Talk:Reredos

Merger Proposal
There appears to be sufficient overlap and leeway in the use of the terms reredos and retable that retable might be best merged into this article. I'll tag and see where the discussion goes. Waldhorn (talk) 18:12, 14 October 2012 (UTC)

Definitely merge. J S Ayer (talk) 02:04, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

Disagree. The retable and the reredos may often be present in traditional architecture, but often enough one is present without the other. The over lap may be cause by misunderstanding, and the definition/identification/understanding of both would be better served by unique entries. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 108.2.78.102 (talk) 13:07, 21 March 2014 (UTC)

Agree. The retable, reredos, and altar/communion table are closely related, or at least were until recently. It would be helpful to have a good photograph or diagram of the relationship of the reredos (the large background or wood, stone or fabric for the altar) and the retable which is usually attached to the reredos and it to hold Office Lights and flowers. Eucharistic lights/candles are placed on the altar (North & South ends) or as pavement lamps (North & South ends). I consider these three items significantly liturgically and architecturally related and would like to see them presented together. It would have been helpful for me as I explained these to a student. — Preceding unsigned comment added by BCornely (talk • contribs) 03:09, 1 January 2015 (UTC)


 * Disagree. Hafspajen (talk) 22:26, 26 January 2015 (UTC)


 * Disagree. On Commons, it is a mess ! Category:Retables redirects to Category:Altars !
 * And there are also Category:Retablos and Category:Reredoses. Inside category:Altar pieces.
 * I think that the main category (or the main article in English wikipedia) should be retable. Because there are retables in no-Spanish language countries such as Netherlands, Germany and France. In France, I never heard about Retablo or Reredos. And keep Reredos apart. --Tangopaso (talk) 16:36, 28 March 2015 (UTC)

My understanding is that reredos and retable are quite distinct, although they do usually go togetherNcox (talk) 22:25, 19 April 2015 (UTC)

Article title help needed (copied from VA project talk)
Hallo, I've been asked for advice on an article title but it's not an area I know anything about so I thought I'd ask the members of this project. Please have a look at, previously Altarpiece of Veit Stoss, earlier Ołtarz Wita Stwosza. I tried Googling but by the time I'd found the church it's in referred to as "Church of the Virgin Mary in Krakow", "Krakow's basilica of the Virgin Mary", "The basilica of the Virgin Mary's (or Kosciol Mariacki) at Krakow’s central Grand Square", and "St. Mary's church in Krakow", all on one webpage, I gave up. There are only three individual altarpieces in Category:Altarpieces, which seems to suggest it's possibly not the right category or terminology - or that other altarpieces are wrongly categorised. Over to you. Pam D  17:19, 29 May 2016 (UTC)
 * There seem to be more problems: Two of the entries in this category are "Altarpiece" and "Reredos"...


 * Reredos says it is an altarpiece, and is sometimes called a "retable".
 * Altarpiece says it can be divided into "Reredos" and "Retable".

It seems to me it would probably be best to end the confusion by merging these articles, with some pointers to which terms are most commonly used in different traditions. Unfortunately this is a field in which I have no specialised knowledge at all. Imaginatorium (talk) 18:07, 29 May 2016 (UTC)


 * I am not in favor of a merge. Reredos and retable are distinct terms. The Art and Architecture thesaurus gives the correct uses of each term. Mduvekot (talk) 11:43, 30 May 2016 (UTC)
 * Oppose merge. We have dozens, if not hundreds, of articles on altarpieces (most now detached from their setting and in museums), but clearly no-one has bothered to categorize them correctly since the category was set up 9 months ago. Veit Stoss altarpiece in Kraków is not ideal, but if there is no dominant alternative will do. The usage of these words is complex, and much confused by different usages in the European languages, leading to bad translations in guidebooks etc, not to mention (I think) different preferences within Anglicanism, depending on the wing, and between English-speaking Catholics and Protestants. I have reinstated retable, which some idiot had redirected to to reredos recently, quoting a foreign source. Getty is a start, but does not I think get to the bottom of matters - try the entry on "reredos" here. In practice, there is a great deal of overlap and imprecision in the usage of all of them. Johnbod (talk) 12:57, 30 May 2016 (UTC)
 * I've done some work here, and on dossal, and will copy this to Talk:Reredos for the record. Johnbod (talk) 15:41, 4 June 2016 (UTC)

A Minor Change:
Should I publish this?

"Editing Reredos (section) - "

== External links ==


 * Britannica This link does not work, as of 8/8/2019. Error 503.


 * Alterpiece Mentions "Reredos" but the Online Brittanica does not have a separate article on it as of 8/8/2019.

I am a little wary as I've not yet altered a page so extensively. Advice appreciated.