The blood shed by Christ for the redemption of humanity is a concept Christians regularly consider. Whether in the practical consumption of wine at the Eucharist or in the multiple visual iconographies seen in artwork or vestments, we understand the price paid by Christ for our redemption through the shedding of his blood.
In meditating on the meaning of this theology and its iconography, we might more obviously think of the Crucifixion or other scenes of the Passion. However, here at Watts, we like to be different.

Hand-stitching a cope in the Watts workroom, embroidered with a depiction of the pelican feeding her young.
Instead, focusing on our hand-embroidered Minster Cope in Oyster 'Shrewsbury' with Green 'Bellini' Orphreys, we will consider the lesser-used iconography of the pelican.
The symbolism of the mother pelican feeding her children is part of an ancient literary lineage and our hood embraces being a part of this grand historical tradition. First considered in the Physiologus (c.2AD) by an unknown author, we are introduced to the Pelican as a Christ-like metaphor. Indeed, the pelican’s origins in the Physiologus were documented by early Christian figures such as St. Epiphanius, St. Basil and St. Peter of Alexandria, establishing early Christian credence to the iconography. The Physiologus outlines the pelican as follows:
‘The little pelicans strike their parents, and the parents, striking back, kill them. But on the third day the mother pelican strikes and opens her side and pours blood over her dead young. In this way, they are revivified and made well. So Our Lord Jesus Christ says also through the prophet Isaiah: I have brought up children and exalted them, but they have despised me (Is 1:2). We struck God by serving the creature rather than the Creator. Therefore He deigned to ascend the cross, and when His side was pierced, blood and water gushed forth unto our salvation and eternal life.’
The pelican, known of all birds to love its young the most, cared for her chicks attentively. But as the chicks grew, they began to strike their mother’s face. In the arrogance of her children, the mother grows angry and strikes back, killing her young.
Whilst this last detail might seem more distant from the act of love we typically associate with Christ’s sacrifice, the allusion is drawn more effectively in the Epiphanius version (4AD). Instead of striking her young, the mother kills her young with her excessive kisses, emphasising the overwhelming love of the mother despite her frustration.
In both narratives, after three days, the mother feels great pain for the loss of her children and the cost of their lives, and so tears open her breast to bathe the dead chicks in her blood and restore them to life. In some versions of the legend, after the mother has fed her children, she perishes as a result. We recognise this ultimate act of selfless sacrifice for the glory of rebirth in Christ’s death and resurrection.

Altar frontal in our 'Stag' Cloth of Gold, embroidered with the image of the Pelican feeding her young.
The understanding of the pelican as a metaphor for Christ has seen continuation in art, literature and theology throughout the centuries. For example, by the Fourteenth Century, Dante in his Divine Comedy, describes the act of St John who lay his head on Christ’s bosom during the Last Supper: ‘lay Upon the bosom of our Pelican: This he, into whose keeping, from the Cross, The mighty charge was given.’ Rather than merely continuing the tradition, Dante inserts the pelican as a direct metaphor for Christ. In doing so, he departs from the parallel - similar but fundamentally different - narratives. Instead, by referring to Christ as “our Pelican,” he encourages the pelican as a symbol for Christ himself.
Images of the pelican feeding her young, owing to the analogy to Christ, were forbidden in churches of the late 17th century.
However, the iconography was not entirely censored and can be seen in post-Reformation England in the words of Shakespeare. In Hamlet (1623), Laertes speaks, ‘To his good friend thus wide, I’ll ope my arms / And, like the kind, life-rendering pelican / Repast them with my blood.’ In a tradition which would have seen these lines spoken to an audience of varied class, background and liturgical understanding, the fact that the pelican, and the redemptive shedding of blood, are so casually inserted, speaks to how accessible this metaphor for Christ’s Crucifixion and Resurrection had become, even if the pelican could no longer be depicted visually in churches.
By the Eighteenth Century, the pelican can be seen to decorate churches once more. With the changing climates in the English socio-theological landscape, the pelican had a precedent of being commissioned in England (there are different traditions of its use in the C18th, most notably in Ireland) as a less overt replacement for the rood Crucifix. During this period, the two iconographies adopted a synonymous guise, understood as two separate iconographies with a shared theology, but not necessarily the conflated topos seen in the earlier literary traditions of Dante and Shakespeare.
The Pelican from the reredos of St James Piccadilly, Lime Wood, 1684.
An example of this new tradition can be seen at St James Piccadilly. Commissioned by Robert Gayer, the infamous Anglo-Dutch carver Grinling Gibbons has reimagined the Pelican with an intense realism. With her beak sharpened to an aggressive point and viscous blood pouring from her wound, Gibbons captures the intensity of her sacrifice.
But, with her wings broadly outstretched, the maternal pelican mirrors the outstretched arms of the Crucified Christ. Their arms and wings uniformly open in an act of loving embrace despite the imminent death they both await, reminding us that this sacrifice is balanced by the tenderness of her love.
Moreover, with the application of gold leaf and the lustrous foliate carving above, Gibbons’ carving further suggests the dichotomy of Christ's suffering for the pending light our redemption that we have come to understand from the Crucifixion.
As a result, our pelican seeks to make accessible this sensitive union of theology and ancient iconography, recognising both the pain of self-sacrifice and also the redemptive light of resurrection shared by both Christ and the pelican.
After all, ‘And the Light shineth in darkness, and the darkness comprehended it not’ (John 1:5). Despite God’s love and - as God Incarnate - Christ showed humankind, the chicks struck their mother’s face. It is only the darkness of Christ’s death that exposes the sinfulness of humanity. But, in sacrificing himself, much like the pelican, Christ illuminates a way for humanity to be saved from this sinful nature. Ultimately, it is the darkness of the parent’s death that the light of redemption shines through and allows their children to overcome the finality of death through resurrection.
Our Minster Cope evocatively captures this dichotomy of darkness in suffering and the light of redemption. Various techniques and materials enhance the tonal and emotional depth of the iconography in the hood. These include hand embroidery of white, ivory, cream, and gold strands for the pelican and her chicks, couched rich red velvet for blood accents, and appliquéd gothic silk damask for the bursts of line and the nest.

Our hand-embroidered cope hood, rich in silk shaded threads and Japanese Gold thread.
For example, the shades of white mimic the expressive splay of feathers and are layered in a rounded form that animates the iconography with a tangible realism. Indeed, the pelican’s curvilinear neck, enhanced by the rich embroidery of her plumage, encourages a viewer to follow the direction of the embroidery from the downward bow of her head to the tip of her beak. There is little room for misinterpretation as the pelican pointedly marks the location of her sacrifice.
Here, in an act of immolation, she tears her flesh to create an open and bloody wound. Rich red embroidery outlines the pelican’s beak, and both emphasise the self-inflicted nature of her sacrifice for the love of her children and also signify her imminent death as a result.
Executed in padded velvet, the blood is raised above the embroidery and damask of the rest of the scheme. The subtle shading seen in the pelican’s wings is absent in the presentation of the blood. Instead, the wound and the droplets of blood that bleed from it are purposely differentiated from the pelican’s embroidered form and have a dynamic quality that differs from the pelican’s realism.


Preliminary sketches made for an alternative pelican design.
Even in alternative designs for the pelican, the droplets of blood are of an overtly graphic quality. As is observed in these two preliminary sketches, the blood is the only one-dimensional contribution to the scheme, whilst shading and gradation are utilised broadly — more easily observed in the coloured design — the droplets sit at the centre of the scheme and are boldly coloured. In short, the blood is given a subtle dominance.
As such, this graphic presentation of her blood allows us to navigate the pelican as a form of shared symbolism with the blood shed by Christ.
This is further understood below, where the three graphic and three-dimensional droplets correspond with the pelican’s young. Poignantly, the beak of the chick in the centre of the composition is embroidered over the couching, demonstrating the liminal intersection between the symbolic sacrifice of the blood and the realism of partaking in its consumption. Thus, much like congregations who gather for the Eucharist to share in the sacrificial blood of Christ, these chicks reach out to their mother’s sacrificial blood for its cleansing sustenance.
This direct parallel between the Eucharist and the pelican is neatly drawn in Saint Thomas Aquinas’ Eucharistic hymn Adoro te devote. Aquinas asks the pie pelicane, Jesu Domine, (the pious pelican, Lord Jesus), to ‘clean me, the unclean, with Your Blood, One drop of which can heal the entire world of all its sins.’ As a result, Aquinas clarifies the conflation of the pelican’s symbolism with the sacrifice of Christ and celebrates the cleansing, redemptive qualities of the blood of Christ.

A digital mock-up made for the final design of our Minster Cope in Oyster 'Shrewsbury' with Green 'Bellini' Orphreys.
The subtle dispersal of gold threads and the gold ‘Gothic’ silk damask of the sunburst reflect the redemption we share at the Eucharist. As Christ declared, ‘I am the Light of the world. He that followeth Me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the Light of life’ (John 8:12). Therefore, Christ’s suffering directly facilitates this Light of life. So, whilst the shedding of his blood is perceived with sombre weight, reflected in the choice of velvet for the blood in our cope, this act of sacrifice is edged in a glorious flame-like light that burns a path for Christian resurrection, as so beautifully outlined by Aquinas.
As a result, the continued links between the pelican and the loving sacrifice of Christ are explicit. Just as we strike God in arrogance with our sin, it is through the blood of God Incarnate, Christ, that we are revived. Whether you adopt the pelican, a scene of Crucifixion, or partake in the Eucharist, this act of love continues as Christ feeds us with His body and blood in our liturgy and art.

Minster Cope with Pelican Embroidery – available to purchase here.