Article (Mirabilia Ars)
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The art as a temporal landmark in the Cathedral of Barcelona: tradition and innovation
Lorena da Silva VARGAS
Original title: A arte como marco temporal na Catedral de Barcelona: tradição e inovação
Published in
Keywords: Art, Cathedral of Barcelona, Memory.
Among the corners of the gothic Cathedral (1298-1448) that prevails in the current landscape of Barcelona, there are artistic elements left by the time from the primitive paleochristian basilica, built in the 4th century A. D., passing through the visigoth church, by the romanesque and gothic cathedrals and entering the modernity until the recent history of the Cathedral of Barcelona. Here, we will seek to lift some of these temporal landmarks given by art over the centuries and which, preserved in the temple, tell the life of the Cathedral.
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Fashion in M.S.A. 1 of the General Chronicle of Spain of 1344. Contribution to the dating of the illuminura
Catarina Martins TIBÚRCIO
Original title: A moda no M.S.A. 1 da Crónica Geral de Espanha de 1344. Contributo para a datação da iluminura
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Keywords: 15th Century, Chronic, Fashion, Illumination.
This article starts from a study about the fashion we could observe in the illumination of the manuscript of the Science Academy of Lisbon, known as M.S.A. 1 of the Crónica Geral de Espanha de 1344. We believe that this kind of reproduction reveals us the daily habits of kings, noble men and people, in what concern the dress fashion of a precise time of Portugal’s history, in this particular case, the fashion habits from the period this manuscript was made. We will use that information to contribute to a more accurate date for the illumination of this manuscript, which is now a controversial question. To give to our conclusions a bigger consistency, we will do a comparison between the fashion in the illumination of M.S.A. 1 and the fashion in the illumination of other international contemporary illuminated manuscripts.
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Register and fabulistic tradition: the case of Wolf, the fox and the ape
Claudio R. CUELLAR
Original title: Registro y tradición fabulística: el caso del lobo, la zorra y el simio
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Keywords: Collocation, Fidem, Furtum, Lexical cohesion, Systemic-functional grammar.
The objective of this communication is to analyze the purpose that is granted to the legal use of slang and knowledge of the Roman law and Spanish in two sources that tell a judicial process by theft: on the one hand, the episode on the lawsuit that happened between the wolf, the fox and Don Ximio in the Libro de Buen Amor (321-371); and on the other hand, we will analyze the roman version in which indirectly inspired the Arcipreste de Hita, the fable “Lupus et vulpes judice simio” (Pha. Ae. X) written by Fedro. And given that it is studying the log to determine the reception of Roman law and Spanish in the mentioned authors, use -the only methodological effect – the grammar systemic-functional, in regard to placement and the field, tenor and mode.
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On the supposed line of development of the medieval portraiture. From the donor to individual portrait
José María SALVADOR GONZÁLEZ, Cristina DE LA CASA RODRÍGUEZ
Original title: Sobre la supuesta línea de desarrollo de la retratística medieval. Del donante al retrato individual
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Keywords: Donor, Flemish painting, Individual, Middle Ages, Portrait, Quattrocento.
This paper aims to assess the problems arisen when trying to talk about the development of medieval portraits. Usually, we tend to think that the donor is typical of the Early Middle Age, and then, progressively, the importance of the subject depicted increases, so that finally we can encounter the Italian, but mostly Flemish, portrait in which the values of modern society, such as the distance taken from the religious principles or the human being’s feeling of superiority, are reflected. Throughout our paper, this so-called perfect evolution will be tested, by doing an initial approach to the concepts of “donor” and “portrait”, so that we can realise that this kind of expressions used by art historiography are just characteristic of narrow-minded visions which cannot be used to reproduce the existing diversity of the Art. Finally, we will analyze the different ways of depicting people throughout the Middle Ages, giving particular emphasis on the line of thought and the philosophy dominant every concept and piece described, with the firm belief that ideas, instead of mere formalist analysis, give us the key points about the human being’s representations throughout history, and in a more precise way, the medieval period.
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Byzantine iconography of The Nativity of the Virgin Mary in the light of a homily of St. John Damascene
José María SALVADOR GONZÁLEZ
Original title: Byzantine iconography of The Nativity of the Virgin Mary in the light of a homily of St. John Damascene
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Keywords: Byzantine Iconography, Medieval Art, Nativity of the Virgin, St. John of Damascus, Virgin Mary.
As a result of the fact that the New Testament mentions little episodes and provides very few details of the real life of the Virgin Mary, several pious apocryphal legends emerged during the first centuries between the eastern Christian communities, which tried by all means to solve this hermetic silence surrounding the birth, childhood, youth, adulthood and death of the Mother of Jesus. These apocryphal accounts were then assumed and interpreted by numerous Church Fathers, theologians and sacral orators. These reflections of such prestigious thinkers structured a solid corpus of doctrine from which several devotions and Marian liturgical feasts of great importance would arise shortly after. The supernatural birth of Mary, after her miraculous conception in the womb of her elderly and sterile mother Anne, is a primary milestone in her “imaginary” life. As natural fruit of these heterogeneous literary and theological sources, the European medieval art and, in a very special way, the Byzantine one, addressed with remarkable enthusiasm the iconographic theme of The Nativity of the Virgin Mary, especially since the 10th-11th centuries, as one of the most significant episodes in the life of the Theotókos. On this basis, our paper proposes a triple complementary objective. First and foremost, it will highlight the content of the apocryphal sources and some thoughts or patristic exegesis on the subject, with particular emphasis in the homilies of St. John Damascene. Secondly, it will look at some Byzantine paintings on The Nativity of Mary, to determine to what extent the apocryphal accounts and the exegetical or doctrinal reflections on this Marian event are reflected in the characters, situations, attitudes, accessories and scenic items represented in these paintings. Finally, it will suggest some author’s interpretations which seem plausible on the possible symbolic meanings underlying in this relevant, dogmatic core and in its corresponding iconographic theme.
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The monastery and the social function of religious architecture: the Cantiga 45 of the Cantigas de Santa Maria by king Alfonso X (13th century)
Bárbara DANTAS
Original title: O mosteiro e a função social da arquitetura religiosa: a Cantiga 45 das Cantigas de Santa Maria do rei Afonso X (século XIII)
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Keywords: Cantigas de Santa Maria, Medieval architecture, Middle Ages, Monastery.
D. Afonso wanted his obra maestra, the Cantigas de Santa Maria, to encompass everything that man sees and feels. And there is nothing more seen and felt than Architecture. Especially for us Religious Architecture. In Cantiga 45, the wise king presents us with a miracle report in which a knight, very affectionate to bad attitudes, wished to repair his errors and build a monastery dedicated to the Virgin Mary. His monastery would have all the rooms and spaces necessary for the monastic life.
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Between the sacred and the profane: the case of the Portrait of Dame as Saint Cecilia (c. 1720) and its sacred-profane relations at Ema Gordon Klabin’s collection
Karin PHILIPPOV
Original title: Entre o sacro e o profano: o caso do Retrato de Dama como Santa Cecília (c. 1720) e suas relações sacro-profanas na Coleção Ema Gordon Klabin
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Keywords: Ema Gordon Klabin, Private collecting, Profane, Sacredness, Saint Cecilia.
From the Portrait of Dame as Saint Cecilia (c. 1720), attributed to Pierre Gobert’s circle (1662-1744), this article aims at problematizing its relations between sacred and profane which occurs both inside the picture, and regarding its collector, Ema Gordon Klabin (1907-1994), who acquires it in the 1950 decade and hangs it over her bed.
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Musical Palimpsestism in the Sephardic traditions in the profane/sacred context in the transmission of knowledge and the perpetuation of traditions
Antonio Celso RIBEIRO
Original title: O Palimpsetismo musical nas tradições judaicas sefarditas no contexto profano/sacro na transmissão do conhecimento e perpetuação de tradições
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Keywords: Alterity, Authorship, Bakhtin, Dialogism, Jewish, Knowledge Transmission, Music, Palimpsestic, Sacred, Secular.
The aim of the present work is to analyze the reuse of secular traditional melodies from the Sephardic culture with sacred texts adapted for liturgical service, hypothesizing that this procedure works well for knowledge transmission and perpetuating traditions. Disregarding any insinuation or intention of profanity in making this interchange of melody/text, profane/sacred, a convention enshrined by a custom consecrated since the Middle Ages, the main scope of this paper, both among Christians and Jews, I resort to the analogy with the technique of palimpsest – reutilization of parchment whose primitive text has been scraped or washed off to give way to another – to understand the migration of meanings between the profane/sacred genres covering en passant the concept of authorship, alterity and dialogism of the Russian philosopher Mikhail Bakhtin.
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Idols that collapse. The memory of the cult of Apollo in the Flight into Egypt of the Holy Family
Patricia GRAU-DIECKMANN
Original title: Ídolos que se derrumban. El recuerdo del culto a Apolo en la Huida a Egipto de la Sagrada Familia
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Keywords: Apollo, Early Christianity, Flight to Egypt of the Holy Family, Late Middle Ages.
Through the iconographic analysis of two representations of the Flight to Egypt of the Holy Family, one of the fifth century and another of the fourteenth century, an attempt will be made to consider the possibility of the durability in Christian art of motifs linked to the ancient Greco-Roman religion, syncretized in the cult of Apollo settled in Egypt. Two emblematic works of this iconography will be analyzed, but chronologically and geographically opposed. They are the mosaic representation of the Flight to Egypt in Santa Maria Mayor of Rome (432) and the flemish diptych of Dijon (c. 1390), by Melchor Broederlam (c. 1355-1411). Both will serve as paradigmatic images to suspect that the presence of the ancient myths was not totally eradicated from the popular imagination, at least during the period from the Early Christianity to the Late Middle Ages. The written sustenance is found in the narrations of the earliest Apocryphal Gospels. The central theme is the plastic repetition of the presence of the idols of the temples of the god Apollo that fall from their pedestals when the Holy Child is present.
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An approach to the iconography of the Book of Hours of Isabel the Catholic, Ms. II / Tesoro, Real Biblioteca: 4 Marian Images between the biblical text and apocryphal legends
Herbert GONZÁLEZ ZYMLA, Concepción del CASTILLO BLASCO
Original title: Una aproximación a la iconografía del Libro de Horas de Isabel la Católica, Ms. II/Tesoro, Real Biblioteca: 4 Imágenes marianas entre el texto bíblico y las leyendas apócrifas
Published in
Keywords: Apocripha, Book of Hours, Isabel the Catholic, Marian iconography, Medieval Art.
This article focuses on highlighting the role that, in the context of the spread of the devotio moderna during the late Middle Ages, acquired the precious Book of Hours of Queen Isabel the Catholic. To focus as much as possible the research topic, our paper analyzes –between the many miniatures illustrating this splendid illuminated codex– only four images referred to Mary: the Presentation of the Virgin to the Temple, the Annunciation, the Adoration of the Magi and the Coronation of the Virgin Mary. We complete our analysis by comparing these four images with the biblical and apocryphal texts that narrate these Marian events.
