacred Gifts and Worldly Treasures: Medieval Masterworks from the Cleveland Museum of Art\"",
"opening_date": "2007-05-10T00:00:00"
}
]
},
"provenance": [
{
"description": "according to William Wixom, an unconfirmed report tells us that the entire group (1965.237-1965.247) was found in a single, huge pithos or jar. (J. J. Klejman, New York).",
"citations": [],
"footnotes": null,
"date": null,
"sortorder": null
}
],
"find_spot": null,
"related_works": [
{
"id": 141651,
"description": "The Good Shepherd, 280\u201390 CE. Anatolia, late Roman-early Christian. Marble; overall: 49.5 x 26 x 16.2 cm (19 1/2 x 10 1/4 x 6 3/8 in.). The Cleveland Museum of Art, John L. Severance Fund, 1965.241",
"relationship": null
},
{
"id": 141645,
"description": "Jonah Under the Gourd Vine, 280\u201390 CE. Anatolia, late Roman-early Christian. Marble; overall: 32.3 x 46.3 x 18 cm (12 11/16 x 18 1/4 x 7 1/16 in.). The Cleveland Museum of Art, John L. Severance Fund, 1965.239",
"relationship": null
},
{
"id": 141644,
"description": "Jonah Cast Up, 280\u201390 CE. Anatolia, late Roman-early Christian. Marble; overall: 41.5 x 36 x 18.5 cm (16 5/16 x 14 3/16 x 7 5/16 in.). The Cleveland Museum of Art, John L. Severance Fund, 1965.238",
"relationship": null
},
{
"id": 141643,
"description": "Jonah Swallowed, 280\u201390 CE. Anatolia, late Roman-early Christian. Marble; overall: 50.4 x 15.5 x 26.9 cm (19 13/16 x 6 1/8 x 10 9/16 in.). The Cleveland Museum of Art, John L. Severance Fund, 1965.237",
"relationship": null
}
],
"former_accession_numbers": [],
"did_you_know": null,
"early_education_description": null,
"artlens_description": null,
"description": "The Old Testament prophet Jonah is shown with his hands raised in prayer. It is unclear which moment of the biblical story of Jonah is depicted here. He may be praying in the belly of the sea monster. He might likewise be pleading with the Lord for the city of Nineveh\u2019s destruction or lamenting the withering of the gourd beneath which he sought shelter after fleeing Nineveh.",
"external_resources": {
"wikidata": [
"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q60760376"
],
"internet_archive": [
"https://archive.org/details/clevelandart-1965.240-jonah-praying"
]
},
"citations": [
{
"citation": "Wixom, William. \"Early Christian Sculptures at Cleveland.\" The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 54, no. 3 (1967): 67-88.",
"page_number": "Reproduced: P. 81",
"url": "http://www.jstor.org/stable/25152146."
},
{
"citation": "Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York, N.Y.), Margaret English Frazer, and Kurt Weitzmann. Age of Spirituality: Late Antique and Early Christian Art Third to Seventh Century. New York: The Museum, 1977.",
"page_number": "407-411",
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Kitzinger, Ernst. 1978. \"The Cleveland Marbles\". I Monumenti Cristiani Preconstantiniani. 653-675.",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "McColl, Donald Alexander. Early Christian Sculptures at Cleveland in Their Eastern Mediterranean Context. Dissertation: Oberlin College 1991.",
"page_number": null,
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1991.",
"page_number": "Reproduced: p. 14",
"url": "https://archive.org/details/CMAHandbook1991/page/n29"
},
{
"citation": "Lehman, Karen M. \"Sacred and Profane Hellenizing Marbles of the Late Third Century Roman Empire: Secular Portraits and Religious Narrative Sculptures in the Cleveland Museum of Art Reviewed in the Cultural Context.\" M.A. thesis, Kent State University, 2004.",
"page_number": "Mentioned: p. v; Reproduced: p. 109, fig. 26",
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Cleveland Museum of Art, and Holger A. Klein. Sacred Gifts and Worldly Treasures: Medieval Masterworks from the Cleveland Museum of Art. Cleveland, Ohio: Cleveland Museum of Art, 2007.",
"page_number": "Mentioned and reproduced: P. 34-37, no. 1",
"url": ""
},
{
"citation": "Cleveland Museum of Art. The CMA Companion: A Guide to the Cleveland Museum of Art. Cleveland: Cleveland Museum of Art, 2014.",
"page_number": "Mentioned and reproduced: P. 261",
"url": ""
},
{
"citation": "Fliegel, Stephen. \u201cA Walking Tour: The entire new museum wing by wing, with curators calling out a few favorite works in the collection.\u201d Cleveland Art: Cleveland Museum of Art Members Magazine 54, no. 1 (January/February 2014): 8-33.",
"page_number": "Reproduced and Mentioned: p. 13",
"url": "https://archive.org/details/CMAMM2014-01"
},
{
"citation": "Hornik, Heidi J. \"Freestanding Sculpture.\" In The Routledge Handbook of Early Christian Art.Jensen, Robin Margaret Jensen and Mark D. Ellison, editors. Abingdon Oxon; New York, NY: Routledge, 2018",
"page_number": "Reproduced: p. 74, fig. 5.2",
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Rumscheid, Frank, Sabine Schrenk and Kornelia Kressirer. Go\u0308ttliche Ungerechtigkeit?: Strafen und Glaubenspru\u0308fungen als Themen antiker und fru\u0308hchristlicher Kunst. Petersberg: Dr. M. Imhof, 2018.",
"page_number": "Reproduced: p. 304; IV.2.3 Abb. 12-14",
"url": null
},
{
"citation": "Bol, Peter, Carola Reinsberg, Renate Bol, D. Kreikenbom, Hans-Ulrich Cain, Heike Richter, and Britta O\u0308zen-Kleine. Plastik der ro\u0308mischen Kaiserzeit vom Regierungsantritt des Antoninus Pius bis zum Ende der Antike. Worms : Wernersche Verlagsgesellschaft mbh, 2019.",
"page_number": "Mentioned: p. 189, 191, 193, 195; Reproduced: Abb. 182a-b (bd.2)",
"url": ""
},
{
"citation": "Jensen, Robin Margaret. From Idols to Icons: The Rise of the Devotional Image in Early Christianity. Oakland, California : University of California Press, 2022.",
"page_number": "Mentioned and reproduced: p. 82-83, fig. 4.5",
"url": ""
},
{
"citation": "Hornik, Heidi J. \"Interpreting Select Early Sculptures Using Art-Historical Methodology.\" In Early Christians and Their Art, edited by Mikeal C. Parsons and Robin M. Jensen, 1-247. Atlanta: SBL Press, 2023.",
"page_number": "Mentioned: p. 9; Reproduced: p. 11, fig. 1.8",
"url": ""
},
{
"citation": "Chatterjee, Paroma. The Bucolic Mode in Byzantine Art : Sound, Weather, Imperium. Leeds, U.K.: ARC Humanities Press, 2025.",
"page_number": "Mentioned and reproduced: p. 39, fig. 8",
"url": ""
}
],
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"updated_at": "2026-08-01 11:36:36.147000"
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