Dossal

[2] Retable and reredos are alternative terms for solid structures, as is altarpiece, all of them rather more commonly used today.

Dossal remains the usual term for an ornamental cloth suspended behind an altar,[3] probably attached to the wall behind.

More rarely, a cloth dossal may continue as a horizontal "tester" hanging immediately over the altar, giving the cloth of honour configuration typical for enthroned monarchs and others in the Middle Ages, and often seen in medieval and Renaissance paintings of the Virgin Mary in particular.

A refinement of the definition of a painted dossal is that it could be easily detached and fitted between poles (or some similar arrangement), and was carried in processions on particular feast-days.

This definition is especially found relating to medieval Italy, and the Franciscans, who are thought to have begun this practice, commissioning Berlinghiero Berlinghieri soon after St Francis' canonization in 1228.

The "Bardi Dossal" in the Bardi Chapel of Santa Croce, Florence . This is usually so called, but is an altarpiece and might also be called a retable or reredos . The shelf it rises from is a gradine .
Dossal curtain, below a painted altarpiece, Weston-on-the-Green , Oxfordshire
Green riddel curtains, with a metalwork dossal, in the Mass of St Gilles by the Master of Saint Giles