Adam and Eve are Expelled from the Garden of Eden

12th-13th century
Mosaic
Cathedral of the Assumption, Monreale, Sicily

The inscription is hic expulit adam et evam de paradiso deus et posuit cherubin custodem cum flammeo gladio, "Here God expelled Adam and Eve from Paradise and placed the cherubim with a flaming sword as a guard." This is a shortening of Genesis 3:23-24. The act of expulsion is performed by an angel, as usual in this iconographic type. At left is the cherub guarding the gate of Paradise, a detail less common in images of this type.

The couple wear the tunicas pelliceas that God has made for them (verse 21). This phrase means tunics of "skins," not necessarily of leather as some modern translations have it. As in the other panels and in the corresponding scenes in the Palatine Chapel, Eve has a pair of white ribbons in her hair.

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View other panels in the cathedral's Genesis sequence.
Read more about Adam and Eve.
Read more about images of the Creation.

Photographed at the cathedral by Richard Stracke, shared under Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike license.