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This article argues for a rereading of the eighth-century Northumbrian Franks Casket. Rather than examining it to discover a directed thematic or symbolic program, the article considers the network of effects that arise from its complex and continually varied combination of text and images. The Franks Casket seems to avoid establishing a hierarchy of iconographic elements that would lend emphasis to a decipherable symbolic program. Instead, the arrangement of visual and textual elements on the Franks Casket suggests a concern with the modes and interrelationships of visual and written texts in and of themselves. The study reveals a remarkable sophistication on the part of its creator, who utilized narrative, design, and visual fluency to create an experience for the viewer that is remarkably independent of established models and dogma.
Thomas Klein (Tue,) studied this question.