Chapter 7 of the Acts of Apostles recounts St Stephen’s defense against blasphemy. Confounded by his eloquence, his accusers took him outside the city where they stoned him to death, without trial. During their exertions they laid aside their cloaks, which were looked after by a young man called Saul, who was later converted to Christianity and adopted the name of Paul. In this scene St Stephen, fatally wounded, falls to the ground, struck on the head and the cheek by large stones. Four men holding stones are in the act of throwing them onto his prone body. Their discarded clothing lies on the ground in the foreground, and the man in the background on the left, wearing a green floppy hat, is Saul/St Paul. The bearded man holding an orb at the top right of the panel is an insertion of glass of c.1340, intended to represent the dying saint’s vision of Christ. Stephen’s sanctity is attested by the two angels, centre top, who carry his naked nimbed soul up to heaven in a cloth.
