St. Crispin

1510
Altar of the shoemakers, City Church, Schwabach

According to a late medieval legend, St. Crispin and his brother Crispinian worked as shoemakers in Soissons at the end of the 3rd century, introducing Christianity to the poor who came to their shop. When the authorities learned what they were doing they were tortured and finally beheaded. In this portrait Crispin's attributes are the shoe in his right hand and the halberd in his left. Halberds are not frequent in the two saints' images, but they do refer clearly to their manner of death.

The image is on the closed side of one of the two wings of an altarpiece. The closed side of the other wing has a corresponding image of Crispinian holding a halberd and a palm branch, the symbol of martyrdom.

Read more about images of SS. Crispin and Crispinian.

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Source: this page at Wikimedia Commons.