Click to view high resolution image
Bishop Iso von Wölpe (ca. 1170–1231) rose to a position of considerable power in the early 13th-century Holy Roman Empire. Beginning in 1205, as prince-bishop of Verden, a town in what is now the northwest German state of Lower Saxony, he wielded great spiritual and secular authority during a time of immense political and religious tumult. In his role as prince-bishop, Iso enjoyed imperial immediacy, meaning he was an elector of the Holy Roman Emperor and, by default, operated largely independently of the emperor (and to an extent, the pope). This synthesis of ecclesiastical and lay authority in one local ruler was a defining feature of 13th-century imperial politics in the Germanies. Iso's monumental brass, dedicated upon his death in 1231, is the oldest remaining medieval brass monument in Europe.
The inscription around the edge of the brass reads: "Iso von Wölpe, thirty-first bishop of Verden ruled for 26 years. He built the monastery of Saint Andrew. He was the first to fortify Verden. He gave up the lordship of the city and besides relinquished control of the monks’ goods. Having bought the patrimony of Westen for 500 marks and more, he donated it to Saint Mary. He died happily in the year of the Lord’s incarnation MCCXXXI on the nones of August." His effigy shows him dressed in full liturgical vestments: he wears an alb, dalmatic, chasuble, pallium, and on his head, a miter. The subdued patterns decorating his priestly garments bring the viewer’s eyes up to meet Iso’s strong gaze. A crosier, a symbol of the bishop’s role as shepherd of his flock, leans against his right side. In each hand he holds a model of a building: in his right, St. Andrew's Church, which he founded in 1220, and in his left, the city wall of Verden, which he commissioned during his episcopate and which demarcated what would later become the town’s boundaries. This representation aptly illustrates his power as both religious and lay ruler over the town.