The stained-glass window in the back of the Wittmer Family Mausoleum in the Allegheny Cemetery in Pittsburgh is a montage of symbolism.  Like many such displays the meaning of the symbolism is not always straight forward—that is, it is subject to interpretation.  The window could be a bucolic landscape with the dove gently descending on the Earth bringing peace.  Or it could be a scene imbued with meaning, with each element adding to the interpretation.

At the top of the window is a dove.  It is surrounded by a halo suggesting it is holy. There are several references in the Bible that refer to the dove as a symbol of the Holy Spirit. Matthew 3:16 reads, “And Jesus, when he was baptized, went up straightway out of the water: and, lo, the heavens were opened unto him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove, and lighting upon him.” In Mark 1:10 the Bible says, “And Straightway coming up out of the water, he saw the heavens opened, and the Spirit like a dove descending upon him.” Again in John 1:32, the Bible reads, “And John bare record, saying, I saw the Spirit descending from heaven like a dove, and it abode upon him.” 

However, the dove is also closely associated with peace, often depicted with a sprig of an olive in its beak, as is the case here. This, too, originated in the Bible. After the waters receded in the story of Noah, the dove appears. Genesis 8:11, “And the dove came in to him in the evening; and, lo, in her mouth was an olive leaf pluckt off; so Noah knew that the waters were abated from off the earth.”  It was viewed as a sign of God’s forgiveness. 

The landscape has a river running through it.  In Greek mythology, the River Styx wrapped its way around Hades (the Underworld) nine times.  To cross from this life to the next, the dead had to pay with a coin to be ferried from the realm of the living to the realm of the dead.  The toll was placed in the mouth of the deceased to pay Charon, the ferryman.  It was said that if the dead person did not have the coin, he was destined to wander the shores of the River Styx for a century.  The “boat” was one of the images found on Victorian graves to represent the crossing from one world to the next.  Leaving a coin on a gravestone, then, becomes a way to pay the ferryman and saving the spirit of the dead from the fate of wandering in the depths for a hundred years.

In the foreground of the scene are two plants—cattails tulips.  Cattails are found in marshes and at the pond’s edge.  The cattail is a plain plant, a common plant that flourishes next to the water.  In Christianity, the great prophet—the infant Moses—was found floating in a tiny basket woven of bulrushes and among the cattails.  Cattails, therefore, became connected to a place of Salvation.  And because cattails only thrive with “wet feet” faithful Christians see it as a plant that is connected to the source of living waters—the teachings of the Church.  Cattails are a metaphor for the humble servants of the Lord who live a life of humble obedience.

In Victorian times, flowers took on significance as a way to send coded messages; this was known as floriography from the Latin combining flora—“goddess of flowers”—and graphein—“writing.”  In 1878, Kate Greenaway, a popular author and illustrator, gained fame for an illustrated children’s book of verse she wrote titled Under the Window, which delighted children.  Just six short years later, Greenaway published the Language of Flowers.  Tulips have a secular meaning—a symbol of love and passion but in funerary art it most likely represents eternal life.