The Baptism of Christ
12th century with later modifications
Mosaic
Palatine Chapel, Palermo, Sicily
On the left, John wears the "garment of camels' hair, and a leathern girdle about his loins" noted in Matthew 3:4. In the middle as always Jesus stands in the Jordan River, baptized simultaneously with water by John and with the Holy Spirit from above. On the right the usual angel with towel has been doubled to two angels with two towels of different colors. The Greek inscription at the top simply means "Baptism."
In the water at the bottom of the panel Christian baptism is symbolized by two small human figures ride on dolphins. The dolphin is a conventional symbol of resurrection (Sill, 19) or of the Christian person (Catholic Encyclopedia, s.v. "Dolphin").
The piled-up look of the water may refer to the kind of vessel in which candidates for Christian baptism were immersed, or it could reflect the idea in the commentaries that when Jesus entered the Jordan it "turned back and stopped flowing, rising up in a heap."1 The piled-up water is also seen in
this relief
in a Croatian cathedral
this one
in a Swiss museum.
View this image in full resolution.
Read more about the Baptism of Christ.
Photographed at the chapel by Richard Stracke, shared under Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike license.