The European Fortune of the Roman Veronica in the Middle Ages (Convivium Supplementum) (English and Italian Edition) [Bilingual ed.] 9788021087798, 802108779X

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Exchanges and Interactions in the Arts of Medieval Europe, Byzantium, and the Mediterranean Seminarium Kondakovianum, Series Nova Université de Lausanne • Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic • Masaryk

C

University •

CONVIVIUM SUPPLEMENTUM 2017 Exchanges and Interactions in the Arts of Medieval Europe, Byzantium, and the Mediterranean Seminarium Kondakovianum, Series Nova Journal of the Department of Art History of the University of Lausanne, of the Department of Art History of the Masaryk University, and of the Institute of Art History of the Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic Editor-in-chief / Ivan Foletti Executive editors / Klára Doležalová, Karolina Foletti, Zuzana Frantová, Sára A. Hudcovicová, Martin F. Lešák, Leoš B. Mátl, Adrien Palladino, Veronika Tvrzníková, Johanna Zacharias Typesetting / Anna Kelblová, Monika Kučerová, Berta K. Marešová, Petr M. Vronský Cover design / Petr M. Vronský Publisher / Masarykova univerzita, Žerotínovo nám. 9, 601 77 Brno, IČO 00216224 Editorial Office / Seminář dějin umění, Filozofická fakulta Masarykovy univerzity, Arna Nováka 1, 602 00 Brno Print / Tiskárna Didot, spol s r.o., Trnkova 119, 628 00 Brno E-mail / [email protected] http://www.earlymedievalstudies.com/convivium.html © Ústav dějin umění AV ČR , v. v. i. 2017 © Filozofická fakulta Masarykovy univerzity 2017 © Faculté des Lettres, Université de Lausanne 2017 Published / November 2017 Reg. No. MK ČR E 21592 ISSN 2336-3452 (print) ISSN 2336-808X (online) ISBN 978-80-210-8779-8 Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, among its programmes of promotion and valorization of in-house research contributed to the development of this research project and the dissemination of its results. The Associazione Volto Ritrovato also contributed in the same way.

supplementum

committees Editors—Klára Benešovská (Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic ), Ivan Foletti (Masaryk University, Brno), Herbert L. Kessler ( Johns Hopkins University, Masaryk University, Brno), Serena Romano ( Université de Lausanne), Elisabetta Scirocco (Bibliotheca Hertziana, Max-Planck-Institut für Kunstgeschichte), & Hans Belting (Staatliche Hochschule für Gestaltung in Karlsruhe) Editor - in - chief  — Ivan Foletti Executive editors — Klára Doležalová, Karolina Foletti, Zuzana Frantová, Sára A. Hudcovicová, Martin F. Lešák, Leoš B. Mátl, Adrien Palladino, Veronika Tvrzníková, Johanna Zacharias Editorial board — Michele Bacci ( Université de Fribourg), Xavier Barral i Altet ( Université de Rennes, Università di Venezia Ca’ Foscari), Nicolas Bock ( Université de Lausanne), Valentina Cantone ( Università di Padova), Clario Di Fabio ( Università di Genova), Ondřej Jakubec ( Masaryk University, Brno), Xenia Muratova ( Université de Rennes), Assaf Pinkus ( Tel Aviv University), Jiří Roháček ( Institute of Art History, Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic), Erik Thunø (Rutgers Unive­rsity), Alicia Walker ( Bryn  Mawr College)

The European Fortune of the Roman Veronica in the Middle Ages edited by Amanda Murphy, Herbert L. Kessler,

Marco Petoletti, Eamon Duffy & Guido Milanese with the collaboration of  Veronika Tvrzníková

contents

The European Fortune of the Roman Veronica in the Middle Ages



i. the origins of the fame of the roman veronica Herbert L. Kessler

12

introduction: The Literary Warp and Artistic Weft of Veronica’s Cloth 32

Zbigniew Izydorczyk The Cura Sanitatis Tiberii a Century after Ernst von Dobschütz

50

Rémi Gounelle & Céline Urlacher-Becht Veronica in the Vindicta Salvatoris

58

Barry Windeatt ‘Vera Icon’? The Variable Veronica of Medieval England

72

Federico Gallo De sacrosanto sudario Veronicae by Giacomo Grimaldi. Preliminary Investigations

84

Nigel Morgan ‘Veronica’ Images and the Office of the Holy Face in Thirteenth-Century England



ii. the devotion and cult of the veronica

102

Aden Kumler Signatis… vultus tui: (Re) impressing the Holy Face before and after the European Cult of the Veronica

114

Rebecca Rist Innocent iii and the Roman Veronica: Papal pr or Eucharistic Icon?

126

Guido Milanese Quaesivi vultum tuum. Liturgy, figura and Christ’s Presence

136

Jörg Bölling Face to Face with Christ in Late Medieval Rome. The Veil of Veronica in Papal Liturgy and Ceremony

144

Uwe Michael Lang Origins of the Liturgical Veneration of the Roman Veronica



iii. the promotion of the veronica cult

158

Gisela Drossbach The Roman Hospital of Santo Spirito in Sassia and the Cult of the Vera Icon

168

Kathryn M. Rudy Eating the Face of Christ. Philip the Good and his Physical Relationship with Veronicas

180

Étienne Doublier Sui pretiossisimi vultus Imago: Veronica e prassi indulgenziale nel xiii e all’inizio del

xiv secolo 194

Marc Sureda i Jubany From Holy Images to Liturgical Devices. Models, Objects and Rituals around the Veronicae of Christ and Mary in the Crown of Aragon (1300–1550)

218

Chiara Di Fruscia Datum Avenioni. The Avignon Papacy and the Custody of the Veronica

232

iv. the spread of the veronica cult Hanneke van Asperen ‘Où il y a une Veronique attachiée dedens‘. Images of the Veronica in Religious Manuscripts, with Special Attention for the Dukes of Burgundy and their Family

250

Marco Petoletti & Angelo Piacentini The Veronica of Boniface of Verona

260

Stefano Candiani The Iconography of the Veronica in the Region of Lombardy: 13th–14th Centuries

274

Raffaele Savigni The Roman Veronica and the Holy Face of Lucca: Parallelism and Tangents in the Formation of their Respective Traditions

286

Raffaella Zardoni & Emanuela Bossi & Amanda Murphy The Iconography of the Roman Veronica. From the Repertoires of Karl Pearson to Veronica Route

302

photographic credits

10

I.

The Origins of the Fame of the Roman Veronica

introduction

The Literary Warp and Artistic Weft of Veronica’s Cloth Herbert L. Kessler

For Jeffrey Hamburger at sixty In featuring Saint Veronica proffering the portrait impressed on a cloth she has just used to wipe Christ’s face, Jacquemart de Hesdin’s depiction of Christ on the Way to Calvary in Paris seems entirely natural (Musée du Louvre; [Fig. 1])1. Neither of the painting’s principal visual models portrays a securely identifiable relic image or Saint Veronica, however, not Pietro Lorenzetti’s fresco at Assisi, from which the nude thieves, soldier seen from the back, and hanging Judas derive 2, nor Simone Martini’s panel, also in the Louvre, which provided the Jerusalem gate, the little boy, Mary and John3. Indeed, only a few scattered works vie for chronological precedence with Jacquemart’s early fifteenth-century painting including Saint Veronica in the Passion narrative, most notably, an early fifteenth-century Jacquemart’s painting has been much discussed largely in terms of attribution and original context see: Erwin Panofsky, Early Netherlandish Painting, Cambridge, ma 1953, p. 82; Otto Pächt, “Un tableau du Jacquemart de Hesdin?”, Burlington Magazine, xcviii (1956), pp. 146–53; Millard Meiss, French Painting in the Time of Jean de Berry, London 1967, vol. 1, pp. 160–169; Herman T. Colenbrander, “‘Scripta manent’. Jacquemart de Hodin, Painter from Mons?”, in Manuscripts in Transition. Recycling Manuscripts, Texts and Images, Brigitte Dekeyzer, Jan van der Stock eds, Louvain 2005, pp. 225–233; Eberhard König, Vom Psalter zum Stundenbuch. Zwei bedeutende Handschriften aus dem 14. Jahrhundert, Leipzig 2015, pp. 314–333; Herbert L. Kessler, “Veronica’s Textile”, in The Primacy of the Image in Northern European Art, 1400–1700: Essays in Honor of Larry Silver, Leiden 2017, pp. 125–139. Although usually considered to be a folio detached from a manuscript, perhaps the Grandes Heures of the Duc de Berry, the seriously damaged depiction may qualify, instead, as an independent “parchment painting” of the genre Kathryn M. Rudy has studied in Postcards on Parchment. The Social Lives of Medieval Books, New Haven 2015. 2 Alessio Monciatti, “Il transetto meridionale della Basilica inferiore di San Francesco (entro il 1319?)”, in Pietro e Ambrogio Lorenzetti, Chiara Frugoni ed., Florence 1998, pp. 26–55. 3 Simone’s panel was at the Chartreuse de Champmol near Dijon from at least 1791, Hendrik W. van Os and Marjan Rinkleff-Reinders,“De reconstructie van Simone Martini’s zgn. Polyptiek van de Passie”, Nederlands Kunsthistorisch Jaarboek, xxiii (1972), pp. 13–26; Pierluigi Leone de Castris, Simone Martini, Milan 2003, pp. 300–310, 362–363.

1 / Jacquemart de Hesdin, “Christ on the Way to Calvary”, ca 1400–1410 / Paris, Musée du Louvre

1

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introduction

Netherlandish Biblia Pauperum in the British Library (King’s, ms 5, fol. 16r)4. The familiar feature is, in fact, the product of separate thirteenth- and fourteenth-century developments in literature and art that, for centuries, continued to be formed into diverse patterns. The conference held at Magdalene College Cambridge on 4–5 April 2016 sought to unravel individual threads that contributed to the history of Saint Veronica and the face of Christ imprinted on her veil; this volume of the papers presents the results. Saint Veronica herself appeared in art relatively late; the earliest portraits are the fresco in Santa Veronica de Hoè that Stefano Candiani discusses here, a statue from 1313–1315 in Écouis (southeast of Rouen)5, a marginal figure in the Parisian Book of Hours of Yolande of Flanders, dated 1353–1358 (British Library, Yates Thompson, ms 27, fol. 44v; [Fig. 2]), and the Lombard manuscripts Candiani introduces6. These seem to be composites made from conventional portraits; in the Book of Hours, for instance, Saint Veronica is the mirror-image of the saint opposite her (perhaps Agnes), distinguished by her wimple 7. Saint Veronica displaying the veronica grew in favor during the fifteenth century; it is found, for instance, in the initial d that originally began the “Deus in adjutorium meum intende” for tierce of the Hours of the Cross in Jean Fouquet’s now dismembered Hours of Etienne Chevalier of ca 1452–1460 (Chantilly, Musée Condé, [Fig. 3])8 and among the additions made ca 1445–1450 to the Hours of Phillip the Bold (Brussels, Bibliothèque royale, ms 11035–37) that Kathryn Rudy analyzes here9. The veronica had a distinct history which Raffaella Zardoni, Emanuela Bossi, and Amanda Murphy examine10. Isolated depictions of it appeared on such thirteenth-century pilgrim badges as the one in the Musée Cluny labeled: signet sanctu sodario [Fig. 4]11; like the earliest representations of the Saint holding it, the relic displays a disembodied 4

5 6

7

8 9 10

11

14

Biblia Pauperum: King’s ms 5, British Library, London, Lucern 1993–1994. See: James Marrow, Passion Iconography in Northern European Art of the Late Middle Ages and Early Renaissance. A Study of the Transformation of Sacred Metaphor into Descriptive Narrative, Kortrijk 1979, p. 151. Dorothy Gillerman, Enguerran de Marigny and the Church of Notre-Dame at Écouis, University Park, pa 1994, pp. 71–84, 168; Gerhard Wolf, Schleier und Spiegel. Traditionen des Christusbildes und die Bildkonzepte der Renaissance, Munich 2002, p. 116 ff. Meiss, French Painting (n. 1), pp. 160–169; Il volto di Cristo, Giovanni Morello, Gerhard Wolf eds, Milan 2000, pp. 194–195; Wolf, Schleier (n. 5), pp. 141–142; Alexa Sand, Vision, Devotion, and Self Representation in Late Medieval Art, New York 2014, pp. 77–79. The cult of Saint Veronica is documented in the West from the eleventh century; see: La Vengeance de Nostre-Seigneur. The Old and Middle French Prose Versions. The Version of Japheth, Alvin E. Ford ed., Toronto 1984, p. 13. Both Ambrogio and Simone may have included Saint Veronica among Christ’s companions; and she is, perhaps, the woman wearing a kerchief in Jacquemart’s version of the Carrying the Cross in the “Brussels Hours” (Bibliothèque Royale, ms 1160/61, fol. 186r); Panofsky, Netherlandish Painting (n. 1), vol. 2, pl. 20, fig. 45; Meiss, French Painting (n. 1), Fig. 194. Jean Fouquet, peintre et enlumineur du xve siècle, catalogue of an exhibition (Paris, bnf, 25 March – 22 June 2003), François Avril ed., Paris 2003, pp. 30–35; Nicole Reynaud, Les Heures d’Etienne Chevalier par Jean Fouquet, Dijon 2006. Rudy, Postcards (n. 1), pp. 183–185. Scholarship on the veronica is vast. Ernst von Dobschütz’s Christusbilder. Untersuchungen zur christlichen Legende, Leipzig 1899, remains a fundamental, albeit dangerously flawed, source. More recently: André Chastel, “La Véronique”, Revue de l’art, xl–xli (1978), pp. 71–78; Roma 1300–1875. L’arte degli anni santi, Marcello Fagiolo, Maria Luisa Madonna eds, Milan 1984, pp. 106–126; Hans Belting, Likeness and Presence. A History of the Image before the Era of Art, Edmund Jephcott trans., Chicago 1994, pp. 215–224; Jeffrey Hamburger, “Vision and the Veronica”, in The Visual and the Visionary, New York 1998, pp. 316–382; Gerhard Wolf, “‘Or fu sí fatta la sembianza vostra?’ Sguardi all ‘vera icona’ e alle sue copie artistiche” in Il volto (n. 6), pp. 103–114; “Alexifarmaka. Aspetti del culto della teoria delle immagini a Roma tra Bizanzio e Terra Santa nell’Alto Medioevo”, in Roma fra Oriente e Occidente, Spoleto 2002, vol. 2, pp. 755–796; and Schleier (n. 5); Tiziana Di Blasio, Veronica il mistero del Volto. Itinerari iconografici, memoria e rappresentazione, Rome 2000; Christiane Kruse, Wozu Menschen malen. Historische Begründungen eines Bildmediums, Munich 2003, pp. 269–306; Rémi Gounelle, “Les origines littéraires de la légende de Véronique et de la Sainte Face: La Cura Sanitatis Tiberii et la Vindicta Salvatoris”, in Sacre impronte e oggetti ‘non fatti da mano d’uomo’ nelle religioni, Atti del Convegno internazionale (Torino, 18–20 maggio 2010), Adele Monaci Castagno ed., Alessandria 2011, pp. 231–251; Jean-Marie Sansterre, “Variation d’une légende et genèse d’un culte entre la Jérusalem des origines, Rome et l’Occident: quelques jalons de l’histoire de Véronique et de la Veronica jusqu’à la fin du xiiie siècle”, in Passages. Déplacements des hommes, circulation des textes et identités dans l’Occident médiéval, Actes du colloque (Bordeaux, 2–3 février 2007), Joëlle Ducos, Patrick Henriet eds, Toulouse 2013, pp. 217–231; Sand, Vision (n. 6), pp. 27–83; Julia Weitbrecht, “The Vera Icon (Veronica) in the Verse Legend Veronica ii: Medializing Salvation in the Late Middle Ages”, Seminar: A Journal of Germanic Studies, lii (2016), pp. 173–192. See: Denis Bruna, Enseignes de pèlerinage et enseignes profanes, Paris 1966, p. 50; Anni Santi Roma (n. 10), pp. 46 –49; Sible de Blaauw, Cultus et Decor. Liturgia e architettura nella Roma tardoantica e medievale, Vatican 1994, pp. 668 – 669; 748–749; Romei & Giubilei. Il pellegrinaggio medievale a San Pietro (350–1350), Mario d’Onofrio ed., Milan 1999, pp. 342–347; “La Véronique”, in Voyager au Moyen Âge, catalogue of the exhibition, Paris 2014, p. 55.

2 / “Christ on the Way to Calvary”, Parisian Book of Hours of Yolande of Flanders, 1353–1358 / London, British Library, Yates Thompson, ms 27, fol. 44v 3 / Jean Fouquet, “Christ on the Way to Calvary”, Hours of Étienne Chevalier, ca 1452–1460 / Chantilly, Musée Condé

15

introduction

frontal face with short beard and long hair flowing symmetrically on either side, and rays of the cross, albeit no halo or cloth as such. The badges purport to reproduce the “sudarium quod Veronica vocatur” documented in St Peter’s from the ninth century, which, like a sudarium in Oviedo, may not have had a clearly depicted face. Indeed, Joseph Wilpert’s description of the veronica as a “square piece of light colored material, somewhat faded through age, two faint rust-brown stains, connected one to the other”12 corresponds well to the Oviedo sudario; and the eleventh-century Old English translation of the Vindicta Salvatoris that Barry Windeatt discusses here reiterates the ambivalence. A depiction of Pope Sixtus iv (r. 1471–1484) displaying the Veronica during the 1475 Jubilee in Ludovico Lazzerelli’s Fasti Christianae religionis at Yale (Beinecke Library, ms 391, fol. 41v; [Fig. 5]) pictures a distinctly different kind of veronica13; it, too, sports long flowing hair and pointed beard, but it is a dark form without neck or shoulders, what Hannecke Van Asperen refers to as the “tadpole” type and Zardoni, Bossi, and Murphy as a cut-out, suggesting that the bearded visage was a contrafactum made directly from Christ’s face. The same basic forms can be recognized in the Byzantine Mandylion and on some badges issued to pilgrims by the Vatican’s pictores Veronicarum and mercanti di Veronichi 14; and the flat shadowy form, mostly defined by a superimposed frame, appears in replicas of the Rome icon from Jaen to Prague to Vienna15. Ugo da Carpi reproduced it on a painting for Pope Celestine’s ciborium (perhaps made for the 1525 Jubilee year) which he inscribed “fata senza penello” [Fig. 6]16. The development of the artistic representations is, then, the reverse of the narrative Jacquemart depicted. Instead of Saint Veronica’s receiving the image-bearing cloth from Christ on the way to Golgotha and then the veronica’s becoming a venerated acheiropoieton, representations of the sudarium Christi treasured in St Peter’s in Rome engendered the Saint who, in turn, came to be inserted into the Passion story, but only around 1400.

Vera icona A tenth-century text had already identified an image of Christ imprinted directly on Saint Veronica’s garment (ἀχειροκμήτως ἐγγράψαι) and claimed that it was treasured in Rome17; the Old English translation of the Vindicta Salvatoris seems to confirm the claim. Nevertheless, until the end of the twelfth century, the cloth itself seems to have been more important than any image it may have presented and was associated with a Saint Veronica mostly in the popular imagination. Writing between 1159 and 1181, for example, Peter

16

12 Die römischen Mosaiken und Malereien der kirchlichen Bauten von iv. bis xiii. Jahrhunderts, Freiburg 1916, vol. 2, pp. 1117–1121. 13 Hamburger, “Vision and Veronica” (n. 10), p. 317. 14 Belting, Likeness and Presence (n. 10), p. 221. The oldest written sources about the veronica also engage aspects of the Abgar legend; and the Mandylion and veronica were often interchanged. As Sureda points out, in 1414–1415, Lluís Borrassà let the veronica stand in for the Mandylion in the scene of Christ delivering the Holy Face to Abgar on his altarpiece now in the Museu Diocesan in Vic. See Van Asperen and, for a discussion of the Mandylion/veronica relationship Zardoni, Bossi, and Murphy. 15 Belting, Likeness and Presence (n. 10), pp. 215–224. 16 Nicole Blackwood has pointed out that Ugo da Carpi, who was a print maker, formed the shadowy face from a woodblock and then, in a play on “acheiropoietos,” worked the paint with his own fingers. On the seventeenth-century continuation, see Louise Rice, “Bernini and the Frame of the Volto Santo”, Bolletino dei Monumenti Musei e Gallerie Ponteficie, xxxii (2014), pp. 195–200; “The Pre-Mochi Projects for the Veronica Pier in Saint Peter’s”, in The Eternal Baroque. Studies in Honour of Jenifer Montagu, Carolyn H. Miner ed., Milan 2015, pp. 175–201; and “The Unveiling of Mochi’s ‘Veronica’”, Burlington Magazine, clvi (2014), pp. 735–40. See also: Tristan Weddigen, “Weaving the Face of Christ: On the Textile Origins of the Christian Image”, in Senses of Sight: Towards a Multisensorial Approach of the Image. Essays in Honor of Victor i. Stoichita, Henri de Riedmatten et al. eds, Rome 2015, pp. 83–110. 17 “Ἡ ἑτοιμασία τῆς αἱμόρρου Βερονίκης τοῦ ῥάκκους, ῆν εικόνα ὁ ἀποδεχόμενος τὰς προθέσεις Κύριος ἀχειροκμήτως ἐγγράψαι εὐδόκησεν”; see: Alexander Alexakis, Codex Parisinus Graecus 1115 and Its Archetype, Washington, dc 1996, p. 349; Wolf, “Alexifarmaka” (n. 10), pp. 775–778; Ann van Dijk, “The Veronica, the Vultus Christi and the Veneration of Icons in Medieval Rome”, in Old Saint Peter’s, Rome, Rosamond McKitterick et al. eds, Cambridge 2013, pp. 229–256. Grimaldi reports that the veronica was brought to Rome after the Resurrection; see: Gallo’s contribution here.

4 / Veronica, pilgrim token, 13th century / Paris, Musée Cluny 5 / Display of the Veronica in Saint Peter’s in Rome, “Fasti Christianae religionis” by Ludovico Lazzarelli, ca 1480 / New Haven, Yale University, Beinecke Library, ms 391, fol. 41v 6 / Ugo da Carpi, “Saint Veronica Displaying Veronica, Flanked by Saints Peter and Paul”, ca 1525 / Vatican, Fabbrica di San Pietro

introduction

7 / Veronica, Bonmont Psalter, Germany, 1260 / Besançon, Bibliothèque municipale, ms 54, fol. 18r

18

Mallius, a canon of St Peter’s, described the “Oratorium Sanctae Genetricis Virginis Mariae quod vocatur Veronica, ubi sine dubio est Sudarium Christi” 18; and his contemporary, Peter the Deacon (ca 1107 – ca 1153), referred simply to the “sudarium vero, cum quo Christus faciem suam extersit, quod ab aliis Veronicae dicitur”19. As a vera icona, the veronica’s real history started only after Pope Celestine iii (1191–1198) and especially his successor Innocent iii (1198–1216) began to promote the sudarium as an image-not-made-by-hand, a rival to the Lateran’s “Acheropita”, a history that Gisela Drossbach, Aden Kumler, Uwe Michael Lang, and Rebecca Rist all consider. Not surprising, as Nigel Morgan argues in his contribution, the earliest representations of the veronica followed no set type. Matthew Paris’ Holy Face in the Chronica maiora from the fifth decade of the thirteenth century (Cambridge, Corpus Christi College Library, ms 16, fol. 49v) is a conventional Christ identifiable as the veronica only by the accompanying words20. Suzanne Lewis rightly recognized that it may, in fact, have depended “on a textual rather than a pictorial source”21; indeed, the bust portrait may have been improvised from the description of the image-relics by Gervase of Tilbury (ca 1150–1228): “est ergo Veronica pictura Domini vera secundum carnem repraesentans effigiem a pectore superius in basilica S. Petri”22. From the start, it would seem, texts played as much of a role in the figuring

of the veronica as any hypothetical Urbild. The depiction on a bifolium inserted into an earlier Psalter (British Library, Arundel, ms 157, fols 1v–2r) follows Paris’ formula, as does the veronica a German illuminator introduced into the Bonmont Psalter two decades later (Besançon, Bibliothèque municipale, ms 54, fol. 18r; [Fig. 7])23: the half-length depictions of the Savior, bearing a cross-nimbus and sporting ringlets that fall onto his shoulders and a closecropped cleft beard, replicate a type that goes back to Late Antiquity24. Moreover, the veronica’s appearance remained fluid. In 1249, Jacques Pantaleon (ca 1195–1264) sent a painted portrait identified in the Cyrillic titulus as: “The Lord’s image on a handkerchief”, i.e. the Mandylion, to his sister Sibylle, the Abbess of Montreuil-lesDames, who had asked for a “sanctam Veronicam seu veram ipsius imaginem et similitudinem”25. As Marco Petoletti and Angelo Piacentini note, a “veronica” was intended to serve as the frontispiece of Boniface of Verona’s poem, Veronica, of 1272–1276, even though the text that follows recounts the Abgar story as well as the account in the Vindicta Salvatoris; and about the same time, the illuminator of the English Apocalypse in Lisbon (Gulbenkian Collection, ms l.a. 139, fol. 13r; [Fig. 8]) portrayed Titus returning from Jerusalem with the Temple curtain which displays a vera icona, its flowing auburn hair, cross-nimbus, slightly askance eyes, and stub-neck, not very different from the earlier versions. Paolo Veneziano included a veronica in his Santa Chiara altarpiece of ca 1320 (Trieste, Museo Civico Sartorio; [Fig. 9]); with its fully disembodied face completely encompassed by a cruciform halo, forelock, cleft beard, and long ringlets, as well as the patterned fringed cloth [Fig. 10], it recalls such Byzantine Mandylions as the one Jacques Pantaleon sent his sister as a veronica and may well represent a translation to Italy of the eastern tradition26. Marc Sureda points out that, even within the confined image ecology of the Crown of Aragon and despite King Martin’s privileged Barcelona “veronica”, morphological diversity and the easy interchange of miraculous images remained characteristic. The range of visual expression may be understood as a form of dissimulation. In his highly influential De Trinitate, Augustine had already embraced variety of portraiture as proof that God is unrepresentable and that all depictions of Jesus are mere human contrivance:

introduction

“For even the countenance of our Lord Himself in the flesh is variously fancied by the diversity of countless imaginations, which yet was one, whatever it was. Nor in our faith which we have of our Lord Jesus Christ, is that wholesome which the mind imagines for itself, perhaps far other than the reality”27. 18 Peter Mallius, Descriptio Basilicae Vaticanae, Roberto Valentini, Giuseppe Zucchetti eds, Rome 1946, vol. 3, p. 210; van Dijk, “Veronica” (n. 17), p. 245. 19 Liber de locis sanctis; pl 173.1121. 20 Suzanne Lewis, The Art of Matthew Paris in the Chronica Majora, Berkeley 1987, pp. 126–131; Il volto (n. 10), pp. 169–172; Herbert L. Kessler, “Christ’s Dazzling Dark Face”, in Intorno al Sacro Volto. Genova, Bisanzio e il Mediterraneo (secoli xi–xiv), A. R. Calderoni Masetti, Colette Dufour Bozzo, Gerhard Wolf eds, Venice 2007, pp. 231–246; Paul Binski, “The Faces of Christ in Matthew Paris’s Chronica Majora”, in Tributes in Honor of James H. Marrow: Studies in Painting and Manuscript Illumination of the Late Middle Ages and Northern Renaissance, Jeffrey Hamburger, Anne S. Korteweg eds, London 2006, pp. 85– 92; Rudy, Postcards (n. 1), pp. 44–48. 21 Lewis, Matthew Paris (n. 20), p. 129. 22 Gervase of Tilbury, Otia Imperialia. Recreation for an Emperor, S. E. Banks, J. W. Binns eds and trans., Oxford 2002, pp. 604– 607. 23 See: Ann-Barbara Franzen-Blumer, “Zisterziensermystik im ‘Bonmont-Psalter’: Ms. 54 der Bibliothèque Municipale von Besançon”, Kunst + Architektur in der Schweiz, li (2000), pp. 21–28; Sand, Vision (n. 6), pp. 52–59. 24 See: Martin Büchsel, Die Entstehung des Christusporträts. Bildarchäologie stat Bildhypnose, Mainz am Rhein 2003. 25 André Grabar, La sainte face de Laon. Le Mandylion dans l’art orthodoxe, Prague 1931; Annemarie Weyl Carr,“Images. Expressions of Faith and Power”,in Byzantium. Faith and Power (1261–1557), Helen C. Evans ed., New York 2004, pp. 174– 175. Jean-Michel Sansterre’s careful reading of the letter accompanying the gift indicates that the reference is not to the veronica in Rome but rather to the face depicted in the Mandylion: “Deux témoignages sur la Sainte Face de Laon au xiiie siècle?”, Revue belge de philologie et d’histoire, lxxxvi (2008), pp. 273–285. 26 On the relationship to the Mandylion, see Stephen Perkinson, The Likeness of the King. A Prehistory of Portraiture in Late Medieval France, Chicago and London 2009, pp. 75– 83 and Rist’s contribution to this volume. 27 “Nam et ipsius facies dominicae carnis innumerabilium cogitationum diuersitate uariatur et fingitur, quae tamen una erat quaecumque erat. Neque in fide nostra quam de domino iesu christo habemus illud salubre est quod sibi animus fingit longe fortasse aliter quam res habet”; De trinitate, viii.4, (Corpus Christianorum Series Latina, vol. 50), p. 276; W. J. Mountain, F. Gloriae ed., Turnhout 1968; A. W. Haddan trans., Edinburgh 1873, p. 209.

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20

Eight centuries later, Gervase of Tilbury maintained that, despite apparent differences, the various acheiropoieta he knew in Rome were essentially identical to one another: “If you carefully examine [the Lateran ‘acheropita’] you will find that it is not unlike the Veronica in St Peter’s basilica, or the portrait which is inside the oratory of St Lawrence, or the Image of Lucca”28. The grossi issued in Lucca that Kumler introduces make this claim vivid and real; except for the inscription: s. vvlt de luca, the impressed face would be taken as Rome’s veronica. As Windeatt and Raffaele Savigny demonstrate here, Gervase’s differentiation and assimilation of the various types also reflected an agenda of recognizing Roman priority even while distinguishing a local cult. The same malleability may explain the exceptional variation of the veronica itself. Parmigianino’s sketch for the St Peter’s altarpiece (Florence, Galleria degli Uffizi; [Fig. 11]), for example, is distinctly different from Ugo da Carpi’s final version (Vatican, Fabbrica di San Pietro; [Fig. 6]). The one captures the visage’s emergence from the shadows and its dissolution into the bright light, a shift that Julian of Norwich noted in a text Windeatt introduces and that Zardoni, Bossi, and Murphy discuss in connection with actual light and dark faces. By contrast, Ugo da Carpi’s official realization replicates the original’s 28 “Quod si diligenter uultum dominicum […] attendas, non absimilem Veronice basilice sancti Petri, eiue picture que in ipso sancti Laurentii est oratorio, Vultuique Lucano reperies”; Otia Imperialia (n. 22), pp. 606– 607.

8 / Vespasian Receiving the Veronica, Apocalypse, England, ca 1265–1270 / Lisbon, Gulbenkian Collection, ms l.a. 139, fol. 13r 9 / Paolo Veneziano, Veronica, detail of Santa Chiara triptych, ca 1320 / Trieste, Museo Civico Sartorio 10 / Paolo Veneziano, Life of Christ, Santa Chiara triptych, San Cipriano monastery, ca 1320 / Trieste, Museo Civico Sartorio

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defining matrix which asserts the image in the cloth’s ineffability. Giacomo Grimaldi’s sketchy albeit archeological rendering discussed by Federico Gallo, in turn, reverts to Parmigianino’s mode. Unlike modern scholars who attempt to deduce Christ’s portrait by folding, flipping, and photo-shopping the Shroud of Turin, Manopello Christ, and other allegedly “true” faces, medieval and early modern authors and image-makers conformed to the Augustinian argument that no single portrait captured the divine likeness and so accepted various claimants of vera icona 29. Because of the wide morphological diversity, whether or not a portrait of Christ was meant to represent Saint Veronica’s image is often uncertain. Jacquemart’s own drawing of Christ’s face in a boxwood sketchbook in the Morgan Library in New York, for instance, may have nothing to do with the veronica 30; and a Florentine panel, also in New York (Metropolitan Museum of Art), certainly does not refer directly to the Roman relic-image, even though it includes two angels supporting a cloth of honor behind the bust-length depiction31. The veronica’s ground also varied. Some ornaments suggested eastern origins32; others indexed seal impressions and, in turn, the Eucharist33; still others sought to convey a shifting iridescence. Paris’ veronica is framed and set against a patterned ground34; but, in general, the veronica’s cloth is simpler, most often an unadorned fabric or, as in the Liber Regulae dell’Ospedale romano di Santo Spirito in Sassia (Rome, Archivio di Stato di Roma) that Étienne Doublier and Gisela Drossbach discuss, a dazzling gold leaf. This may be because the veronica was generally understood to have been impressed on Saint Veronica’s garment and not, as in Byzantium, on a handkerchief. The Psalter of Yolande of Flanders, for instance, pictures the face on a white fabric that resembles Saint’s garments; while Robert Campin set a dark, impressionistic visage against a diaphanous gold fabric, probably gazzatum; folded into twenty squares, the same textile used also in Saint Veronica’s headdress [Fig. 12] 35. Van Asperen shows that, when copies of the veronica were circulated independently, the ground was often parchment; perhaps this was meant to imitate cloth or to emphasize the carnality of the support for the divine face 36.

Texts and Contexts Beginning with Matthew Paris, the common means for securing the veronica’s identity was to attach it to one of the prayers directed to the miraculous image-relic in Rome. In Paris’ Chronica Majora, for instance, the veronica is accompanied by the Deus qui nobis signati, of uncertain authorship but generally ascribed to Pope Innocent iii: “Oh God, who has willed for us as a memorial your image on the sudarium, at the request of the blessed Veronica, grant us, illumined by the splendor of your face, present to us here on earth as if in a mirror

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29 A short time before that, Innocent iii had had the seventh-century Sancta Sanctorum painting of the enthroned Emmanuel framed so that the head was outlined in precious metal, just as the Mandylions and Veronica are, and as later versions codify. 30 See: Robert Scheller, Exemplum: Model-Book Drawings and the Practice of Artistic Transmission in the Middle Ages (220 bc – c. 1470), Amsterdam 1995, pp. 219–225. 31 Miklòs Boskovits. Pittura fiorentina alla vigilia del Rinascimento, 1370–1400. Florence 1975, p. 370. 32 See Catherine Jolivet-Lévy, “Note sur la représentation du Mandylion dans les églises byzantines de Cappadoce”, in Intorno al Sacro Volto (n. 20), pp. 137–144. 33 Alexei Lidov, “Holy Face, Holy Script, Holy Gate. Revealing the Edessa Paradigm in Christian Imagery”, in Intorno al Sacro Volto (n. 20), pp. 145–162; see also Kumler and Zardoni, Bossi, and Murphy in this volume. 34 The one in the Chronica Maiora is actually pasted onto the page; Lewis, Matthew Paris (n. 20), p. 126. 35 See Wolf, Schleier (n. 5), pp. 210 –211. From gaz, Persian for raw silk, gazzatum was first mentioned in 1279 associated with Gaza and, hence, Palestine; see Charles du Fresne Du Cange, Glossarium mediae et infimae Latinitatis, 10 vols, Niort 1883–1887, vol. 4, col. 49b. One thinks of the Manopello Christ in this connection; Heinrich Pfeiffer, Il volto santo di Manoppello, Pescara 2000. On transparent veronicas, see the Zardoni, Bossi, and Murphy contribution. 36 See: Herbert L. Kessler,“Configuring the Invisible by Copying the Holy Face,”in The Holy Face and the Paradox of Representation, Herbert L. Kessler, Gerhard Wolf eds, Bologna 1998, pp. 129–151 (reprinted in Spiritual Seeing. Picturing God’s Invisibility in Medieval Art, Philadelphia 2000, pp. 64– 87).

11 / Parmigianino, Saint Veronica Displaying Veronica, Flanked by Saints Peter and Paul, sketch for Saint Peter’s altarpiece, 1524 / Florence, Galleria degli Uffizi 12 / Robert Campin, Saint Veronica Holding Veronica, c. 1420 / Frankfurt, Städel Museum

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and in a mysterious way, that by your Passion and cross, while venerating, honoring, and adoring your face, we may, one day be able to see you without fear face to face when you come before us as judge”37.

The words activated the veronica’s power as Kumler underscores; indeed, recycling a cliché about images’ capacity to engender affect, Paris asserted that for the veronica to be most effective, devotions had to be recited in front of the image: “Therefore, many people recommend these prayers with associated verses to memory so that in this way their devotion is increased through illustrated pictures”38. Likewise, the popular Legenda aurea of Jacobus de Voragine (1228–1298) has Tiberius’ agent Volusian try to buy the vera icona “for gold or silver” to which Saint Veronica replies, “only true piety can make it effective”39. In this way, the vera icona participates in a process analogous to the one Tim Ingold has called “textility”, not of making but of reception40; text alludes to image and image to text and, together, the two engage the view/reader in a process that enlivens and empowers one another. The Bonmont Psalter realizes the interweaving perfectly; the face is impressed on a “cloth” comprising Psalms and the papal prayer so that, as Alexa Sand has shown “to read the word, the eye must pass across the very image it describes”41. Image is the warp, text the weft. Although the annual procession Innocent iii instituted in Rome tethered the veronica to the feast of the Wedding at Cana, the reference to the Passion in the prayer attributed to the Pope reflects a growing inclination to associate it with Christ’s sacrificial death and, in turn, with the Jews; as Windeatt points out, so did the link to Vespasian. The Gulbenkian picture, for instance, was cued by Berengaudus’s claim that “the opening of the sixth seal refers to the rejection of the Jews and the calling of the gentiles” and features the mourning “daughters of Jerusalem” who watch the Jewish men being slaughtered and pushed into the Tiber. In his Chronicon episcopi, Sicard of Cremona (1155–1215) reported that “the sudarium of Veronica was transported to Rome from Jerusalem, and it cured Tiberius from leprosy, and was accomplished against the Jews for the death of Christ, and the leaders of the priests were destroyed and killed by Titus and Vespasian”42. Jacquemart built on the legend, featuring Caiphas and his predecessor Annas at the center of composition, the “leaders of the priests” destined soon to be killed. During the fourteenth century, the association with the Passion was cemented when the veronica was entered among the arma Christi as Windeatt discusses. Thence, it was incorporated into the increasingly popular Mass of St. Gregory which tethered it to the Eucharistic wafer 43, a relationship that Kumler traces in the very notion of impression.

Saint Veronica

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The tradition of using the veronica as Saint Veronica’s attribute may, like that of the independent veronicas, derive from Saint Peter’s where tokens and badges were issued that picture the woman displaying the vera icona 44. Difficult to date, the latter typically show the Saint wearing a wimple and grasping the cloth by its upper corners so that the miraculous image on it becomes the clear focus of attention, perhaps as Jörg Bölling and Chiara Di Fruscia document in this volume, imitating the relic’s actual display by pope and canons in Saint Peter’s (cf. [Fig. 5]). The “authorized”images may account for the iconographic uniformity of the early representations in Lombardy, Ecouis, and elsewhere45. Other souvenirs show the Saint with her cloth flanked by the apostles Peter and Paul, as Doublier and Rémi Gounelle and Céline Urlacher-Becht explain; affirming the motif’s essential Romanness46. And ultimately, Van Asperen and Sureda demonstrate, Saint and cloth were merged so that Veronica is, herself, assimilated to the icon.

For all her association with Rome, Saint Veronica had a special relationship to France47; according to the so-called Vindicta Salvatoris, after she delivered the cloth to the Emperor Vespasian, the Saint left the Eternal City traveled through Northern Italy and Milan, reaching Poitiers and then withdrawing to Aquitaine where she died and was interred (in Soulac, near Bordeaux)48. The cult surely accounts for the late twelfth-century French translation of the early medieval Vindicta Salvatoris (La Vengeance de Nostre-Seigneur, ca 1190)49, and other texts that Windeatt treats: Robert de Boron’s Joseph of Arimathea (ca 1200)50 and Roger d’Argenteuil’s Bible en françois (ca 1265), as well as late medieval enactments of the story known as the Mystères de la Passion51. It may have been because of Saint Veronica’s veneration in his homeland that Philippe Auguste (1165–1223) was shown the veronica when he visited Saint Peter’s in 119152, and that, half a century later, Juliana of Cornillon (d. 1258), the instigator of the Feast of Corpus Christi, also cherished a veronica53. The Hours of Yolande of Flanders includes Saint Veronica on the same page as Saint Louis and Saint Denis; indeed, the composition constructs a visual pun from two French saints: Saint Denis holds his own head and Saint Veronica proffers Christ’s (impressed on her veil). Several fourteenth-century pilgrim badges unearthed in France feature Saint Veronica displaying the cloth (beside kneeling devotees)54; and, although as Di Fruscia and Doublier discuss, 37 “Deus qui nobis signatis vultus tui lumine memoriale tuum ad instanciam Veronice ymaginem tuam sudario impressam relinquere voluisti, per passionem et crucem tuam et sanctum sudarium tuum tribue nobis, ut ita nunc in terris per speculum in enygmate venerari adorare honorare ipsam valeamus ut te tunc facie ad faciem venientem super nos iudicem securi videamus Dominum nostrum Jesum Christum. Amen”. See: Solange Corbin, “Les Offices de la Sainte Face”, Bulletin des études portugaises et de l’Institut français au Portugal, xi (1947), pp. 1–65; Flora Lewis, “Rewarding Devotion: Indulgences and the Promotion of Images”, in The Church and The Arts, Diana Wood ed., (Studies in Church History 28), Oxford 1995, pp. 179–194; Christoph Egger, “Papst Innocenz iii. und die Veronica. Geschichte, Theologie, Liturgie und Seelsorge”, in The Holy Face (n. 36), pp.181–203; Il volto (n. 6), pp. 172– 173; Weyl Carr, “Images” (n. 25); Debra Higgs Strickland, “Looking Back: The Westminster Psalter, the Added Drawings, and the Idea of ‘Retrospective Crusade’”, in The Crusades and Visual Culture, Elizabeth Lapina et al. eds, Farnham 2015, pp. 157–184. Lang, Drossbach, Kumler, and Morgan take up aspects of this question here. The prayer addressed to “Sancta Veronice imaginem tuam sudario impressa” secures the identification of the face in Hours of Yolande de Soissons (New York, Morgan Library, ms m729), painted at the end of the thirteenth century in Amiens; see: Karen Gould, The Psalter and Hours of Yolande of Soissons, Cambridge, ma 1978; David Boffa, “Disfluency and Deep Processing as Paths to Devotion: Reading and Praying with the Veronica in the Psalter and Hours of Yolande of Soissons (M. 729)”, Peregrinations: Journal of Medieval Art and Architecture, iv (2013), pp. 190 –214; Nino Zchomelidse, “Liminal Phenomena: Framing Medieval Cult Images with Relics and Words”, Viator, xlvii (2016), pp. 243–296; and Kumler in this volume. 38 “Multi igitur eandem orationem cum pertinentiis memoriae commendarunt, et ut eos major accenderet devotio, picturis effigiarunt hoc modo”; Matthaei Parisiensis, Monachi Sancti Albani, Chronica Majora, H. R. Luard ed., London 1876, vol. 3, pp. 7–8; Lewis, Matthew Paris (n. 20), p. 489; Rudy, Postcards (n. 1), p. 45. 39 Jacobus de Voragine, The Golden Legend. Readings on the Saints, William Ryan trans., Princeton 1993, p. 212. 40 Victoria Mitchell has analyzed some of the punning relationships in “Textiles, Text and Techne”, in Obscure Objects of Desire: Reviewing the Crafts in the Twentieth Century, Tanya Harrod ed., London 1997, pp. 324–332. 41 Vision (n. 6), p. 53. 42 “Et cum regnasset Tiberius annis v post passionem Domini mortuus est. Eodem tempore Sudarium Veronicae deportatum fuit Romam de Hierusalem, et liberatus fuit Tiberius a lepra; et vindicta Christi facta fuit de Judaeis propter mortem Christi; et mortui et destructi fuerunt principes sacerdotum, et venditi per Titum et Vespasianum; et Pilatus in navi vivus deductus fuit Romam“; pl 213.449. 43 See Jörg Bölling, Rist, and Kumler in this volume. 44 See: Bruna, Enseignes (n. 11), p. 50; Romei & Giubilei (n. 11), pp. 342–347; “Véronique” (n. 11), p. 55. 45 See Di Blasio, Veronica (n. 10). 46 See Rist. 47 As Wolf already noted, Schleier (n. 5), p. 142. 48 See Jean-Aurélien Lagardère, Sainte Véronique, apôtre de l’Aquitaine, son tombeau et son culte à Soulac ou Notre-Dame-de-Fin-Terres, archidiocèse de Bordeaux, Toulouse 1877; Vengeance de Nostre-Seigneur (n. 6), pp. 14–18. 49 Two Old English Apocrypha and Their Manuscript Source: The Gospel of Nichodemus and the Avenging of the Saviour, J. E. Cross ed., Cambridge 1996, pp. 248–293; The Apocryphal Gospels: Texts and Translations, Bart Ehrman, Zlatko Plese eds, Oxford 2011; Gounelle, “Les origines littéraires” (n. 10); Sansterre, “Témoignages” (n. 25). Also: Lydie Lansard, “Deux miracles pour un nom”, in Miracles d’un autre genre: récritures médiévales en dehors de l’hagiographie, Olivier Biaggini, Benédicte Milland-Bove eds, Madrid 2012, pp. 157–170. Here, Gounelle and Urlacher-Becht and Izydorcyk. 50 See: Robert de Boron, Le roman du Graal, Bernard Cerquiglini ed., Paris 1981; Merlin and the Grail, Nigel Bryant trans., Cambridge 2001, pp. 15–44. 51 The Passion de Semur, P. T. Durbin ed., Leeds 1981. 52 See: Roger of Howden, Gesta regis Henrici ii, William Stubbs ed., London 1867, pp. 228–229. 53 “Cum autem aperuisset Reclusa Veronicam suam: Christi Virgo fixit occulos ad imaginem Salvatoris, quae statim nimio corrpta Dolores, ex memoria passionis Christi, ad terram corruit & defecit”; Vita venerabilis Julianae de Cornelion, ch. xxviii, in Vie de sainte Julienne de Cornillon, Jean-Pierre Delville ed. and trans., Louvain-la-Neuve 1999, pp. 80–81; Sansterre, “Témoignages” (n. 25), p. 282. 54 See: Chastel, “La Véronique” (n. 10).

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the veronica itself stayed in Rome during the Avignon period, in 1382, King Charles vi nevertheless appointed Saint Veronica (who, in some legends was herself a seller of cloth) patron of the guild of textile merchants he established in Paris55. As Van Asperen shows, the vera icona continued to enjoy a cult in France throughout the fifteenth century56; a document of 1467 called for control of the crowds of pilgrims drawn to Montreuil during the veronica’s annual procession outside the monastery’s walls57; and a late fifteenth-century supplement to the Cronica et cartularium monasterii de Dunis reports that the icon was used at the dedication of the abbey church near Dunkerque in 1262.

The Passion The insertion of Saint Veronica holding the veronica into narratives of Christ’s death enacted complex origins and an accelerated evolution during the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries; and it, too, was preceded by several experiments. In Santa Maria del Monte di Velate in Varese, for instance, the cult image is positioned on a pier in such a way that the Saint seems to introduce the Crucifixion pictured behind her 58. In the Santa Chiara triptych, Paolo Veneziano inserted the vera icona precisely at the place it came in the written narrative, namely between Christ Carrying the Cross and the Crucifixion, providing – as Jacquemart would – an island of contemplation amid the historical unfolding 59. Half a century later, the Psalter of Yolande of Flanders marked a similar transitional moment; the rooster directly below the Saint ties her to the Denial of Peter and hence to the Passion sequence pictured in the bas-de-page; as in the Mystère de Semur, Peter (keys in hand) converses with the maid who points toward Christ led by Roman soldiers before the High Priest and his Jewish co-conspirators who, with mask-like faces and theatrical gestures, plot to put him to death. The Mystère has Peter admit to his betrayal60, which may have fed the cult of penitential remission that Doublier analyzes; beginning with St Ambrose, St Peter’s tears were understood as evidence of penance, which Rist underscores Pope Innocent iii had tied to the veronica, and which, therefore, may have reinforced the indulgence cult associated with Saint Peter’s’ veronica.

Unstable Texts, Changeable Pictures

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The texts related to the veronica and St Veronica were varied and fluid, cross-referencing each other and also assimilating visual representations of diverse types. Several contributions to this volume examine the complex textual transmission. Studying the Cura Sanitatis Tiberii in relation to the fifth-century sources and their evolution, for instance, Zbigniew Izydorczyk demonstrates that the uniform and cohesive account printed in von Dobschütz’s version, on which scholars rely, in fact belies the derivative and varied text transmitted in manuscripts; and Gounelle and Urlacher-Becht disclose a similar instability in the Vindicta. Petoletti and Piacentini untangle the diverse strands that Boniface of Verona entwined in his poem; and Windeatt notes that the Titus and Vespasian is a synthetic work with alternate versions. Even Voragine’s authoritative account in the Golden Legend, Sureda shows, was subtly changed in the Catalan translation and remained only one of several available textual sources tapped by painters in the Crown of Aragon. Savigni, in turn, notes that Gervase of Tilbury had both personal experience with various relics of Christ in Rome and also knew diverse written accounts. Among other things, the legends offer diverse accounts of Saint Veronica’s role and, in particular, of how she came to acquire the vera icona61. Commonly identified with

Berenike, whose hemorrhaging according to the synoptic Gospels, Christ had healed, she acquired various personae in texts. We learn from Windeatt that she was named as Mary of Bethany; in Boniface’s Veronica, she is the wife of Abgar of Edessa who simply inherited the cloth (i.e. the Mandylion).

introduction

Drama Not treated in the Cambridge conference or otherwise in this volume, Passion plays were a venue in which the multiple variations, both written and pictorial, were absorbed, perpetuated, and interwoven. Most of the plays underscore Jewish complicity in Christ’s death, which Jacquemart, who seems principally to have followed the version recorded in the Mystère de Semur 62, dramatized in his emphasis on Caiaphas (identified by a bishop’s miter) shown counting on his fingers (presumably an allusion to the thirty pieces of silver he paid Judas to betray Jesus) and discussing the treachery with Annas and, above all, on his setting Judas as Christ’s counterpart. And he pictured Jews and Romans turning their backs on the Savior – about to hang on the tree, as the Vengeance puts it – and looking, instead, at the disemboweled Judas suspended from a tree branch as a devil flees with his soul. Judas’ entrails exposed in a parted cloth provide the carnal antithesis of the image-not-made-by-human-hands on Saint Veronica’s veil. Fouquet disassembled Jacquemart’s picture and reconstituted the elements, referring once again to texts. He portrayed Saint Veronica both in the initial and also, a second time at the far right of narrative, comforting Christ as he struggled bleeding and sweating under the weight of the cross by offering a large white cloth. For this double portrayal, Fouquet seems to have tapped into the Mystères which vividly describe the Saint’s moving toward Christ with her kerchief and then has her showing of the image impressed on it to the audience63. Fouquet virtually eliminated Jacquemart’s anti-Jewish tone; although Judas still hangs prominently from a tree, now gushing blood onto his garment spread out on the ground beneath him, it is a Roman soldier who calls attention to him; and Caiaphas (identified by the miter) and Annas recede into the distance as members of the Roman 55 Graham Runnalls, “Jean Fouquet’s ‘Martyrdom of St Apollonia’ and the Medieval French Stage”,   Medieval English Theatre, xix (1997), p. 58. 56 Maryan W. Ainsworth, “’À la façon grèce’: The Encounter of Northern Renaissance Artists with Byzantine Icons,” in Byzantium (n. 25), pp. 260–269. 57 Grabar, La sainte face (n. 25), p. 9; Ainsworth, “‘Façon grèce’” (n. 56). 58 Candiani, “L’iconografia”. The panel by Campin almost certainly functioned in a similar fashion; see: Felix Thürlemann, Robert Campin: A Monographic Study with Critical Catalogue, New York, 2002, pp. 117–130, 281–283; Wolf, Schleier (n. 5), pp. 210–211. 59 Lorenzo Coelin, Il fascino e il mistero racchiusi nei polittici dei secoli xiv e xv, e-book, 2015, pp. 59–60. 60 “Encor ung peu que je n’enraige. Pour cecy que dit vous avez. Certes, beaul sire, vous savez Que ja je ne vous traïray, Ains cruciffîer me lairay, Que ce que traïson vous face”; Le mystère de la Passion en France du xive au xvie siècle: étude sur les sources et le classement des mystères de la Passion; accompagnée de textes inédits, Émile Roy ed., Dijon 1903, p. 122. 62 Passion de Semur (n. 51), p. 206. 63 veronna: Et je n’ay guyere que despendre; Ma toille y purteray pour vendre, Pour ung pou d’argent amasser. deus: Femme que par cy voy passer, Voulieze ung peu vers moy vernie. Ce drap me preste ung peu tenir, Mon visaige en tourcheray. veronna: Sire, voluntiers le feray, La toille te veul bien bailler, Car je te voy cy travaillé, Mont bien emploieré, la tien. deus: Veronne, bonne femme, tien, Reploie ta toille ensamble. veronna: Beaul doulx sire, elle vous resable. Escripte y est votre face, Je vou en rendz honneur et grace. Stage directions: Modo ostendat popolo. Bonnes gens, veez vous cy l’imaige de son tresprecieulx visaige? Pour l’amour de ly l’ameray, Il m’a baillié tresbell amsaigne. Mystère de la Passion (n. 60), p. 90*. The Mystère de la Passion Nostre Seigneur and the Mystère del la Bibliothèque Sainte-Geneviève also create a parallel between the narrative and initial of the page: dieu: Famme que par cy voy passer, / Vueilliez .i. pou vers moy venir / Ce drap voudroie .i. pou tenir; / Mon visage y vueil essuier. veronce: Ce ne me doit pas ennuier, / Mais me doit abellir sans faille. / Tenez le frap; je le vous baille. / A moult bien emploié le tien. dieu: Veronce, bonne femme, tien, / Vecy ton drap. Dy qu’il t’en sanble! Jesus rend le drap à Véronce, qui le regarde. Puis elle le montre a la foule et aux spectateurs, pour reveler l’image de Jésus. Le Mystère de la Passion Nostre Seigneur, Graham Runnalls ed., Geneva 1974, p. 184; Passion de Semur (n. 51), p. 206. See also Robert S. Sturges, The Circulation of Power in Medieval Biblical Drama, New York 2015, pp. 33–50.

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introduction

cohort. The old order is pictured literally passing from the scene, as in a play; indeed, the depiction of Paris as the City of Jerusalem in the distance may allude to the actual staging of the Passion during Holy Week in the city 64. Saint Veronica’s counterpart, the woman directly below her in a white apron forging nails with powerful, physical blows, is the blacksmith’s wife who acts as Saint Veronica’s foil in the French Passion plays, including those of Autun, Semur, Arras, and Auvergne65. Variously named Hédroit, Malembouchée, and Grumaton, she fashioned the nails for Christ’s crucifixion after her husband had assured the soldiers that he was unable to do it because his hands were diseased66. The wine glass at the far right may allude to the blacksmith’s argument that he is so ill he could not even drink, yet alone work metal67. The blacksmith’s physical efforts to fabricate the instruments that will pierce Christ’s flesh intensify the aura of the veronica not made by human hands – that brings salvation68. Here, as always, the relationship between art and theater is complicated, in ways that Laura Weigert has recently stressed69; text, performance, and picture are not productively to be disentangled from one another; they constitute what Weigert rightly characterizes as a complex visual culture. Thus, while the juxtaposition of Saint Veronica and the forger’s wife in the miniature may reflect the text, the parallel with the soldiers raising their clubs to beat Simon of Cyrene as he tries to help Christ seems entirely pictorial. The same is true of the display in the foreground of lance, nails, hammer, tongs, and large-handled jug, together with the veronica and cross, which evokes an artistic ensemble that was particularly popular during the period known as the arma Christi; the bloody footprints Christ left impressed in the dirt as he struggled to Golgotha and the veronica are among the venerated signs70. More specifically, the still-life in the miniature’s lower third punctuated by Saint Veronica exposing the vera icona, together with the forger’s wife fashioning the nails (and the nearby scene of the others fashioning the cross itself), recall a popular variant of the arma Christi known as the Christ du Dimanche71. Pictorial composition transforms elements from literature into new ideas. French retellings also account for Jacquemart’s earlier attention to the “daughters of Jerusalem” to whom Christ directs his gaze in the Louvre leaf 72. In the Vengeance Saint Veronica quotes the apposite passage from Luke’s Gospel (Lk 23, 28) at the moment she departs the Holy Land for Rome 73; and the Mystère de Semur has the daughters of Jerusalem play roles in the drama leading to Christ’s confrontation with the woman74. The same written sources also explain Jacquemart’s emphasis on Saint Veronica’s head covering; the Vengeance describes her crevichief (from cuevrechief, literally a couvrir-chief) and the metric version a “guimple tournée”75. Several of the copies Van Asperen analyzes preserve the continuity between the covering and the image; when Robert Campin portrayed the Saint as an elderly woman and showed the veronica folded into twenty squares76, he seems to have been drawing on the Vengeance de Nostre-Seigneur which is set forty years after Christ’s death and reports that when Veronica and Clement prayed together for the restoration of Vespasian’s health “she unfolded the cloth and had him adore it”77. The description of Juliana of Cornillon’s opening the (physical) Veronica and then looking at Christ in the eyes (aperuisset Veronicam suam; Christi Virgo fixit occulos ad imaginem Salvatoris) may assimilate the same narrative 78.

A Shimmering Textile

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The variety of pictorial types and the vera icona’s peculiarly wide range of contexts engaged a word culture in which descriptions of the cloth and impressed image were,

themselves, unstable. Innocent iii, the great codifier, tried to channel the fluidity by establishing an office, station and annual procession in Rome, as well as modes of veneration; but his attempts seem only to have exacerbated the situation. As the veronica spread and indulgences accrued, local images, histories, and politics came to be assimilated to it. Virtually any face of Christ could pass as the miraculously-made image; and as Van Asperen argues, even the veronica itself could be manufactured far away from Rome and still maintain its power. Text or context could link a face of Christ to the legend of Saint Veronica, including rituals. Bölling underscores the veronica’s function in Easter, Ascension Day, and Christmas liturgies; and Sureda notes its role in these and other Aragon feasts. Guido Milanese and Kumler go so far as to maintain that the vera icona was a surrogate for the Sacraments themselves. In the end, however, the veronica’s success lay more in its offering individual access to Christ and facilitating papal indulgences, two aspects already of the earliest representations. Jacquemart began a new tradition by merging the imago (effigies) with a historia (the two medieval genres that generally functioned independently of one another) by interweaving various threads of the constantly shifting Veronica traditions identified in these essays79. Inserting the veronica into the tumultuous narrative derived from Italian Passion imagery, he identified Saint Veronica with Mary and Christ’s other friends. And constructing a bridge between the praying daughters of Jerusalem and the two donors in the foreground, he connected present to past and suggested that the very making of the painting was an ex voto act, that is, an exchange of mundane wealth for the promise of remission of sin that underlies the veronica itself. As is true even of isolated representations, 64 Fouquet’s deep engagement with theater is well documented; Gordon Kipling, “Theatre as Subject and Object in Fouquet’s ‘Martyrdom of St. Apollonia’”; Graham Runnalls, “Jean Fouquet’s ‘Martyrdom of St Apollonia’”; Gordon Kipling, “Fouquet, St. Apollonia, and the Motives of the Miniaturist’s Art: A Reply to Graham Runnalls”, Medieval English Theatre, xix (1997), respectively, pp. 26–80, 81–100, and 101–20; Wolf, Schleier (n. 5), pp. 174–177; Reynauld, Jean Fouquet, pp. 216–222; Laura Weigert, French Visual Culture and the Making of Medieval Theater, New York 2015, pp. 34–53. For somewhat later German plays see: Nicolette Zwijnenburg, Die Veronicagestalt in den deutsche Passionsspielen des 15. und 16. Jahrhunderts, Amsterdam 1988; and Ulrich Barton, “Vera Icon und Schauspiel: Zur Medialität der Veronica-Szene im mittelalterlichen Passionsspiel”, Beiträge zur Geschichte der deutschen Sprache und Literatur, cxxxiii (2011), pp. 451–469. 65 Sharon Mueller-Loewald,“Quatre Figures Féminines Apocryphes dans Certains Mystères de La Passion en France”, Fifteenth­century Studies, xxviii (2003), pp. 173–183. 66 Wolf, Schleier (n. 5), p. 170. 67 J’ay une apostume en la gorge, / Ne je n’ose boire de vin. / Foy que je doy le roy divin, / Mes mains ne fussent pas oyseues, / Mais elles sont toutes roigneuses. Mystère de la Passion (n. 63), pp. 186–187. 68 As Wolf noted, the veronica and the nails came to be sheltered in the Sainte Chapelle, which Fouquet portrayed in the distance; Schleier (n. 5), p. 175; see Le trésor de la Sainte-Chapelle, catalogue of the exhibition, (Musée du Louvre, 31 mai – 27 août 2001), Jannic Durand et al. eds, Paris 2001. 69 Laura Weigert, French Visual Culture and the Making of Medieval Theater, New York 2015, pp. 23–24, 80 ff.; and Eadem, “Visualizing the Movement of Urban Drama in the Late Middle Ages: The ‘Mystère’ of the Lord’s Vengeance in Reims”, in Meaning in Motion. The Semantics of Movement in Medieval Art, Nino Zchomelidse, Giovanni Freni eds, Princeton 2011, pp. 161–187. 70 Lisa H. Cooper, Andrea Denny-Brown, The Arma Christi in Medieval and Early Modern Material Culture, Farnham 2014. 71 Dominique Rigaux, Le Christ du dimanche, histoire d’une image médiévale, Paris 2005; Lisa H. Cooper, Artisans and Narrative Craft in Late Medieval England, Cambridge 2011, pp. 118 –119; Philippe Cordez, “Werkzeuge und Instrumente in Kunstgeschichte und Technikanthropologie”, in Werkzeuge und Instrumente, Philippe Cordez, Matthias Krüger eds, Berlin 2012, pp. 1–19; Lisa H. Cooper, Andrea Denny-Brown, “Introduction. Arma Christi: The Material Culture of the Passion”, in Cooper/Denny-Brown, Arma Christi (n. 70), pp. 8 –10. 72 See: Naomi Reed Kline, “The Typological Window of Orbais-l’Abbaye: The Context of its Iconography”, Studies in Iconography, xiv (1995), pp. 83–130. 73 “Tunc Veronix dixit: ‘Filiae Hierusalem, nolite flere super me, sed super uos, et super filias uestras flete; numquam enim audistis Deum dicentem, qui dereliquerit omnia pro Christi nomine, centuplum accipiet et uitam aeternam possidebit’”; Two Old English Apocrypha (n. 49), p. 284. 74 “Hee! filles de Iherusalem, Ainsin me fault estre souffrans. Par ma mort seront ly sers francz, Sur vous et vous enffens plorés; Le temps vient que dire pourrez Les femmes soient beneïctes Quil d’anffant ne seront ansinctes. Gardez plux deul ne démenez”; Passion de Semur (n. 51), p. 210. 75 “Elle prist la toaille, del chief li a ostee / Son cher fil apella don’t l’arme estoit alee / Par devant son viaire a la guimple tornee”; see: L. A. T. Gryting, “The Oldest Version of the 12th-century Poem ‘La Venjance de Nostre Seigneur’”, The University of Michigan Contributions in Modern Philology, xix (1952), p. 40. 76 See Wolf, Schleier (n. 5), pp. 210–211. 77 Campin reinforced the conceit of the dark relic’s becoming a visible face, a dynamic that was amplified when the wing was folded back to reveal the central subject, almost certainly a depiction of the Crucifixion or Deposition. 78 Vie (n. 53), p. 81. 79 See: Herbert L. Kessler, “The Icon in the Narrative”, in Spiritual Seeing (n. 36), pp. 1–28.

introduction

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introduction

not only the making of the Louvre painting but also the looking at it engages texts. In this case, the Vengeance de Nostre-Seigneur is the referent in which after Saint Veronica cites the daughters of Jerusalem, she quotes Matthew 19, 29: “Everyone who has left every­thing for the name of Christ will receive a hundredfold and will possess eternal life” commits to “worship him and serve him as long as I live because my redeemer himself lives, and on the last day, I shall see God, my savior”80. Saint Veronica’s cloth is, as Robert Campin understood, made of shimmering gazzatum in which doubled wefts of text constantly cross each other and hold the warp of images in place. With great diligence, such scholars as those assembled in Cambridge in 2016 may be able to trace individual threads; but the vera icona’s fabric is so intricate and delicate, they unlikely ever fully disentangle them. 80 Apocryphal Gospels (n. 49), p. 553.

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articles

Abstract – The Cura sanitatis Tiberii a Century after Ernst von Dobschütz – The Cura sanitatis Tiberii (cst) is generally assumed to be the earliest textual witness to the legend of Veronica’s image of Christ. Attested in manuscripts since the eighth century (the Lucca codex), it was critically edited by Ernst von Dobschütz in 1899 as part of his Christusbilder. Impressive and magisterial, Dobschütz’s cst has been adopted as a point of reference by most modern scholars on Saint Veronica’s legend. More than a century after its publication, however, there are reasons to reassess its reliability and to confront it with the actual texts preserved in manuscripts. During the last three decades, more than ninety new manuscripts of the cst have come to light – over twice the number used by Dobschütz, including two ninth-century and two tenth-century copies; one of the tenth-century manuscripts preserves a version very close to the Lucca text. This paper offers a critique of Dobschütz’s edition, arising from the ongoing project of a new collation of cst manuscripts. Keywords Cura sanitatis Tiberii, Ernst von Dobschütz, Pontius Pilate, Veronica, Tiberius, Pilate apocrypha, manuscripts

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Zbigniew Izydorczyk University of Winnipeg [email protected]

The Cura sanitatis Tiberii a Century after Ernst von Dobschütz Zbigniew Izydorczyk

One of the earliest textual sources for the legend of St Veronica and her healing image of Christ is the so-called Cura sanitatis Tiberii (cst)1, an early medieval narrative forming part of the apocryphal cycle of Pilate. It relates how emperor Tiberius, afflicted by an incurable malady, dispatches an emissary, Volusianus, to Jerusalem to seek out and bring back a healer named Jesus. On his arrival in Jerusalem, Volusianus learns that Jesus has been executed on Pilate’s orders, so he

incarcerates Pilate; he also discovers that a woman, named Veronica, owns an image of Jesus, which he requisitions. He then returns to Rome with Pilate, Veronica, and her image. When he reports on his mission to the emperor, Tiberius exiles Pilate to the town of Ameria, summons Veronica, and 1

Société des Bollandistes, Bibliotheca Hagiographica Latina (hereafter bhl), [http://bhlms.fltr.ucl.ac.be, no. 4218-4220c]; Mauritius Geerard, Clavis Apocryphorum Novi Testamenti (hereafter cant), Turnhout 1992, no. 69.

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venerates the image of Jesus. He is immediately cleansed of his affliction, and within a year passes away “credens in Jhesu Christo”. Then the focus changes abruptly to Peter, Paul, and Simon Magus, the last one claiming to be the Son of God. Nero summons Pilate from exile to get his account of Jesus and reads Pilate’s letter to Claudius. Peter confirms the truth of the letter, and so does Pilate. Finally, Pilate is again sent away and commits suicide, and Nero dies as ingloriously as Simon. This curious text attracted scholarly attention already in the eighteenth century, but it was not until its influential edition by Ernst von Dobschütz that scholars were afforded some insight into a wider range of its textual forms2. Dobschütz’s edition has become a standard and, for the most part, unquestioned point of reference in discussions of the work’s origin and reception. The purpose of this paper is to confront Dobschütz’s Cura sanitatis Tiberii with the evidence of extant medieval witnesses and to determine the extent to which the edition captures the textual entity that actually emerges from manuscripts.

Dobschütz’s Edition

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Dobschütz’s edition distinguishes between two different versions of cst, designated as a and b: the former is found in manuscripts as an independent work announced by its own title, whereas the latter is always attached to another apocryphon from the cycle of Pilate, the Evangelium Nicodemi (en)3. Dobschütz presents version a in its entirety, and it constitutes the main body of the edited apocryphon. From version b, in contrast, he prints only a handful of unique passages not attested in a; in the edited text, they are distinguished from version a by the use of italics and angled brackets. They include, for instance, a transitional sentence anchoring cst deictically in the Epistola Pilati, the concluding section of en; an account of the converted emperor Tiberius raging against the Roman Senate for not acknowledging Jesus as a god; and notes about the suicides of Pilate and Nero. All grammatical and lexical divergences between the two versions as well as all idiosyncrasies of individual manuscripts are documented in the textual apparatus.

Dating and Localization Dobschütz situated the composition of cst between the end of the fifth century and the beginning of the eighth; he also invoked the sixth century and a date ca 600 as potential points of origin4. As Rémi Gounelle pointed out, the first of these alternatives, although the least precise, is the most prudent as it accords with the terminus a quo provided by several echoes of en and the terminus ante quem offered by the earliest manuscript witnesses of cst 5. There are no known references to or quotations from cst verifiably antedating its earliest manuscripts6. Dobschütz placed the author of cst in northern Italy, and more specifically in Tuscany, on the basis of a reference to Pilate’s exile to “Tusciam civitatem Ameriam”7. Gounelle, however, is highly skeptical of this localization as it rests on rather tenuous evidence8. An alternative location was suggested by Arturo Graf, who noted that “Roma posseditrice della preziosa reliquia [i.e., the Roman Veronica], era più di ogni altra città interessata alla creazione di così fatta leggenda”9. More recently, Jean-Marie Sansterre has associated cst with the controversies over images in Rome in the eighth century. He observes that “Les accents iconodules [in cst] sont tels qu’une attribution à Rome me paraît plus vraisemblable qu’à la Toscane à laquelle pense von Dobschütz”10. The link with Rome gains additional support from a mention of a portrait of Christ given to Veronica in a ninth-century iconophile florilegium possibly indebted to the grand florilegium compiled by hellenophones in Rome in 77011. However, the question that would still require an answer is whether cst was actually composed in that cultural context or whether it was simply available and put to use in it12.

Authorship, Mode of Composition, Sources Dobschütz’s discussion of the origin of cst shows some signs of tension between two different conceptualizations of authorship and composition. On the one hand, he is well aware that legendary and apocryphal texts, such as en or cst, emerged through anonymous, iterative processes of translation, rewriting, compilation, and adaptation, carried out by a succession of writers and translators of

different abilities and with varying competence in grammar and style13. On the other hand, however, the traditional philological approach Dobschütz espouses assumes an authorial, competent, definitive text at the beginning of a textual tradition. Thus, although in places Dobschütz claims to be working towards the “ursprüngliche Gestalt”, or “Originaltext” of cst14, his critical edition reconstructs what he himself calls “Form 2” of the apocryphon, not the presumed “Ur-gestalt 1”15. Consequently, his dating and localization of the author also pertain to the reviser who reshaped a pre-existing text rather than to the initial compiler who cobbled it together in the first place. What is certain, as Dobschütz points out16, is that cst is not a uniform, cohesive, and consistent text but a derivative compilation, drawn from and inspired by earlier sources. The seams between the compiled materials are sometimes easily visible. For example, Tiberius’s interest in Jesus is explained in two different ways, first through an allusion to his miracles (possibly an echo of Eusebius’s Historia ecclesiastica 2.2) and then through a reference to his illness; Tiberius dispatches Volusianus to Jerusalem not once but twice (in ch. 1 and again in ch. 2–3); and the story of Peter and Pilate before Nero (ch. 15–20) is only crudely stitched to the preceding narrative. Dobschütz admits that “es oft schwer ist, auch nur die älteste uns zugängliche Form klar zu erkennen,” and that “[d]ie ganze letzte Erzählung aus Neros Zeit mag eine jüngere Zuthat sein”17. The two parts of cst were already joined when the reviser produced “Form 2”18, attested in most of the early manuscripts and edited by Dobschütz as version a. However, five of his manuscripts, dating from the eleventh century (ms d) and later (mss e [Census 42], g [Census 429], k [Census 262], and 10 [Census 181]) do not transmit the story of Nero, while two others 2

cst was printed twice in the eighteenth century, first by Petro

Francisco Foggini in De Romano divi Petri itinere et episcopatu eiusque antiquissimis imaginibus exercitationes historico-criticae, Florence 1741, pp. 38–46, from Florence, Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana, ms s. m. 599; and again by Johannes Dominicus Mansi in Stephani Baluzii Tutelensis Miscellanea, vol. 4, Lucca 1764, pp. 55–60, from Lucca, Biblioteca Capitolare Feliniana, ms 490, and from Foggini’s printing. The edition by Ernst von Dobschütz, Christusbilder. Untersuchungen zur christlicher Legende, Leipzig 1899, pp. 163**–190**, used a much wider range of witnesses; see the section “Manuscripts” below. In the ensuing paper, most manuscripts will be keyed to (a) the sigla used by Dobschütz in his edition of cst (manuscripts are

listed on pp. 158**–159** and 203**); and (b) the number identifiers assigned to manuscripts in Zbigniew Izydorczyk, Manuscripts of the Evangelium Nicodemi: A Census, Toronto 1993. Thus, Foggini printed the text of Dobschütz’s ms 1 (Census 81), and Mansi printed the texts of Dobschütz’s mss a (not in Census) and 1. When a manuscript is not mentioned in either of these publications, it will be identified by its current location, repository, and shelf-mark. For a concordance of all manuscripts mentioned in this paper, see the Appendix. 3 bhl 4151p-sa; cant 62. 4 Dobschütz, Christusbilder (n. 2), pp. 213, 203**, 276* respectively. 5 Rémi 63e,“Les origines littéraires de la légende de Véronique et de la Sainte Face : La Cura sanitatis Tiberii et la Vindicta Salvatoris,”in Sacre impronte e oggetti ‘non fatti da mano d’uomo’ nelle religioni, A. Monaci Castagno ed., Turin 2011, p. 233. The echoes occur in ch. 5, 6, 8, and 9; see Dobschütz, Christusbilder (n. 2), pp. 171**–172**, 174**–175**. The earliest witness of the Latin en is the Vienna Palimpsest, whose lower layer containing en has been dated to the fifth century; see Myriam Despineux, “Une version latine palimpseste du ve siècle de l’Évangile de Nicodème (Vienne, önb ms 563)”, Scriptorium, xlii (1988), pp. 176–183. On the earliest manuscripts of cst, see below. 6 The earliest works to have drawn on cst include the Vindicta Salvatoris (vs; bhl 4151v, 4221–4221k; cant 70), from the eighth century but possibly earlier (ca 700 according to Dobschütz, Christusbilder [n. 2], p. 276*; but cf. Gounelle, “Les origines littéraires” [n. 5], pp. 243–244); however, in manuscripts, vs is attested only from the ninth (Bibliothèque d’agglomération de Saint-Omer, ms 202, described by J. E. Cross and Julia Crick, “The Manuscript: Saint-Omer, Bibliothèque Municipale 202”, in Two Old English Apocrypha and Their Manuscript Source: The Gospel of Nicodemus and The Avenging of the Saviour, J. E. Cross ed., Cambridge 1996, pp. 10–35); De Veronilla, possibly of the tenth century (Gounelle, “Les origines littéraires” [n. 5], p. 236, n. 18); and the Translatio et miracula sanctorum Senesii et Theopontii (bhl 8115–8116), written in the first half of the eleventh century (P. E. Schramm ed., Monumenta Germaniae Historica, Scriptores, vol. 30, pt. 2, Hannover 1934; rpt Stuttgart 1964, pp. 984–992; Antonio Viscardi, “La cultura nonantolana nei secoli xi–xii”, in Atti e memorie della Deputazione di storia patria per le antiche provincie modenesi, viii/5 [1953], p. 351); Paolo Tomea, “L’agiografia dell’Italia settentrionale (950–1130),” in Hagiographies : Histoire internationale de la littérature hagiographique latine et vernaculaire en Occident des origines à 1550, Guy Philippart ed., Turnhout 2001, vol. 3, pp. 131, 160. What appears to be a reference to cst occurs also in a Greek comment found in a ninth- or tenth-century florilegium copied in Rome; see Jean-Marie Sansterre, “Variations d’une légende et genèse d’un culte entre la Jérusalem des origines, Rome et l’Occident. Quelques jalons de l’histoire de Véronique et de la Veronica jusqu’à la fin du xiiie siècle,” in Passages: déplacements des hommes, circulation des textes et identités dans l’Occident médiéval : actes du colloque de Bordeaux (2–3 février 2007), Joëlle Ducos, Patrick Henriet eds, Toulouse 2013, pp. 220–221, n. 12. 7 Dobschütz, Christusbilder (n. 2), pp. 214, 203**; cst, ch. 11, p. 179**. 8 Gounelle, “Les origines littéraires” (n. 5), p. 233. 9 Arturo Graf, Roma nella memoria e nelle immaginazioni del Medio Evo, Turin 1923, p. 304. 10 Jean-Marie Sansterre,“Entre deux mondes? La vénération des images à Rome et en Italie d’après les textes des vie-xe siècles,” in Roma fra Oriente e Occidente, (Settimane di Studio del Centro Italiano de Studi sull’Alto Medioevo, vol. 49), Spoleto 2002, pp. 1012–1013, n. 57; for further arguments in favour of the Roman origin of cst, see Idem, “Variations d’une légende” (n. 6). 11 Sansterre, “Entre deux mondes?” (n. 10), pp. 1006–1009; Idem, “Variations d’une légende” (n. 6), pp. 220–221. 12 That cst was available in Italy in the late eighth and ninth centuries is certain: one of its earliest manuscripts – Lucca, Biblioteca Capitolare Felianiana, ms 490 (ms a) – was written at Lucca, and a related copy – Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France (bnf), ms lat. 2849a – was also possibly Italian; see below, pp. 7, 15. 13 Dobschütz, Christusbilder (n. 2), pp. 157**, 195**. 14 Ibidem, pp. 162**, 195**. 15 Ibidem, p. 211, sp. n. 1. 16 Ibidem, pp. 211–213, 200**–203**. 17 Ibidem, p. 211. 18 Recently, Rémi Gounelle raised the question of the original scope of the cst narrative in medieval manuscripts; see “Les origines littéraires” (n. 5), p. 234.

35

1 / Opening folio of the Cura sanitatis Tiberii from Lucca, late 8th – early 9th century / Lucca, Biblioteca Capitolare Feliniana, ms 490, fol. 342r

36

begin it with a new title (f [Census 39], h [Census 279]). He explains the absence of the second part in later manuscripts as “nachträgliche Kürzung”19. While such subsequent abridgement is not only conceivable but likely20, Dobschütz was apparently not aware that the short form of cst, without the story of Nero, was available already in the ninth century as evidenced by Barcelona, Archivio de la Corona de Aragón, ms Ripoll 106 (Census 12), and that at least eighteen later manuscripts, in addition to those he noted, likewise lack the Nero section21. All in all, more than half of all cst a manuscripts identified so far transmit the short version. This does not prove that the short form antedates the long one, but it certainly demonstrates its presence in the Early Middle Ages and its prevalence later in the period. As a compilation, cst owes its existence to earlier materials, but it does not appear to be quoting verbatim from its sources, or if it does, those sources remain unidentified. Parallels, allusions, and individual details can indeed be traced back to other works. Dobschütz was inclined to think that “unsere Legende auf griechischen Boden entstanden ist”22, pointing out correspondences with pseudo-Clementine homilies, which mention the figure of Bernike living in Tyrus; Acta Petri et Pauli (Marcellus version), which includes an account of Peter’s conflict with Simon Magus; and the Acta Pilati, which inspired Joseph’s account of Jesus’s ascension and the testimony of the righteous Jews23. However, not all those parallels represent direct borrowings, and it is not always clear whether the compiler (or reviser) worked directly from the source texts or only from memory. For example, it is not really the case, as Dobschütz asserts, that “[d]ieselben Zeugen, die dort [i.e., in en] vor Pilatus Jesu Unschuld beteuerten, treten hier [i.e., in cst, ch. 6] vor Volusian gegen Pilatus auf”24. Although the list of witnesses who came before Volusianus is reminiscent of the one in en (ch. 2.4), only three of the names25 actually coincide with those in en. Likewise, it is not clear whether the compiler had read those texts in Greek originals or in Latin translations, although on this score Dobschütz’s intuition might be right. For example, cst refers to the mountain from which Jesus ascended as “Malec”, using the name present in a group of Latin manuscripts of en but better

attested in Greek manuscripts of Acta Pilati (the Greek source of en)26. The argument about the Greek origin of the compiled materials and the proximity of cst to translations from Greek would be strengthened if it could be shown that some of the apparent corruptions in the Lucca text (ms a, Census 81), one of earliest manuscripts of cst, are in fact distorted Greek words27.

Manuscripts Dobschütz used a fair range of manuscripts for his edition: fourteen for version a (designated with lower case letters from a to n, plus ga and gb; he does not use the sigla i or j) and twenty-three for version b (designated with Arabic numerals from 1 to 23), plus two early printed editions28. He notes, however, that his list is not exhaustive, partly because he was not able to search the catalogues of all libraries and partly because many catalogues did not clearly identify cst as such, especially when it was absorbed into en, with which it often co-occurs in manuscripts29. However, Dobschütz’s list of thirty-seven manuscripts represents less than a third of the currently known witnesses: according to a recent survey, cst is extant in over 130 manuscripts, and further copies will, no doubt, emerge in the future30. Seven of Dobschütz’s manuscripts date from the twelfth century or earlier 31, the two oldest being the late eighth- or early ninth-century Lucca, 19 Dobschütz, Christusbilder (n. 2), p. 212, n. 1. 20 See the section on bnf ms lat. 2849a below. 21 See Census 28, 63 (ms gb), 64 (ms ga), 79, 93, 109, 116, 136, 230, 236, 264, 340, 354, 358, 391, 404, 408, 421, plus Kraków, Biblioteka Jagiellońska, ms 1356; the last manuscript is described in Catalogus codicum manuscriptorum Medii Aevi latinorum qui in Bibliotheca Jagiellonica Cracoviae asservantur, vol. 9: Numeros continens inde a 1354 usque ad 1353, Maria Kowalczyk, Anna Kozłowska, Miecislaus Markowski et al. eds, Krakow 2008, pp. 46–62. 22 Dobschütz, Christusbilder (n. 2), p. 212, n. 2. 23 Ibidem, pp. 212–213, 200**–203**. 24 Ibidem, p. 212. 25 Isaac, Finees, and Azarias; Aaddas and Levi occur elsewhere in en, but Didimus, Lucius, Ezias, and Mattheus do not. 26 Dobschütz, Christusbilder (n. 2), p. 201. 27 Cf., for instance, Dobschütz’s note on “diotrofistorum” in ch. 9 (Christusbilder [n. 2], p. 169**), or the use of “egonam” (i.e., “iconam”) for “imaginem” (Christusbilder, [n. 2], p. 176**). 28 Dobschütz, Christusbilder (n. 2), pp. 158**–159**; mss ga, gb, 22, and 23 are mentioned on p. 203**. For the Epistola Pilati, incorporated into cst, Dobschütz used thirty additional manuscript and/or early printed sources. 29 Dobschütz, Christusbilder (n. 2), p. 158**. 30 I am currently preparing a census of Latin manuscripts of cst. 31 mss a, b, c, d, 1 (Census 81), 2 (Census 263), 3 (Census 396).

Biblioteca Capitolare Felianiana, ms 490 (from Lucca; ms a [Fig. 1]), and Paris, bnf, ms lat. 2034 (from north-eastern France; ms b), which Dobschütz placed in the ninth but which Lowe assigned to the late eighth century 32. Among the recently identified manuscripts, there are ten additional copies from that same early period, including three from the ninth century33, one from the tenth34, and six from the eleventh or twelfth35. Thus, although Dobschütz had access to the two oldest manuscripts of cst, he was familiar with less than half of all early witnesses and an even smaller proportion of the later ones.

Titles in Manuscripts

38

The shortcomings of catalogue descriptions Dobschütz refers to are not necessarily the cataloguers’ fault. Medieval manuscripts do not consistently acknowledge cst as an independent work and, when they do, they do not use a consistent title. When attached to en, version b usually has no title of its own and is typically followed by a colophon that harkens back not to the stories of Veronica and Pilate but to the apocryphon of the Passion; for example, Dobschütz’s earliest witness of version b, ms 1 (Census 81), ends on fol. 25r with “Explicit ystoria de passione Christi”. Similar colophons conclude cst in Dobschütz’s mss 5 (Census 97) and 12 (Census 201), as well as in a number of manuscripts unknown to him; clearly, most medieval scribes who copied version b did not think of it as a work in its own right36. Scribes who copied version a as a self-standing piece, unattached to en, designated it by a variety of titles foregrounding one or more of its major themes, that is, the healing of Tiberius37, Veronica’s image of Christ38, and the punishment of Pilate39. The only title that recurs with minor variation in several manuscripts is Qualiter Tyberius cesar Ierosolimam Volusianum ad Ihesum direxit, found in at least six codices from the tenth to the thirteenth centuries40. The title Cura sanitatis Tiberii occurs only in the already mentioned Lucca manuscript (ms a), and there is no evidence that it had any currency before the Lucca text was first printed by Mansi in 176441; it was then popularized by Dobschütz’s edition.



Second-hand Transcripts Dobschütz did not have first-hand knowledge of all the manuscripts he listed in the introduction to his edition. In person, he collated six complete and two partial manuscripts42, plus the two early prints; others, he knew second- and, in some cases, third-hand, sometimes as complete texts, at other times only as excerpts43. Thirteen manuscripts listed as witnesses of version b (those numbered 11 to 23) do not appear to have been used for the edition beyond the first sentence, and there is no evidence that Dobschütz was intimately familiar with their contents. The reliance on second-hand transcripts inevitably affected the accuracy of the edition. The errors attributable to the fact that Dobschütz used Massman’s edition of Sinner’s transcript of Bern, Burgerbibliothek, ms 120 (ms c, which contains only ch. 1–2 of cst), are admittedly negligible44. However, in other cases, the impact of recycled inaccuracies may have more serious consequences. For example, Dobschütz did not consult the Lucca text of cst in person, relying instead on a partial collation prepared by G. Karo. As it turns out, the variant readings recorded in Dobschütz’s apparatus show a number of discrepancies in relation to the manuscript: some words are entirely omitted, others are miscopied, and, in a few instances, later medieval corrections are confused with the original text 45. The situation is equally problematic in the case of Dobschütz’s key manuscript of cst b, ms 1 (Census 81). Here, Dobschütz used the transcript published by Foggini (1741), unaware of (or, more likely, resigned to accept) the transcript’s many shortcomings, such as missing, misidentified, or supplied letters and words, and – at one point – a whole clause inadvertently omitted46.

Cura sanitatis Tiberii a To locate the original form of cst (i.e., “Form 2”), Dobschütz focused on the two earliest manuscripts: his mss a (Lucca, Biblioteca capitolare Feliniana, ms 490) and b (Paris, bnf, ms lat. 2034). The text in the former shows numerous faults and corruptions, while the latter presents a lexically and syntactically coherent text, without any lacunae or serious

lapses in meaning. Not surprisingly, it is on the Paris manuscript that Dobschütz based his edition of version a. He follows the Paris copy closely and adjusts it – by drawing on ms a or one of the later witnesses – in only minor ways, typically to clean up the accidence (e.g., the confusion between accusatives and ablatives or between nominatives and accusatives) and to resolve occasional lexical issues. Three other early manuscripts, unknown to Dobschütz, carry the same text-type as his ms b: they are the well-known Einsiedeln, Stiftsbibliothek, ms 326 (Census 75), executed in the second third of the ninth century by a scribe trained at Fulda; Barcelona, Archivio de la Corona de Aragón, ms Ripoll 106 (Census 12), copied in the second half of the ninth century in Catalonia; and Paris, bnf, ms lat. 3003, made in the tenth century. Although they introduce additional variants, they run close to ms b, and confirm that this form of cst was indeed gaining currency at the close of the first millennium.

Cura sanitatis Tiberii b Dobschütz did not edit a full, integral text of cst b because he considered it to be a product of a series of gradual revisions that smoothed and adapted the original as a continuation of en. He included it in his edition primarily on account of what it could contribute to “die Feststellung des Originaltextes a”47. He assumed that it went back to the eleventh century, presumably on the basis of what he considered to be its earliest manuscripts, his mss 1 (Census 81), 2 (Census 263), and 5 (Census 396). In fact, only one of those copies can be safely dated to the eleventh century, namely ms 2, written by Adémar de Chabannes around 102548. 32 For a recent codicological study of the Lucca codex, see Gabriella Pomaro, “Materiali per il manoscritto Lucca, Biblioteca Capitolare Feliniana 490”, in In margine al Progetto Codex: Aspetti di produzione e conservazione del patrimonio manoscritto in Toscana, Gabriella Pomaro ed., Pisa 2014, pp. 139–199. On bnf ms lat. 2034, see Bibliothèque nationale, Catalogue général des manuscrits latins, Ph. Lauer ed., vol. 2: Nos 1439–2692, Paris 1940, pp. 288–289; E. A. Lowe, Codices latini antiquiores, pt. 5: France: Paris, Oxford 1950, n. 540; and Bernhard Bischoff, Katalog der festländischen Handschriften des neuten Jahrhunderts, vol. 3: Padua – Zwickau, Birgit Ebersperger ed., Wiesbaden 2014, p. 59, no. 4122a. 33 Census 12 (from Catalonia), Census 75 (by a scribed trained at Fulda), and Paris, bnf ms lat. 2849a (from France or Italy). On the dating and scribe of Census 75, see Bischoff, Katalog (n. 32), vol. 1: Aachen – Lambach, Wiesbaden 1998, p. 242, no. 1132. For a description and

dating of the bnf ms lat. 2849a, see Bibliothèque nationale, Catalogue général (n. 32), vol. 3: Nos 2693 à 3013a, Paris 1952, pp. 156–157 ; and Bischoff, Katalog (n. 32), vol. 3, p. 86, n. 4253. 34 Paris, bnf, ms lat. 3003. For its description, see Bibliothèque nationale, Catalogue général (n. 32), vol. 3, pp. 390–391. 35 Census 232, 357, 376, 377, 384, and Oxford, Bodleian Library, ms Laud. misc. 234. The last-named manuscript is described in H. O. Coxe, Bodleian Library Quarto Catalogues, vol. 2: Laudian Manuscripts, Oxford 1973 [1858–1885], cols. 198–199. 36 See Census 26, 36, 55, 57, 70, 85, 125, 144, 149, 157, 169, 174, 311, 314, 367, 402. 37 Dobschütz’s ms ga (Census 64), 9 (Census 259) as well as Census 137 and Paris, bnf, ms lat. 3003. 38 Dobschütz’s ms n (Census 330) and Census 109. 39 Census 136, 171, 317. Dobschütz’s ms a alludes to both the healing of Tiberius and the damnation of Pilate. Dobschütz stresses that it is the story of Pilate that forms the kernel of the legend and not the story of Veronica, which serves “nur als eine Hilfslinie im Kreise der Pilatus-Legenden” (Christusbilder [n. 2], p. 208; cf. p. 212). Since he also observes that “unser Text [cst] der Urform der Legende sehr nahe stehen muss” (p. 212), it is surprising that he chose to entitle it Cura sanitatis Tiberii and not Damnatio Pilati. 40 Dobschütz’s mss c and f (Census 39), plus Census nos. 42, 75, 376, and Dublin, Trinity College, ms 509. On the last-named manuscript, see Marvin L. Colker, Trinity College Library Dublin: Descriptive Catalogue of the Medieval and Renaissance Latin Manuscripts, Dublin 1991, vol. 2, pp. 943–954. 41 Mansi, Stephani Baluzii Tutelensis Miscellanea (n. 2), p. 55. 42 The complete manuscripts included mss b, h (Census 279), 2 (Census 263), 3 (Census 396), 6 (Census 104), and 8 (Census 271); the partial ones were mss k (Census 262) and 10 (Census 181). See Dobschütz, Christusbilder (n. 2), p. 160**. 43 Dobschütz’s mss a, c, d, e (Census 42), f (Census 39), g (Census 429), n (Census 330), 1 (Census 81), 4 (Census 98), 5 (Census 97), 7 (Census 178), and 9 (Census 259). 44 J. R. Sinner, Catalogus codicum mss. Bibliothecæ Bernensis, Bern 1770, vol. 2, p. 24–26; Hans Fer. Massmann, Der keiser und der kunige buoch, oder die sogenannte Kaiserchronik, Quedlinburg/Leipzig 1854, pt 3, pp. 578–579. Sinner classicizes the spelling to some extent, omits the word “Titvlvs”, which occurs after the title, writes “reverentia” instead of “reverencia” (elsewhere, he does retain the manuscript distinction between -t- and -c-), and does not mention that the word “corpore” is a correction by the original scribe written above the cancelled “populo”. Massmann writes “Romanorum” instead of “Romanum” (transcribed correctly by Sinner), “praestare” instead of “prestare,” and “secretior” instead of “secrecior” (p. 578). Cf. Dobschütz, Christusbilder (n. 2), p. 163**, apparatus to l. 4; and p. 164**, apparatus to l. 10. 45 P. 174**, apparatus to l. 5 reads “invidioss (-sum esse a2) populo”instead of “invidioss (-sum esse a a2) populo”(f. 344r, ll. 4–5); p. 180**, apparatus to l. 10 “corporis sui” instead of “corporis suis” (f. 345r, l. 15); p. 183**, apparatus to l. 2 “que etiam adfirmabant (affirmant a2)” instead of “que etiam adfirmant (affirmabat a2)”(f. 345r, l. 31); p. 184**, apparatus to l. 4 “sunt (sit a2) acta” instead of “sunt (sint a2) acta” (f. 345v, l. 13); p. 184, apparatus to l. 9 “provocabit a1” instead of “prouocauit a1” (f. 345v, l. 18), indicates that a2 cancelled “cognoscat magnitudo tua” instead of “nouerat magnitudinem tuam” (f. 345v, l. 19), “per invidio se a1” instead of “per invidiosa a1” (f. 345v, l. 19); p. 185**, apparatus to l. 1 “patres rege eorum habitabant a1, pater eorum haberat a2” instead of “pater rege eorum habitant a1, haber[..] patres eorum a2” (f. 145v, l. 21); and so on. 46 For example, De Romano divi Petri itinere, p. 39, l. 7 reads “huc” instead of “hunc” (f. 21r, l. 20), l. 9 “honore” instead of “honores” (f. 21r, l. 22); p. 41, l. 18 “hora” instead of “ora” (f. 22r, l. 28), l. 23 “resurrexisse” instead of “resurrexit” (f. 22v, l. 7), l. 26 omits “et” (Ibidem), l. 28 omits “meo”(f. 22, l. 8); p. 42, l. 6 “nuntiabantur”instead of “nuntiantur”(f. 22v, l. 18), l. 10 “retundi” instead of “retrudi” (f. 22v, l. 21); p. 43, l. 32 “quæ” instead of “quomodo” (f. 23v, l. 8); p. 44, l. 18 omits “Et dum hec diceret aspiciens ymaginem”(f. 23v, ll. 24–25), reads “cadit”instead of “cecidit” (f. 23v, l. 25), and so on. 47 Dobschütz, Christusbilder (n. 2), p. 195**. 48 Richard Landes, “A Libellus from St. Martial of Limoges Written in the Time of Ademar of Chabannes (998–1034)”, Scriptorium, xxxvii (1983), pp. 178–204, sp. p. 190, n. 48, p. 204. On Ademar, cf. also Richard Landes, Catherine Paupert, Naissance d’un Apôtre, La Vie de Saint Martial de Limoges, Turnhout 1991.

39

40

His ms 1 has recently been re-assigned to the twelfth or the thirteenth centuries, and ms 5 to the fifteenth49. Dobschütz’s dating of version b is, of course, speculative. If Adémar himself, a wellknown historian and forger, was not the author of version b – the transitional passage after chapter 14 does indeed hint at some familiarity with history – then it must have circulated already in the first decades of the eleventh century for him to have access to it and, if that were the case, it might possibly antedate it. Dobschütz’s comment about the process of gradual smoothing of cst b seems more appropriate for its later medieval development than for its origin. There is no evidence that b emerged gradually or that it represents revisions by a succession of scribes; rather, it appears to be the work of a single scribe who, having found en and cst side by side in his exemplar and having perceived threads of continuity between them, decided to tie them even closer together. The antecedent of version b must have been one of the a manuscripts: despite its numerous lexical alterations and amplifications, b shares a large number of textual characteristics with a against the versions related to the Lucca text (ms a)50. Only infrequently does it align itself with ms a against a51; typically, where it does not introduce idiosyncratic readings, b shares the same wording, including additions and omissions (in relation to a)52, as version a. Dobschütz’s discussion of various subgroups of cst b, based on only a portion of the manuscripts listed in his introduction, is of limited value. By his own admission, he was not interested in later medieval versions and did not investigate them thoroughly. This also explains why he assigned a special place to Zainer’s 1473 editio princeps of en and cst: he was simply not familiar with a fourteenth-century abridged redaction, attested in at least four manuscripts (Census 137, 301, 310, 320), from which Zainer derived his edition53. Version b was probably the most common form of cst, both in Latin and in European vernaculars, because it was often transmitted and translated as part of en 54. Unfortunately, its Latin forms have not yet been surveyed in detail, and the specific sources and character of its vernacular translations remain mostly unknown.

Cura sanitatis Tiberii c? Dobschütz was aware that cst in his ms a (the Lucca codex) contained a divergent text, with many readings strikingly different from those in ms b, on which he based his edition of version a. However, he concluded that its many lexical idiosyncrasies must have resulted from haphazard incorporation of interlinear glosses into a base text closely related to ms b; about the source of the putative glosses he could not say anything definitive55. Consequently, he treated the Lucca text as a rogue, isolated textual incident and relegated it to the apparatus. While there may be some merit to the hypothesis of embedded glosses, one should not lose sight of other possibilities. Dobschütz finds evidence for the glosses, among others, in the frequent switching of synonyms and in the placement of synonymous expressions side by side in the text. However, if cst or its components originated as a compilation of excerpts translated ultimately from Greek, as Dobschütz himself suggests56, could not some of the synonymous pairs of a reflect the use of doublets in the originary translation(s)57? And could not the frequent switching of synonyms be indicative of the process of their simplification? Dobschütz noticed that reflexes of the Lucca text surfaced six hundred years later in ms g (Census 429)58, but he lacked the evidence to postulate the existence of a third textual tradition59. However, a recently identified Paris, bnf, ms lat. 2849a, from the third quarter of the ninth century, contains a text in many respects similar to that in the Lucca codex and suggests that other similar copies must have once existed: together, they left a long-lasting legacy both in Latin and in the vernaculars, and not only in Europe but also in North America. I would propose that we refer to it as tradition c. bnf, ms lat. 2849a is not a direct descendant of the Lucca exemplar, but the two most likely share the same ancestry. They frequently agree in idiosyncratic readings, as in the following examples:

cst a

ut iussi ab ipso hic coniungeremus licet post multos dies vi maris inpediente longo traximus itinere (Christusbilder, p. 169**, ll. 5–6)

cst b (ms 1)

ut iussi ab ipso huc ueniremus licet post multos dies mare impediente longa traximus itinera (f. 22r, ll. 8–10) Lucca ms ut ab ipso directi et ex eius preceptum hic deuenientes post longum itineres tribulatione et fugiendo uim mares (f. 343r, ll. 11–12) bnf lat. 2849a ad ipsos directi et eius precep[...] hic deuenientes post longum itineris tribu[..]cionem et fugiendum uim maris (f. 12v, ll. 16–18)

Although the grammar, word division, and spelling in bnf ms lat. 2849a are often non-standard, it is clear that bnf ms lat. 2849a abridges here its exemplar, which must have carried at least some, if not most, of the features of the Lucca text, as suggested by the presence the words “delator” and “amori suo” in both. The alterations include also a change, possibly through paleographical confusion, in the name of the man who reported Veronica to Pilate: in the Lucca manuscript and ms b, as in the majority of the later tradition, he is called

cst a

prudentia tua mihi nuntiata est (Christusbilder, p. 176**, l. 6) cst b (ms 1) prudentia tua michi multi moda nuntiatur (f. 23r, l. 17 Lucca ms digna prudentia in te cognusco ueritati (f. 344r, ll. 28–29) bnf lat. 2849a dignam prudenciam in te cognoscimus (f. 14v, l. 7)

bnf ms lat. 2849a does occasionally also chart its own path, for instance, when it condenses the narrative of Nero and Pilate (ch. 15–20) to just a few sentences, possibly as part of the process of secondary abridgement mentioned by Dobschütz. Moreover, it distorts in peculiar ways the story of the discovery of Veronica’s image of Jesus. That account begins:

cst a

sic venit quidam homo Marcius nomine pandens secretum cuiusdam mulieris. dixit ad Volusianum: “ante annos fere tres mulierem curavit a profluvio sanguinis; quae cum sanitatem recepisset ob amorem eius imaginem ipsius sibi depinxit, dum ipse maneret in corpore, ipso Jhesu sciente”. tunc Volusianus dixit ad iuvenem: “indica mihi mulieris nomen”. (Christusbilder, pp. 175**, l. 10–16**, l. 3) Lucca ms et uenit quidam marcius nomine Iudęorum quasi delator diuinitatis sacramentum cuiusdam mulieris. et dixit ad uolusianum Ante annos fere tres mulnere curauit a prefluuio sanguinis Qui cum uidisset se iam sona hiconia eius siue amori suo depinxit; Dum adhuc iesus esset in corpore ipsum scientem Respondit ad hec uolusianus dixit ad iuuenem indica mihi nomen mulieris (f. 344r, ll. 18–24)

bnf lat. 2849a (14r)

et uenit quidam orcius nomen quasi dilatur et dixit uolusianus ante annus fere iii mulierem (14v) curauit a profluuio sanguinis. Qui cum euidisset iam sana tonicam ei amori suo pinxit. Que mulieres haberes cito indica mihi nomen mulieres (f. 14r, l. 22–14v, l. 4)

49 On ms 1 (Census 81), see Berthold L. Ullman, Philip A. Stadter, The Public Library of Renaissance Florence. Niccolò Niccoli, Cosimo de’ Medici and the Library of San Marco, Padua 1972, who place it in the twelfth century; and by Nicola R. Vasaturo, Acta capitulorum generalium Congregationis Vallis Umbrosae, vol. 1: Institutiones abbatum (1095–1310), Rome 1985, p. xxxvii, who dates it to “sec. xii–xiii,” with an additional note specifying that en and cst are “in scrittura sec. xiii”. Similarly, ms 5 (Census 97), which Dobschütz presents as “sc. xi/xii,” was dated in Anton Kern, Die Handschriften der Universitätsbibliothek Graz, Vienna 1956, vol. 2, pp. 82–84, to the fifteenth century. A handful of twelfth-century manuscripts have also survived, although none of them was apparently used by Dobschütz; they include Census 15, 232, 241, 357, 377, and 384. Dobschütz’s ms 3 (Census 396), which he ascribed to “sc. xii”, has been dated to the thirteenth century by H. J. Hermann, Die deutschen romanischen Handschriften, Die illuminierten Handschriften und Inkunabeln der Nationalbibliothek in Wien, Leipzig 1926, vol. 2, pp. 340–345. 50 On those versions, see the section “Cura sanitatis Tiberii c?” below. 51 One of those rare cases occurs in ch. 3, where b reads “urguebatur” with a, while all a texts have “coartabatur”(Dobschütz, Christusbilder [n. 2], p. 167**, line 8). 52 For example, in ch. 2, where both a and b include a clause “et dum nullum suae salutis sensisset augmentum”, absent from a (Dobschütz, Christusbilder [n. 2], p. 165**, line 4); or in ch. 4, where they omit the words “militarem statuum”present in a and related texts (Dobschütz, Christusbilder [n. 2], p. 168**, apparatus to line 10). 53 See Zbigniew Izydorczyk, “The Earliest Printed Versions of the Evangelium Nicodemi and Their Manuscript Sources”, Apocrypha, xxi (2010), p. 123. 54 Translations of cst a seem to be rare but not unknown; cf. Czech version in Národní knihovna, ms xvii b 15, described and quoted (siglum u) by Jiří Polívka, Drobné příspěvky literárně-historické, Praha 1891, pp. 24–63. cst b was translated into French (cf. versions d and e in La Vengeance de Nostre-Seigneur: The Old and Middle French Prose Versions, Alvin E. Ford ed., (Studies and Texts 115), Toronto 1993; into English (cf. the versions printed by Betty Hill, “The Middle English Prose Version of the Gospel of Nicodemus from Washington, Library of Congress pre-Ac 4”, Notes and Quaeries. New Series, xxxiv/2 [1987], pp. 156–175, and by William Marx, The Middle English Liber Aureus and Gospel of Nicodemus, Heidelberg 2013, pp. 108–115); and into German (cf. versions a, a8, and c in Achim Masser, Max Siller, Das Evangelium Nicodemi in spätmittelalterlicher deutscher Prosa, Heidelberg 1987). Similar translations likely exist in other languages as well. 55 Dobschütz, Christusbilder (n. 2), pp. 198**–200**. 56 Ibidem, p. 212, n. 2, p. 198**. 57 In some cases, doublets could be part of the scribe’s colloquial language or idiolect. For example, Dobschütz identifies the pleonastic use of the relative and demonstrative pronouns “quibus his” as resulting from the incorporation of a gloss, but see a recent discussion of the same phrase in C. Marius Victorinus, Commenta in Ciceronis Rhetorica, Thomas Riesenweber ed., vol. 1: Prolegomena, Berlin 2015, p. 246. 58 Dobschütz, Christusbilder (n. 2), pp. 195**–196**. 59 Cf. Ibidem.

41

42

Marc(i)us, but in bnf ms lat. 2849a, he is referred to as Orcius. Even more striking is what appears to be a reference to Jesus’ tunic; it is repeated later in the same episode, when Volusianus urges Veronica, “dignare declarare nobis et tonicam ihesu uiri magni...”. (fol. 14v, ll. 8–9). Whether or not it is a misreading of an abbreviated form of the phrase “tunc iconam”, the use of this word suggests that the scribe responsible for this alteration thought that the image was painted on a piece of garment. Dobschütz’s ms b and other early witnesses of cst a do not specify on what substrate Veronica painted the image. The oldest manuscripts of the Vindicta Salvatoris, which borrowed the story of Veronica from cst at an early point, do not specify on what material the image was painted either: the ninth-century Bibliothèque d’agglomération de Saint-Omer, ms 202 (Census 334) and the tenth-century Paris, bnf, ms lat. 5237 (Census 268), refer only to Veronica having “uultum domini”. However, Veronica paints the image “in pallio suo” in what Gounelle terms “Vindicta non volusienne” (i.e., a version in which Volusianus is not mentioned); although all manuscripts of this version date from the thirteenth or fourteenth centuries, it contains some archaic features and may, in fact, antedate the “Vindicta volusienne”60. Similarly, a comment written in Greek in a ninthor tenth-century Roman florilegium, discussed by Sansterre, likewise indicates that Veronica’s image was imprinted on cloth61. The reference to “tunica” in bnf ms lat. 2849a, dating from the same period as the florilegium, belongs, therefore, among the earliest mentions of an image on fabric, which became so iconic in the subsequent centuries. In his description of the ninth-century portion of the manuscript, Bischoff localizes it to southern France or Italy and remarks that some features of the script are not unlike those used in Nonantola62. This last observation is intriguing because it is in a text written in Nonantola between 1035 and 1053, the Translatio et miracula sanctorum Senesii et Theopontii63, that we encounter another early reference to Veronica’s image on cloth or garment. In the Translatio, Anserada, a woman who protected and venerated the bodies of the saints, is compared to Veronica. The author writes: “Illa etenim Veronica femina reverendissima imaginem Christi in panno depictam in cervicali suo in loco dignissimo occulte

reconditam habebat...”64. He clearly suggests that the image was painted on a cloth or garment, “in panno”, and hidden in a pillow or cushion, “in cervicali”, the latter phrase used also in bnf ms lat. 2849a. By the second half of the eleventh century, when the Vindicta Salvatoris was rendered into Old English, the idea of an image on a piece of garment must have already gained some currency, for the translator explains that, although Volusianus worshipped the image as if it was the face of the Lord himself, it was in fact the garment that Christ wore (“þæt reaf, þæt se sylfa hælend werede”)65. A number of characteristic features of bnf ms lat. 2849a reappear in a late medieval revision of cst known to Dobschütz primarily from the variant readings reported from ms g (Census 429) by Schönbach66. By the time he was completing Christusbilder, Dobschütz was also aware of two other manuscripts of the same type, ga (Census 64) and gb (Census 63)67, but it was probably too late for him to rethink and modify his commentary. I have been able to identify five additional copies, mostly from Bohemia and Austria (Kraków, Biblioteka Jagiellońska, ms 1356 from ca 1395; Census 116, 340, and Olomouc, Kapitulní knihovna, co 48768, all from the fifteenth century; and Padova, Biblioteca Universitaria, ms 770, from 150969). What appears to have been the earliest witness of this redaction, written apparently in the early fourteenth century in Italy, was owned in the nineteenth century by Rev. Dr. Ginsburg of Virginia Water, Surrey (its present whereabouts are unknown). The text from Dr. Ginsburg’s manuscript was printed by E. M. Thompson in 188170, but it escaped Dobschütz’s attention. In manuscripts, this version frequently accompanies the so-called Bohemian redaction of en (except in the Kraków and Padova codices)71, either following it directly or separated from it by a story of the cross; however, unlike cst b, it always retains its textual independence and is never subsumed by the preceding apocryphon. This Bohemian version is noteworthy for consistently omitting the story of Nero as well as for its alternative account of the origin of Veronica’s image of Christ. According to this account, the image was not painted by Veronica but left on a piece of linen by Christ himself, who used Veronica’s “lintheum” to wipe the sweat from his

face after a long journey. Although this version of the story has no early medieval antecedents72, the name of the soldier who reported Veronica to Pilate, Orchius, does occur in the just-mentioned ninth-century bnf ms lat. 2849a. In fact, even though it is not based directly on the Paris manuscript, the late medieval Bohemian cst reflects it in other respects as well, preserving a range of its characteristic readings, not attested either in the tradition derived from ms b (the source of Dobschütz’s cst a) or in the Lucca manuscript, such as, for instance, the following:

cst a

quia intrinsecus me dolor perurguit indicio (Christusbilder, p. 165**, l. 8–166**, l. 1)

cst b (ms 1)

Et quidem me intrinsecus doloris perurget indicium (f. 21v, l. 6) Lucca ms quia intrinsicus meos dolores perunguit indicio (f. 342v, ll. 6–7)

bnf lat. 2849a

quia urgor dolosus intrinsecus (f. 12r, l. 5) Bohemian cst quia urgeor doloribus intrinsecus (Thompson, “Apocryphal Legends,” p. 244)

Quite unexpectedly, given its rather limited attestation in Latin, this Bohemian cst found its way into vernacular translations. In the fifteenth century, it was rendered into Czech, and this rendition survives in Praha, Národní knihovna, ms xx a 4 (dated 1472)73. Two additional manuscripts, Praha, Královská kanonie premonstrátů na Strahově, ms dr iii 32 (dated 1442), and Brno, Moravská zemská knihovna, ms mk 97 (dated 1453)74, preserve an expanded Czech redaction, which translates both from the standard cst a and from the Bohemian version, sometimes giving two accounts of the same episode one after another75. This is exactly what happens in the episode of the discovery of Veronica’s image of Jesus, which is reported first in the Bohemian version (in Czech, the name “Orchius,” appears as “Agoncius” or “Aggencius”), and then in the a version as edited by Dobschütz (with “Marc(i)us” as Veronica’s denouncer)76. This mixed version passed from handwritten copies into print, first in Czech and then in German. The

1748 Tübingen edition of the German translation was reprinted by Nicholas Hasselbach in Chestnut Hill, Pennsylvania, in 1763, and it continued to be printed in North America by various publishers serving Anabaptist communities throughout the nineteenth century and into the twentieth77. Four other manuscripts of cst – Oxford, Bodleian Library, ms Laud. misc. 234 (twelfth century); Paris, bnf, ms lat. 1722 (Census 253; late twelfth or early thirteenth century); Praha, Státní knihovna, ms xiv.h.33 (Census 321; thirteenth century); and Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, ms Vat. lat. 3851 (fifteenth century) – preserve yet another version with numerous phrases looking back directly to those in the Lucca codex and in bnf ms lat. 2849a. 60 61 62 63 64

Gounelle, “Les origines littéraires” (n. 5), p. 243. Sansterre, “Variations d’une légende” (n. 6), pp. 220–221. Bischoff, Katalog (n. 32), p. 86, no. 4354. See n. 4 above. Translatio et miracula (n. 6), p. 988. Cf. Honorius Augustodunensis, Speculum ecclesiae, pl 172, col. 831a, who summarizes cst and mentions the image “quam Veronica in panno ob Christi amorem depingere fecerat”. 65 See Two Old English Apocrypha and Their Manuscript Source: The Gospel of Nicodemus and The Avenging of the Saviour, J. E. Cross ed., Cambridge 1996, p. 281. 66 Anton Schönbach, “Review of Constantinus de Tischendorf, Evangelia apocrypha (1876)”, in Anzeiger für deutsches Alterthum und deutsche Litteratur, Berlin 1876, vol. 2, pp. 149 –212, sp. pp. 173–180, quoted from Graz, Universitätsbiblithek, ms 814 (Census 429), which was lost during World War ii. 67 See Dobschütz, Christusbilder (n. 2), p. 203**. 68 Personal communication from Dr. Jitka Blatkowá, Zemský Archiv Opava, pobočka Olomouc. 69 Described by Martina Pantarotto, La Biblioteca manoscritta del Convento di San Francesco Grande di Padova, Padua 2003, p. 127. 70 E. M. Thompson, “Apocryphal Legends”, Journal of the British Archaeological Association, xxxvii (1881), pp. 244–248. 71 For the Bohemian redaction of en, see Zbigniew Izydorczyk, “The Bohemian Redaction of the Evangelium Nicodemi in Medieval Slavic Vernaculars”, Studia Ceranea, iv (2014), 49–64. 72 Except, perhaps, in the Greek comment brought to light by Sansterre, “Variations d’une légende” (n. 6), pp. 220 –221. 73 A basic description and digital images are available at [http:// v2.manuscriptorium.com]. Another copy was once preserved in St Petersburg, Russian National Library, ms Lat. i Qu. 175; see Aleksander Brückner, “Böhmische Studien. Abhandlungen und Texte”, Archiv für Slavische Philologie, xiv (1892), pp. 22–27. I have not been able to verify whether the manuscript is still at the Russian National Library. 74 Descriptions and digital images of the two manuscripts are available at [http://v2.manuscriptorium.com]. 75 The Czech translation of the Bohemian cst used in this expanded version came from a different translation project than the one in Praha, Národní knihovna ms xx a 4. 76 Cf. Polívka, Drobné příspěvky (n. 54), pp. 42–43. Václav Hanka, Čtenie Nikodemovo: co sě dálo při umučeni pane. Pověst krásná o dřevu křiže svatého. Knížky, kterak Tiberius poslal pro Ježíše Voluziána, Prague 1860, pp. 250 –256, published the text of s; more recently, the same text has been edited for Jaroslav Kolár, Milada Nedvědová, Próza českého středověku, Prague 1983, pp. 281–292. The version from k has not been edited. 77 See Zbigniew Izydorczyk, Charlotte Fillmore-Handlon, “The Modern Life of an Ancient Text: The Gospel of Nicodemus in Manitoba”, Apocrypha, xxi (2010), pp. 113–120.

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The narrative is reshaped somewhat to enhance its cohesion, for instance, by having Tiberius call a council of senators, who elect Volusianus as an emissary; the latter’s interview with the emperor appears then as a natural second step in his dispatch to Jerusalem. In the episode of the discovery of Veronica’s image of Christ, the text oscillates between the readings of Lucca manuscript and those of bnf ms lat. 2849a, agreeing sometimes with one and sometimes with the other whenever they both part ways with cst a. Thus, like the Paris manuscript, it suggests that Veronica painted her image on Jesus’ tunic:

cst a

ob amorem eius imaginem ipsius sibi depinxit (Christusbilder, p. 176**, l. 1) Lucca ms hiconiam eius siue amori suo depinxit (f. 344r, l. 22)

bnf ms lat. 2849a

tonicam ei amori suo pinxit (f. 14v, l. 22)

Praha ms tunicam eius sibi amore depinxit (f. 54r, ll. 16–17)

But then, like the Lucca codex, supplies a clause missing from the Paris text and rendered differently in cst a:

cst a

dum ipse maneret in corpore, ipso Jhesu sciente (Christusbilder, p. 176**, l. 2)

Lucca ms Dum adhuc ihesus esset in corpore ipsum scientem (f. 344r, ll. 22–23)

bnf ms lat. 2849a omitted

Praha ms dum adhuc iesus esset in corpore ipso sciente (f. 54r, ll. 17–18)

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Therefore, it appears that neither the Lucca nor the Paris manuscript inspired this version directly, but some other related exemplar that included features of both, either as their common ancestor or sibling. Like the Bohemian cst, this last version also found its way into vernacular translations. In the late thirteenth century, it was rendered into French and is extant in at least four manuscripts78. This redaction cannot rival the cultural impact of

the “Orchius” version, but it further demonstrates that the standard forms a and b of cst did not have a monopoly on vernacular translations.

Epilogue Dobschütz’s edition of cst served well several generations of scholars. Although I am not fully convinced that it represents the original form of the narrative, his version a certainly reflects a texttypes that was in circulation from the late eighth century onwards. The edition also alerted scholars to the existence of a different version, one completely dependent on en; however, because of his focus on the origin of Veronica’s legend, Dobschütz offered little insight into what he considered to be later forms of this narrative. Versions a and b are closely related to each other as the latter is derived from the former. In contrast, the Lucca manuscript, bnf ms 2849a, and the later redactions that preserve their features appear to go back to a different early medieval ancestor, one that was not smoothed and corrected as ms b, the key witness of version a, appears to have been. Dobschütz did not fully appreciate the importance of that alternative tradition, in large part because the range of manuscripts known to him was rather limited. Some other limitations of Dobschütz’s edition reflect what were common philological practices in the nineteenth century. It is possible – but certainly not fair – to find fault with it because it does not meet modern expectations of thoroughness, exactitude, or clarity of presentation. Therefore, instead of criticizing it for not living up to the standards that did not exist in its day, we should acknowledge the editor’s accomplishment in mapping out two major versions of cst and then start planning a new edition that would reflect our own notions about the ontology of apocryphal and legendary texts in the Middle Ages and our own ideas about philological praxis. The first steps towards such an edition would include: • a thorough search for still unidentified manuscripts, • a survey and classification of all texts preserved in those manuscripts, and • an identification of all culturally salient versions.

The new edition should probably seek not only to discover the earliest recoverable text of cst, but also to make available all later versions that had an impact on the textual and cultural traditions, Latin and vernacular, in medieval and post-medieval Europe. In the age of manuscripts, works such as the Evangelium Nicodemi and Cura sanitatis Tiberii did not have a single authorial or authoritative form: they were always dynamic, open, and flexible. Our challenge is to capture their multifarious, fluid textuality and appreciate it at its most impactful points. 78 This French version has been edited by Ford in La Vengeance de Nostre-Seigneur (n. 54), pp. 35–49, from bnf ms fr. 23117, fr. 17229, fr. 413, and Oxford, Queen’s College, ms 305. The text from bnf, ms fr. 696 has been transcribed by Jean-Yves Cordier in his blog for March 13, 2013, entitled “La légende de la Véronique dans le manuscrit Français 696” at [http://www.lavieb-aile.com/article-la-legende-dela-veronique-dans-le-manuscrit-fran-ais-696-116140596.html].

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Appendix Manuscripts listed by Dobschütz Dobschütz’s siglum Census no. a Lucca, Biblioteca Capitolare Feliniana ms 490, ff. 342r–346r (late 8th or early 9th c.) b Paris, Bibdliothèque nationale de France ms lat. 2034, ff. 151v–157r (8th c., 4th quarter) c Bern, Burgerbibliothek ms 120, f. 58v (11th c.) d Bruxelles, Bibliothèque Royale Albert ier ms 9920–31, ff. 166r–168r (11th c.) e Bruxelles, Bibliothèque Royale Albert ier ms ii. 937, ff. 12v–15r (13th c.) 42 f Bruxelles, Bibliothèque Royale Albert ier ms 2720–22, ff. 154v–159r (13th c.) 39 g Graz, Universitätsbibliothek ms 814 (15th c.), destroyed 429 ga České Budějovice (formerly Hohenfurt), Státní vědecká knihovna ms 1 vb 58, ff. 32r– (1470) 64 gb České Budějovice (formerly Hohenfurt), Státní vědecká knihovna ms 1 vb 28, ff. 84r–93v (15th c.) 63 h Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France ms lat. 10586, ff. 80v–85v (14th c.) 279 Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France ms lat. 3628, ff. 122v–125r (15th c.) 262 k l Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France ms lat. 5559, ff. 40r–50v (late 15th c.) 273 München, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek Clm 7587, ff. –40rb (15th c.) 184 m n Roma, Biblioteca Vallicellana ms f. 65, ff. 77v–81v (13th c.) 330 Firenze, Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana ms s. m. 599, ff. 21r–25r (12th c.) 81 1 2 Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France ms lat. 3784, ff. 113r–114r (11th c., 1st half) 263 3 Wien, Österreichische Nationalbibliothek ms 1180, ff. 165rb–167rb (13th c.) 396 4 Graz, Universitätsbibliothek ms 1314 (37/45 4o), ff. 154r–157v (14th c., 2nd half) 98 5 Graz, Universitätsbibliothek ms 856 (38/47 4o), ff. 61r–64r (15th c.) 97 6 Halle/Saale, Archiv der Francke‘schen Stiftungen ms p 7, ff. 34v–41r (15th c.) 104 7 Montpellier, Bibliothèque Interuniversitaire, Sect. Médecine ms 503, ff. 52r–55v (14th c.) 178 8 Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France ms lat. 5557, ff. 20v–25v (13th or 14th c.) 271 9 Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France ms lat. 3338, ff. 166ra–168ra (late 13th – early 14th c.) 259 München, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek Clm 2689, ff. 103va–105va (14th c.) 181 10 11 München, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek Clm 8374, ff. 233ra–235va (late 14th – early 15th c.) 186 12 München, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek Clm 19644, ff. 107rb–110ra (14th c.) 201 13 München, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek Clm 26684, ff. 161ra–162rb (14th c.) 205 14 München, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek Clm 23839, ff. 64va–66rb (1434) 203 15 München, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek Clm 14332, ff. 225rb–227rb (15th c.) 195 16 München, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek Clm 8872, ff. 175r–177r (14th .) 187 17 München, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek Clm 23989, ff. 67ra–67vb (1482) 204 18 München, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek Clm 8485, ff. 62r– (15th c.) 19 Chartres, Bibliothèque municipale ms 34 (14th c.), destroyed 426 20 Oxford, Bodleian Library ms Laud. misc. 402, ff. 129r–132r (13th c.) 237 21 Oxford, Bodleian Library ms Laud. misc. 183/2, ff. 546r–548v (14th c.) 236 22 Praha, Národní knihovna ms Osek 40, ff. 224va–225vb (14th c.) 301 23 Bamberg, Staatsbibliothek ms Theol. 112 (q iv 13), ff. 253va–255vb (15th c.) 11

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Manuscripts mentioned in the paper Census’s no. Dobschütz’s siglum 11 Bamberg, Staatsbibliothek ms Theol. 112 (q iv 13), ff. 253va–255vb (15th c.) 23 12 Barcelona, Archivio de la Corona de Aragón ms Ripoll 106, ff. 136r–139r (9th c., 2nd half) Berkeley, ca, The Bancroft Library ms ucb 20, ff. 48r–56r (12th c.) 15 Bern, Burgerbibliothek ms 120, f. 58v (11th c.) c 26 Bologna, Biblioteca Universitaria ms 2601, ff. –127v (1465) 28 Bordeaux, Bibliothèque Municipale ms 111, ff. 284va–285vb (late 14th c.) 36 Brno, Archiv města Brna ms St. Jacob 98/121, ff. 135r–138r (1423–1424) Bruxelles, Bibliothèque Royale Albert ier ms 2720–22, ff. 154v–159r (13th c.) 39 f Bruxelles, Bibliothèque Royale Albert ier ms 9920–31, ff. 166r–168r (11th c.) d 42 Bruxelles, Bibliothèque Royale Albert ier ms ii. 937, ff. 12r–15v (13th c.) e 55 Cambridge, Trinity College ms r.7.2, pp. 113–119 (1562–1565) 57 Cambridge, University Library ms dd.III.16, ff. 29rb–31rb (14th c.) 63 České Budějovice, Státní vědecká knihovna ms 1 vb 28, ff. 84r–93v (1470) gb 64 České Budějovice, Státní vědecká knihovna ms 1 vb 58, ff. 32r– (15th c.) ga 70 Dublin, Trinity College ms 497 (e.2.26), ff. –62v (late 14th c.)

75 79 81 85 93 97 98 104 109 116 125 136 137 144 149 157 169 171 174 178 181 201 230 232 236 241 253 259 262 263 264 268 271 279 301 310 311 314 317 320 321 330 334 340 354 357 358

Dublin, Trinity College ms 509, pp. 13–18 (mid–15th c.) Einsiedeln, Stiftsbibliothek ms 326, ff. 29r–34v (9th c., 2nd third) Eutin, Kreisbibliothek ms ii, ff. 16b–20a (15th c.) Firenze, Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana ms s. m. 599, ff. 21r–25r (12th c.) 1 Gdańsk, Biblioteka Polskiej Akademii Nauk ms 1956, ff. 90rb–91rb (15th c.) Göttingen, Niedersächsische Staats- und Universitätsbibliothek 4o Cod. Ms. Theol. 153, ff. 95rb–97va (15th c.) Graz, Universitätsbibliothek ms 856 (38/47 4o), ff. 61r–64r (15th c.) 5 Graz, Universitätsbibliothek ms 1314 (37/45 4o), ff. 154r–157v (14th c., 2nd half) 4 Halle/Saale, Archiv der Franckeschen Stiftungen ms p 7, ff. 34v–41r (15th c.) 6 Hannover, Niedersächsische Landesbibliothek ms i 247, ff. 17v–21r (14th c.) Klosterneuburg, Stiftsbibliothek ms 495, ff. 10va–12va (early 15th c.) Kraków, Biblioteka Jagiellońska ms 1356, ff. 68v–70r (1395) Kraków, Biblioteka Jagiellońska ms 1453, pp. 390a–394b (early 15th c.) Leipzig, Universitätsbibliothek ms 819, ff. 108v–111v (early 13th c.) Lemgo, Stadtbibliothek ms 10, ff. 13v–16v (ca 1400) London, British Library ms Add. 22349, ff. 181vb–186ra (14th c.) London, British Library ms Cotton Galba e. vii, ff. 37va–39rb (early 15th c.) London, British Library ms Royal 1 e. ix, ff. 286ra–286va (late 14th c.) London, Lincoln Inn Library ms Hale 73, ff. ? (late 14th c.) Lucca, Biblioteca Capitolare Feliniana ms 490, ff. 342r–346r (late 8th or early 9th c.) a Luzern, Zentralbibliothek ms kb p msc. 29 quarto, ff. 27r–34r (14th c.) Melk, Stiftsbibliothek ms 1838 (474, h 96), ff. 166v–172v (15th c.) Montpellier, Bibliothèque Interuniversitaire, Sect. Médecine ms 503, ff. 52r–55v (14th c.) 7 München, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek Clm 2689, ff. 103va–105va (14th c.) 10 München, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek Clm 19644, ff. 107rb–110ra (14th c.) 12 Olomouc, Kapitulní knihovna co 487, ff. 237r–241r (mid-15th c.) Oxford, Bodleian Library ms Canon. Pat. Lat. 117, ff. 15r–16r (15th c.) Oxford, Bodleian Library ms Fairfax 17, ff. 54v–58v (late 12th c.) Oxford, Bodleian Library ms Laud. misc. 183/2, ff. 546r–548v (14th c.) 21 Oxford, Bodleian Library ms Laud. misc. 234, ff. 45v–48r (12th c.) Oxford, Jesus College ms 4, ff. 105r–106v (11th or 12th c.) Padova, Biblioteca Universitaria ms 770, ff. 23v–28v (16th c.) Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France ms lat. 1722, ff. 106r–108v (12th–13th c.) Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France ms lat. 2034, ff. 151v–157r (8th c., 4th quarter) b Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France ms lat. 2849a, ff. 11v–15v (9th c., 3rd quarter) Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France ms lat. 3003, ff. 174v–188v (10th c.) Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France ms lat. 3338, ff. 166ra–168ra (late 13th–early 14th c.) 9 Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France ms lat. 3628, ff. 122v–125r (15th c.) k Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France ms lat. 3784, ff. 113r–114r (11th c., 1st half) 2 Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France ms lat. 4977, ff. 232va–233va (14th c.) Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France ms lat. 5237, ff. 55r–61v (10th c.) (Vindicta Salvatoris) Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France ms lat. 5557, ff. 20v–25v (13th or 14th c.) 8 Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France ms lat. 10586, ff. 80v–85v (14th c.) h Praha, Národní knihovna ms Osek 40, ff. 224va–225vb (14th c.) 22 Praha, Národní knihovna ms iv.e.8, 139v–iiir (early 14th c.) Praha, Národní knihovna ms v.f.11, ff. 227v–231r (late 14th c.) Praha, Národní knihovna ms x.e.13, ff. 81r–83v (14th c.) Praha, Národní knihovna ms xiv.e.10, ff. 53ra–59 (1312) Praha, Národní knihovna ms xiv.h.2, ff. 31ra–33ra (14th c.) Praha, Národní knihovna ms xiv.h.33, ff. 48v–58v (13th c.) Roma, Biblioteca Vallicellana ms f. 65, ff. 77v–81v (13th c.) Saint-Omer, Bibliothèque d’agglomération de Saint-Omer ms 202, ff. 20v–25v (late 9th c.) (Vindicta Salvatoris) Schlägl, Stiftsbibliothek ms 156 Cpl. 145, ff. 389v–392v (1473) Třeboň, Státní Archiv ms a 14, ff. –102v (15th c.) Trier, Stadtbibliothek ms 112/1092 8o, ff. 22v– (12th c.) Trier, Stadtbibliothek ms 200/1190 8o, ff. 67r–70r (14th c.)

47

367 376 377 384 391 393 396 402 404 408 421 429 436

Urbana, Illinois, University Library ms rbr Uncat. 75 23, ff. 32r–35v (15th c., 1st half) Vaticano, Città del, Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana ms Reg. lat. 630, ff. 63r–65r (12th c.) Vaticano, Città del, Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana ms Reg. lat. 648, ff. 44v–48v (12th c.) Vaticano, Città del, Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana ms Vat. lat. 3851, ff. 1r–3v (15th c.) Vaticano, Città del, Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana ms Vat. lat. 5094, ff. 18v–23r (12th c.) Washington, d.c., Library of Congress ms 95 (Faye and Bond 114), ff. 18r–21v (early 16th c.) Wien, Österreichische Nationalbibliothek ms 563, ff. 123r– (5th c.) (Vienna Palimpsest, Evangelium Nicodemi) Wien, Österreichische Nationalbibliothek ms 1180, ff. 165rb–167rb (13th c.) 3 Winchester, Winchester College Library ms 41, ff. 148r–152r (15th c.) Wolfenbüttel, Herzog-August-Bibliothek Cod. Guelf. 38.8 Aug. 2o, ff. 12ra–15ra (15th c., 1st half) Wolfenbüttel, Herzog-August-Bibliothek Cod. Guelf. 297 Helmst., ff. 137va–139rb (15th c.) Würzburg, Universitätsbibliothek ms m.ch.f. 294, ff. 88rb–90ra (15th c.) Graz, Universitätsbibliothek ms 814 (15th c.), destroyed g Virginia Water, Rev. Dr. Ginsburg (14th c.), lost

Vernacular manuscripts Brno, Moravská zemská knihovna ms mk 97, ff. 240v– (15th c.) Oxford, Queen’s College ms 305, ff. 6a–7d (15th c., 2nd half) Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France ms fr. 413, ff. 26c–30a (15th c.) Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France ms fr. 696, ff. 23r–25v (13th c.) Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France ms fr. 17229, ff. 218d–222b (13th c.) Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France ms fr. 23117, ff. 31a–35a (13th c.) Praha, Královská kanonie premonstrátů na Strahově ms dr iii 32 ff. 100r–122v (1442) Praha, Národní knihovna ms xx.a.4, pp. 101–121 (1472) St Petersburg, Russian National Library ms Lat. i Qu. 175, ff. ? Washington, d.c., Library of Congress ms pre-ac 4, ff. 37v–63v (1395–1415)

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summary Cura sanitatis Tiberii sto let po Ernstu von Dobschützovi

Takzvaná Cura sanitatis Tiberii (cst) je jedním z  nejranějších písemných pramenů zpravujících o legendě Veroničina obrazu Krista. Jeji kritickou edici vydal Ernst von Dobschütz na konci devatenáctého století jako součást své významné studie Christusbilder. Cílem článku Zbigniewa Izydorczyka je srovnat Dobschützovu edici, která stále zůstává výchozím bodem pro diskusi o původu a recepci cst, s dochovanými středověkými svědectvími a určit, nakolik zůstává Dobschützova práce věrná textům, které se dochovaly v rukopisech. Dobschütz ve své edici rozlišuje dvě verze cst, které označuje jako a a b. První z nich se v rukopisu nachází jako samostatný text s vlastním nadpisem, zatímco druhá je vždy připojena k jinému apokryfu Pilátova cyklu, k Nikodémovu evangeliu (en). Verzi a představuje Dobschütz celou, zatímco z verze b uvádí pouze hrstku úryvků, které chybí ve verzi a. Sestavení cst datuje mezi konec pátého a začátek osmého století do Tos­ kánska. Zatímco datace byla doposud většinově přijímána, místo původu bylo opakovaně zpochybňováno. Vzhledem k tomu, že se jedná o období sporu o obrazy, navrhovali badatelé jako alternativu Řím. Dochované texty cst vznikly díky přepisování, překládání či opakování anonymními autory a prostřednictvím přepracování z pera celé řady spisovatelů a překladatelů. Jedná se tedy o odvozenou kompilaci vycházející z a inspirovanou staršími prameny pravděpodobně řeckého původu.

Třicet sedm rukopisů, se kterými Dobschütz pracuje, představuje méně než třetinu dnes známých pramenů. Nově identifikované rukopisy se datují do dvanáctého století či dříve, z čehož dva do pozdního devátého či raného desátého století, dva do desátého a šest od jedenáctého do dvanáctého století. Ve středověkých rukopisech není cst důsledně uznávaná jako samostatný text, a v případech, kdy tomu tak je, nemá jednotný titul. Podobně jako jeho předchůdci z osmnáctého století Dobschütz použil název idiosynkratického kodexu z Luccy, avšak svou verzi a založil převážně na pařížském rukopisu z konce osmého či počátku devátého století (bnf, ms lat. 2034), který má blíže k formě, jež se dostávala do popředí na konci tisíciletí. Dobschützovy úryvky z edice b nejsou příliš cenné, protože se blíže nezajímal o pozdně středověké verze a podrobně je nezkoumal. Přestože Dobschütz odmítl text manuskriptu z Luccy jako bezcenný kvůli jeho pozdějším doplněním, tento spis po sobě ve skutečnosti zanechal důležité středověké dědictví, o jehož existenci Dobschütz nevěděl – verzi c. Ta je doložena v pozdním devátém století (Paříž, bnf ms lat. 2849a) a její odrazy se objevují ve dvou pozdně středověkých verzích cst: jedné, která je běžně následována českou edicí en a druhé, která pozměnila příběh, ale zachovala určitý počet vět pocházející z ranější formy verze c. Dobschützova edice tak zůstává cenným uvedením do studia cst verze a, avšak nabízí jen omezené informace o verzi b a nijak se nezmiňuje o ohlasech kodexu z Luccy.

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Abstract – Veronica in the Vindicta Salvatoris – The text known as the Vindicta Salvatoris is a major landmark in the literary traditions regarding Veronica but its history is enigmatic. It has undergone several rewritings and the oldest forms are as yet unedited. Partly based on unpublished materials, this article shows that the scribes who transmitted and transformed the text over time were not unaware of the figure of Veronica. However, rather than reinforcing it, their actions blurred it, while at the same time according ever greater importance to Jesus’ portrait. In what seems to be the earliest forms of the Vindicta Salvatoris – the so-called “non-Volusianian” recension –, Veronica plays an important role throughout the narrative. She makes the portrait of Jesus available to miraculously cure all sick people who visit her. After healing Tiberius, she takes it back with her to Judea. In the later forms, Veronica becomes merely a foil for the relic and disappears in the final scene. Veronica’s attachment to Jesus’ portrait throughout the Volusianian recension is in all probability aimed at strengthening the believers’ devotion to this remarkable relic, which no longer heals anyone but Tiberius. Keywords Veronica, Holy Shroud, Tiberius, Vindicta Salvatoris, Apocrypha Rémi Gounelle Université de Strasbourg [email protected] Céline Urlacher-Becht Université de Haute-Alsace [email protected]

Veronica in the Vindicta Salvatoris Rémi Gounelle & Céline Urlacher-Becht

The text known as the Vindicta Salvatoris is a major landmark in the literary traditions regarding Veronica analyzed by Ernst von Dobschütz in his remarkable Christusbilder1. However, the origin of this narrative and the history of its textual tradition are far from having been explored in detail. It is nevertheless possible to show that the figure of Veronica evolved throughout the rewritings this text has undergone and that the original representation of her figure must have been very different from that which emerges from the published versions of the Vindicta. We will demonstrate this after presenting a short survey of the Vindicta Salvatoris and its title.

major states of the Latin text. The first one, which remains unpublished3, does not mention the character of Volusianus. Gounelle therefore suggested calling this state the “non-Volusianian recension”. In the second state of the text, the “Volusianian recension”, the character of Volusianus, who is sent to Judea by the Emperor Tiberius, plays an important role. This second recension has clearly known several textual phases, with the text of the Saint-Omer manuscript 4 representing a less 1 2

History of Research In a paper presented at a conference organized in 2010 by the Center for Religious Studies in Turin 2, Rémi Gounelle offered a survey of previous research on the history of this text. Based on the collations of manuscripts preserved in Ernst von Dobschütz’s Nachlass, he identified two

3

4

Ernst von Dobschütz, Christusbilder. Untersuchungen zur christlichen Legende, Leipzig 1899, pp. 197–262. The English wording of this article was revised by E. Shuali and Z. Izydorczyk. Rémi Gounelle,“Les origines littéraires de la légende de Véronique et de la Sainte Face: la Cura sanitatis Tiberii et la Vindicta Saluatoris”, in Sacre impronte e oggetti “non fatti da mano d’uomo”nelle religioni, Atti del Convegno internazionale (Torino, 18–20 maggio 2010), Adele Monaci Castagno ed., Turin 2011, pp. 231–251. Only the beginning of British Library, Harley, ms 495 has been published in an appendix to Eugene Kölbing, Mabel Day, The Siege of Jerusalem. Edited from Ms. Laud Misc. 656 With Variants from All Other Extant Mss., London 1932, pp. 83– 85. Two Old English Apocrypha and Their Manuscript Source. The Gospel of Nicodemus and The Avenging of The Saviour, James Edwin Cross ed., Cambridge 1996, pp. 248 –292. An annotated translation of this text was published in Gisèle Besson, Michèle Brossard-Dandre, Zbigniew Izydorczyk, “Vengeance du Sauveur”, in Écrits apocryphes chrétiens, ii, Jean-Daniel Kaestli, Pierre Geoltrain eds, Paris 2005, pp. 371–398.

1 / Saint Veronica and Volusianus, Evangelica Historia, Lombardy, 14th century / Milano, Biblioteca Ambrosiana, l 58 sup., fol. 66r (redesigned)

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evolved stage than the one published by Constantin von Tischendorf 5. Because of its peculiarities, the non-Volusianian recension made it necessary to reconsider the question of the Vindicta’s date of composition, since the key features on which previous studies were based are absent from this textual form, which Gounelle considered to be older. These inquiries initiated by Gounelle have been continued in the framework of an interdisciplinary research group at the University of Strasbourg 6. On the basis of a study on the motive of the destruction of Jerusalem in the Vindicta Salvatoris, Céline Urlacher-Becht, with the help of Rémi Gounelle, corroborated the probable anteriority of the non-Volusianian recension and demonstrated that it drew on Pseudo-Hegesippus’ De excidio Urbis Hierosolymitae, which is dated at earliest to the end of the fourth century7. This demonstration – which confirms the intuitions of previous scholars8 – undermines the attempts to place the Vindicta Salvatoris early in Late Antiquity. While disregarding the rather improbable hypothesis that it may include traditions dating back to the time of Emperor Claudius9, we should mention Israel Jacob Yuval’s study on Jews and Christians in the Middle Ages. The Israeli scholar compared the Vindicta with little known rabbinic traditions regarding Titus and the destruction of the Temple10. Since he estimates that the Vindicta Salvatoris is one of the sources of the Jewish traditions regarding Titus, he dates it to the second half of the fourth century. The fact that the redactor of the non-Volusianian recension made use of the De excidio Urbis Hierosolymitae (written at the end of the fourth century or later, as already indicated), makes such a hypothesis highly problematic11.

The Title

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In spite of this progress, the origin of the Vindicta Salvatoris remains a mystery. Even its original title is uncertain – which may be not surprising, as medieval scribes were used to alter apocryphal texts quite freely. Constantin von Tischendorf took the title Vindicta Salvatoris from the Milan manuscript, Ambrosianus o3512, without noticing that this title was secondary13. However, this title, which has

become generally accepted in scholarship, is rare in the manuscript tradition. In the other Latin textual witness used by von Tischendorf (Venice, Marcianus, ms Lat. ii, 45), the text is entitled De passione domini nostri Iesu Christi, as in several other manuscripts, including the oldest known (Saint-Omer, Municipal Library, ms 202)14; this is also the case in the manuscript of the British Library, Royal, ms 8 e xvii, in which the theme of the Passion is notably related to the theme of vengeance: Passio Domini quomodo vindicta facta fuit post mortem domini 15. Some titles emphasize the figures of Titus and Vespasian, thus explicitly presenting the narrative as an historical account: Istoria Titi et Vespasiani 16 or De Tyto et Vespasiano17. Some highlight the destruction of Jerusalem: Destructio Hierusalem secundum Nicodemum18 or Relatio de destructione Ierusalem et Iudeorum propter mortem Christi 19. Some titles mention at the same time Titus, Vespasian and the theme of vengeance or destruction: Gesta Salvatoris, quomodo Titus et Vespasianus Ierusalem destruxerunt20; De vindicta facta a Tito et Vespasiano de morte et traditione domini nostri Ihesu Christi 21; or Quomodo Tytus et Vespasianus vindicauerunt dominum Ihesum22. Other seemingly rarer manuscripts stress only Christ’s vengeance: Sermo de vindicta Domini 23 or Vindicta Domini nostri Ihesu Christi 24, or the fate of the Jews: De confusione Iudeorum25. We should also remark that in several manuscripts the title is debated. Thus, in codex Peterhouse 232 from Cambridge (twelfth–thirteenth century), the original title given by the scribe, Passio Domini nostri Ihesu Christi qui in Iudea patitur, was corrected by a fifteenth-century hand into Destructio Ierusalem facta per Titum et Vespasianum26. Furthermore, in several manuscripts the text was initially copied without a title, and a later scribe deemed it appropriate to insert a specific title 27. However, in a considerable number of textual witnesses, the narrative had no title28. Since a global study on the textual tradition is not yet available29, the multiplicity of titles is difficult to interpret. The title De passione domini nostri Iesu Christi is certainly attested since the ninth century 30, but Vindicta is attested since the tenth century31. Should we suppose that the first title was

the older one and that it was subsequently made more specific? But the opposite is also possible, as we may see in the history of The Gospel of Nicodemus: a specific title may change into Passio Domini with variants32. Nevertheless, we should note, in this case, that the expression Vindicta Salvatoris chosen by Tischendorf is rare and is not likely to be primitive. Vindicta Iesu or Domini would be more plausible33. It is also possible that this work was initially disseminated without a specific title, and that copies remedied this lack independently from one another34. It may also be supposed that a precise study on the textual tradition will enable to associate certain titles with precise forms of the text or with manuscripts originating in the same geographical area. Before such a study is conducted, much caution is in order regarding the original title of this work. The only thing we may be sure of is that the title chosen by Tischendorf – Vindicta Salvatoris – is secondary.

Veronica Presented by Nathan Whereas the recensions of the Vindicta identified by Gounelle diverge in their endings, they begin 5

Constantin von Tischendorf, Evangelia apocrypha, adhibitis plurimis codicibus graecis et latinis, maximam partem nunc primum consultis atque ineditorum copia insignibus, Leipzig 1876 [1853], pp. 471–486. 6 This group includes Gabriella Aragione, Agnès Arbo, Alain Chauvot, Frédéric Chapot, Rémi Gounelle, Regina Hunziker-Rodewald and Jean-Luc Vix, all of whom are from the University of Strasbourg, Céline Urlacher-Becht of the University of Mulhouse and Hervé Huntzinger of the University of Lorraine. Serge Bardet of the University of Évry and Matthias Morgenstern of the University of Tübingen have taken part in the group’s work. 7 Céline Urlacher-Becht, Rémi Gounelle,“Un développement littéraire médiéval: la ‘légende’ de la Vindicta Salvatoris”, in La destruction de Jérusalem: lectures, représentations et enjeux, entre Antiquité et Moyen Âge, Paris, Institut d’Etudes Augustiniennes (forthcoming). 8 This dependence was suspected by Arturo Graf, Roma nella memoria e nelle immaginazioni del Medio Evo con un’appendice sulla leggenda di Gog e Magog, Turin 1923, pp. 307 –312 and by Richard Matthew Pollard in “De Excidio of ‘Hegesippus’ and the Reception of Josephus in the Early Middle Ages”, Viator, xlvi/2 (2015), pp. 65–100, but solely on the basis of the published versions. This explains a certain caution on their part, since they were lacking conclusive parallels. Indeed, the Volusianian recension comprises less verbal connections with the De excidio than the non-Volusianian recension. Cf. also Heinz Schreckenberg, Rezeptionsgeschichtliche und textkritische Untersuchungen zu Flavius Josephus, Leiden 1977, pp. 53–56; Karen M. Kletter, “The Christian reception of Josephus in Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages”, in A Companion to Josephus, Honora Howell Chapman, Zuleika Rodgers eds, Malden, ma et al. 2015, pp. 368 –381, sp. p. 377. 9 Cf. for example Aurelio de Santos Otero, Los Evangelios Apócrifos, 6th ed., Madrid 1988, p. 506. 10 Israel J. Yuval, Two Nations in Your Womb. Perceptions of Jews and Christians in Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, Berkeley 2006, pp. 38–51. For a different perspective on the same sources, see Galit Ha-

san-Rokem, “Narratives in Dialogue: A Folk Literary Perspective on Interreligious Contacts in the Holy Land in Rabbinic Literature of Late Antiquity”, in Sharing the Sacred. Religious Contacts and Conflicts in the Holy Land, Arieh Kofsky, Guy Stroumsa eds, Jerusalem 1998, pp. 109–128. 11 The study of the vocabulary in the narrative points goes in the same direction. The use of subregulus, ismaeleticus and negocians in the beginning of the non-Volusianian recension suffices to exclude a date of composition prior to 350. 12 Tischendorf, Euangelia apocrypha (n. 5), p. 471. The manuscripts are presented at the end of the very concise note that the editor dedicates to this text, p. lxxxiv. 13 Cf. infra, n. 27. 14 Two Old English Apocrypha (n. 4), p. 248: Passio domini nostri Iesu Christi Quomodo in Iudea passus fuit. Cf. also Oxford, Bodleian Library, ms 90 (Zbigniew Izydorczyk, Manuscripts of the Euangelium Nicodemi. A Census, Toronto 1993, p. 116). 15 Cf. also the explicit: Sermo uindicationis Christi. 16 This manuscript is mentioned by Graf, Roma nella memoria (n. 8), p. 305, n. 64, who gives the reference: Turin, National Library, ms k.v. 37. The spelling in the quoted titles have been standardized. 17 This title is preserved in Cambridge, St John’s College, ms 127, which is mentioned in Two Old English Apocrypha (n. 4), p. 59, n. 77. 18 Belluno, Biblioteca Civica, ms 355 (Izydorczyk, Manuscripts [n. 14], p. 17). 19 Alençon, Municipal Library, ms 17 (Izydorczyk, Manuscripts [n. 14], p. 13). 20 Naples, National Library Vitt. Em. iii, ms viii.aa.32 (Izydorczyk, Manuscripts [n. 14], p. 111). The expression Gesta Saluatoris refers to the Gospel of Nicodemus. 21 Paris, bnf, ms Nouv. Acqu. lat. 503 (Izydorczyk, Manuscripts [n. 14], pp. 147–148). 22 Douai, Municipal Library, ms 59 (Izydorczyk, Manuscripts [n. 14], p. 45). 23 Paris, bnf, ms Lat. 5327 (Izydorczyk, Manuscripts [n. 14], p. 139). 24 Vatican, Apostolic Library, ms Vat. Lat. 5094 (Izydorczyk, Manuscripts [n. 14], p. 188–189). 25 Oxford, Bodleian Library, ms Rawlinson d.1236 (Izydorczyk, Manuscripts [n. 14], p. 124). 26 Izydorczyk, Manuscripts (n. 14), p. 36. 27 Cf. ms Milan, Ambrosian Library, o.35 sup., in which Incipit Vindicta Saluatoris was added (Izydorczyk, Manuscripts [n. 14], p. 95); Paris, bnf, ms Lat. 2769, fol. 24, in which the title De morte Pilati was added on the top of the page by a later hand. 28 Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, ms 288; Munich, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, ms Clm 11747; Oxford, Bodleian Library, ms Selden Supra 74; Paris, bnf, ms Lat. 1722, Lat. 5561, Lat. 11867, Lat. 18201 (in which the text is presented as a Liber secundus, the first one being The Gospel of Nicodemus); Vatican, Apostolic Library, ms Reg. Lat. 433 (Izydorczyk, Manuscripts [n. 14], pp. 32, 103, 124, 131, 142, 145, 147, 184). 29 Hans Lewy already pointed out this desideratum in 1938 in “Josephus the Physician. A Mediaeval Legend of the Destruction of Jerusalem”,The Journal of the Warburg Institute, i/3 (1938), pp. 221–242, sp. p. 225, n. 4. 30 In Saint-Omer, Municipal Library, ms 202. 31 In Paris, bnf, ms Lat. 5327, which reads: Sermo de vindicta Domini. 32 Cf. Zbigniew Izydorczyk, “The Evangelium Nicodemi in the Latin Middle Ages”, in The Medieval Gospel of Nicodemus. Texts, Intertexts and Contexts in Western Europe, Idem ed., Tempe, az 1997, pp. 44– 101, sp. pp. 75– 78. 33 Brepols’ Library of Latin Texts does not contain any parallel to the expression Vindicta Salvatoris. However, the expression Vindicta Iesu is attested in a thirteenth-century text, the Vita beatae uirginis Mariae et Saluatoris rhythmica, iii, 4110. Vindicta Domini is attested at a much earlier date, since the writings of Augustine, but it is used in a spiritual sense (e.g. Enarratio in Ps. 20, 10). 34 In many manuscripts, the Vindicta comes after The Gospel of Nicodemus, and may be perceived as an anonymous sequel to it, which could have originally been titleless. Nevertheless, as Zbigniew Izydorczyk remarks, “textually and graphically [the Vindicta] was usually marked off as a distinct, independent work” (Izydorczyk, “The Evangelium Nicodemi” [n. 32], p. 60).

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in a similar way. In the non-Volusianian recension35, the Ishmaelite merchant Nathan is in Bordeaux on his way to Rome in order to deliver the tribute of Judea to Tiberius. There, he meets Titus, who is sick and wishes to be cured. Nathan raves to him about what Jesus has done. After mentioning his resurrection, he adds:

occurrence. This reworking resulted in the disappearance of Jesus’ portrait from Nathan’s speech – maybe because it is absent from the canonical narrative on the healing of the woman suffering from hemorrhages, which is adopted by the author.

Seeking the Portrait of Jesus “Et erat quaedam femina in terra nostra, nomine Veronica, quae fluxum sanguinis patiebatur per xii annos curari non potuit nisi per ipsum. Et postea per amore eius vultum suum figuravit in pallio suo. Et omnes ibi advenientes infirmi hodierna die illum adorantes et osculantes mox sanitatem optimam suscipiunt”36 . “And there was a woman in our land named Veronica who was suffering from a flux of blood for twelve years and could not be cured by anyone but him. Then, for the love of him, she portrayed his face on her coat (pallium). And from that day on, all the sick people that came there venerated and kissed (the image), and were shortly thereafter completely cured”.

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A miraculously cured woman had already been mentioned earlier, but not named, by Nathan. In the list of miracles provided at the beginning of his speech, he mentioned that Jesus “delivered a woman from a flux of blood of which she could not be cured for twelve years”37, before alluding to the multiplication of the loaves, the walking on the water, and adding that Jesus had performed countless other miracles. Surprisingly, the narrator does not establish a link between the two women suffering from hemorrhages. When telling of Veronica’s healing, he does not refer to the healing of the woman mentioned before, as if the two healed women were not the same one. Nevertheless, Veronica is immediately identified as being both the woman suffering from hemorrhages in the Gospels and the woman who made Jesus’ portrait. The portrait is presented as a miraculous image, which is widely known and which Veronica offers to all the sick people who come to visit her. This passage seems to have been reworked in the Volusianian version (par. 6), where the two passages regarding the woman suffering from hemorrhages were combined. Veronica’s name now appears in the list of miracles provided by Nathan, which quotes the biblical narrative (Mt 9, 20) literally38. Nothing is left of the second

The absence of any reference to the portrait held by Veronica in Nathan’s speech becomes problematic further in the Volusianian recension. In this textual form, the reader learns that, as soon as they seized Jerusalem, Titus and Vespasian set out to inquire about “Jesus’ face”, but he does not know how the two characters heard that such a portrait existed. This mysterious text reads, according to the version of the Saint-Omer manuscript: “Titus and Vespasian […], taking all their land […] sent out a search for where they could find the face of the Lord. And they found a woman whose name was Veronica, and found the face of the Lord with her” (par. 17–18)39. We note that the narrator does not link this Veronica who has Jesus’ portrait with the Veronica who was cured of the flux of blood and mentioned by Nathan when he spoke of Jesus’ miracles. It is also remarkable that the miraculous virtues of the portrait are no longer explicitly mentioned and that nothing is said regarding the sick coming to be cured by it. Since the non-Volusianian recension had mentioned Jesus’ portrait in Nathan’s speech, the actions of Titus and Vespasian following the fall of Jerusalem are clearer: “And seeking the Lord’s face, they found the woman who had it”. This points explicitly to Nathan’s previous description40.

Back to Rome Then the non-Volusianian recension states that Titus and Vespasian forced Veronica to hand the portrait to them and that it was taken to Rome, with Veronica following behind. In the Volusianian recension, the narrative is more abundant, since the character of Volusianus was inserted. This character may have been taken from the Cura sanitatis Tiberii41. In this version of the narrative, Titus and Vespasian ask Tiberius to send

Volusianus to them and the Emperor agrees. He gives Volusianus the mission of finding a disciple of Jesus who may cure him of leprosy. On his arrival, Volusianus diligently inquires on what happened to Jesus. Among the witnesses who come to him, there is “a woman called Veronica”, who affirms that she was cured by Jesus of her flux of blood (par. 22)42. Jesus’ portrait is not mentioned at this point at all. However, it is mentioned later in the SaintOmer version: after consulting Pilate, Volusianus demands Veronica to give him Jesus’ portrait. She refuses, but then yields under torture (par. 24)43. The text published by Tischendorf is similar, but explains how Volusianus knows of the portrait. Everyone there tells him that Veronica has it. Volusianus summons her then and forces her to give it to him (par. 24)44. In both forms of the text, Volusianus then leaves for Rome, taking the portrait with him. Veronica, who cannot abandon it for she venerates Jesus through it every day, goes with him (par. 26–27). Again, the two recensions differ on an important point. In the non-Volusianian recension, the portrait is made available to the miraculously cured people who visit Veronica45. On the other hand, the Volusianian recension emphasizes that Veronica kept it either in her room or on a piece of cloth where she venerated it. It also stresses Volusianus’ admiration for the portrait from the first moment he saw it (par. 24)46. The portrait changed its function here, as has Veronica, who, from a person offering a miraculous image to the sick, becomes the keeper of a holy relic, which she hides from others.

Veronica in Rome Veronica continues to play an important role in the non-Volusianian recension. She is present until the end of the story and is honored by Tiberius: “Et dixerunt legati: ‘Titus et Vespasianus miserunt tibi vultum Domini, quem femina quae per xii annos curari non potuit medicis et fluxu sanguinis pro eius amore qui eam sanauerat in pallio suo figurauit. Et omnes infirmi qui ad vultum veniebant mox recipiebant sanitatem’. Idem Tiberius dixit: ‘Ite, ostendite mihi’. Tunc apprehendentes vultum Domini miserunt ad imperatorem. Veronica illa secuta est

eum. Multi infirmi ad hoc spectaculum convenerunt et cum expansus esset vultus Domini coram rege, deoscultus est eum et statim factus est sanus. Et omnes infirmi qui aderant saniti sunt a quocumque langore tenebantur. (…) Imperator autem reddidit Veronice vultum Domini et dedit maximas divitias et honores et misit eam per fideles suos in terram suam” 47. “And the legates said: ‘Titus and Vespasian sent to you the face of the Lord, which a woman who could not be cured by the physicians for twelve years portrayed on her coat (pallium) for the love of him who healed her of her flux of blood. Tiberius said: ‘Come, show it to me’. They then took the face and brought it to the Emperor. Veronica followed it. Many sick people came to see what was happening. And when the Lord’s face laid in front of the king, he kissed it and was healed at once. All the sick people who were there were healed of whatever illness they had. (…) The Emperor gave the Lord’s face back to Veronica. He gave her much wealth and honors and ordered his servants to take her back to her land”.

This passage supports what Nathan said in the beginning of the story: Jesus’ portrait healed all the sick people who were there and not only the Emperor, for whom it was presented at the palace. It also confirms that the woman suffering from hemorrhages is also the one who made Jesus’ portrait. 35 The quoted text is that of London, British Library, Royal, ms 8 e xvii. The archives of E. von Dobschütz mentioned above attest that a similar text is transmitted in the following codices: London, British Library, ms Royal 9 a xiv (fol. 292b); Cambridge, University Library, ms Dd.3.16 (Oo.vii.48), fol. 18b and Oxford, Bodleian Library, ms Selden Supra 74 (fol. 28a). In the quotations, the spelling is standardized. 36 London, British Library, ms Royal 8 e xvii, fol. 123b. 37 Ibidem: mulierem de fluxu sanguinis liberavit quae per XII annos curari non potuit. 38 Two Old English Apocrypha (n. 4), p. 254; Tischendorf, Evangelia apocrypha (n. 5), p. 473. 39 Two Old English Apocrypha (n. 4), p. 270. Cf. Tischendorf, Evangelia apocrypha (n. 5), pp. 477–478, where the text is almost the same, but the paragraphs are divided differently. 40 London, British Library, ms Royal 8 e xvii, fol. 124b: Et perquirentes uultum Domini feminam invenerunt quae eum habebat. Sed invita et non sponte eum tradidit eis. Apprehendentes autem Pilatum ligauerunt. […] Veronica cum haec vidisset secuta est vultum Domini. 41 On this text, see Zbigniew Izydorczyk’s contribution in this volume. 42 Two Old English Apocrypha (n. 4), p. 278 (where the manuscript reads Veronix instead of Veronica, as in other places; on spelling in this manuscript, cf. Andy Orchard,“The style of the texts and the translation strategy”, in Two Old English Apocrypha [n. 4], pp. 105– 130, sp. pp. 105–108). The text published by Tischendorf, Evangelia apocrypha (n. 5), p. 180 is very similar. 43 Two Old English Apocrypha (n. 4), p. 280. 44 Tischendorf, Evangelia apocrypha (n. 5), pp. 480 –481. 45 Cf. supra. 46 Two Old English Apocrypha (n. 4), p. 280; Tischendorf, Evangelia apocrypha (n. 5), p. 481. Cf. Gounelle, “Les origines littéraires” (n. 2), pp. 246–248. 47 London, British Library, ms Royal 8 e xvii, fol. 124b –125.

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The Volusianian recension offers a different story. In the Saint-Omer manuscript, Volusianus tells Tiberius what had happened in Judea. When recounting the miracles performed by Jesus, as Nathan had done before him, he does mention the woman suffering from hemorrhages, but without mentioning her name (par. 29)48. He then indicates that Titus and Vespasian sought the Lord’s face and found the woman who had drawn it – Veronica. He adds that he has brought with him Jesus’ portrait as well as the woman in question (par. 32)49. Tiberius then demands to see the portrait, converts and is healed (par. 33–35). The text published by Tischendorf is very similar to the Saint-Omer one, but differs from it in two points. First, the name Veronica appears when the woman suffering from hemorrhages is mentioned (par. 29)50. Second, Volusianus does not say that Veronica drew the portrait (par. 32) – which may therefore seem to be an acheiropoieton – nor that Veronica came with it (par. 33)51. In both cases however, the woman suffering from hemorrhages is linked explicitly with the woman that has Jesus’ portrait, and Veronica disappears from the scene, while the narrative focuses on the portrait. Her fate is not stated.

Conclusion From this comparison of the different known forms of the Vindicta Salvatoris, it becomes clear that the scribes who transmitted and transformed the text over time were not unaware of the figure of Veronica. However, rather than strengthening it, they blurred it, while according more and more importance to Jesus’ portrait, an evolution which

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seems coherent with the growing importance of this relic 52: in the non-Volusianian recension, which seems to be the oldest form of the text, Veronica is the woman suffering from hemorrhages who made a miraculous portrait of Jesus capable of healing any sick man who venerates it. She earns Tiberius’ gratitude and takes the portrait back with her to Judea. In the version of the Volusianian recension, she becomes a devout woman, who possesses Jesus’ portrait – which, according to the Saint-Omer manuscript, she produced – and hides it so she can venerate it daily. Having become, in this recension, merely a foil for the relic, Veronica disappears in the final scene. The Emperor is interested here only in the relic brought before him and he keeps it in Rome. Veronica’s attachment to Jesus’ portrait throughout the Volusianian recension very likely aims at strengthening the believers’ devotion to this remarkable relic, which no longer heals anyone but Tiberius. The non-Volusianian version of the Vindicta is, therefore, an important milestone in the history of the figure of Veronica. We should hope that it will soon benefit from a critical edition and detailed analysis. Such a study will perhaps unveil the origins of the figure of Veronica, who seems to have had, in her first life, a very different appearance than that which has been accessible to scholarship up to now. 48 49 50 51 52

Two Old English Apocrypha (n. 4), p. 290. Ibidem, p. 288. Tischendorf, Evangelia apocrypha (n. 5), p. 484. Ibidem, p. 485. See Gounelle, “Les origines littéraires” (n. 2), which shows that the miraculous image of the non-Volusianian version has become, in the text published by Tischendorf, a precious Roman relic.

summary

Veraikon v textu Vindicta Salvatoris

Text známý jako Vindicta Salvatoris představuje významný milník v literární tradici týkající se Veraikonu, avšak dosud nebyl publikován ani podroben kritickému studiu. Nejasnosti panují i ohledně jeho původního názvu. Jediné, čím si můžeme být jistí je, že titul Vindicta Salvatoris mu byl přiřazen až druhotně. Pokud byl text rozšířen pod jiným názvem v dřívějších obdobích, mohlo se jednat o De passione domini nostri Iesu Christi nebo o Vindicta Iesu (či Domini). V roce 2010 Rémi Gounelle ustanovil dvě hlavní verze latinského textu. První, která zůstává nevydaná, nezmiňuje postavu Volusiana a je proto nazývána „nevolusiánskou edicí“. Ve druhé verzi textu, tzv. „volusiánské edici“, hraje postava Volusiana, kterého císař Tiberius posílá do Judska, důležitou roli. Specifika nevolusiánské edice vedly k nutnosti přehodnotit otázku datace sestavení Vindicty, protože neobsahuje klíčové prvky, na nichž se zakládaly dosavadní studie. Céline Urlacher-Becht s pomocí Rémiho Gounella potvrdila pravděpodobné prvenství nevolusiánské edice a ukázala, že tato verze vycházela z Pseudo-Hegesippova spisu De excidio Urbis Hierosolymitae, datovaného nejdříve do konce čtrnáctého století. Společný článek Rémiho Gounella a Céline Urlacher-Brecht srovnává další známé formy

textu Vindicty Salvatoris. V nevolusiánské edici je první vystoupení Veroniky na scéně poměrně překvapující. Zdá se, že jsou zde přítomny dvě ženy stejného jména, uzdravené Ježíšem, avšak vypravěč nevytváří jasné pojítko mezi Veronikou, která nese Ježíšův portrét, s tou, která byla vyléčena. Veronika nicméně hraje v celém příběhu důležitou roli, protože poskytuje zázračně uzdravující portrét Krista všem nemocným lidem, kteří ji navštěvují. Po uzdravení císaře Tiberia si Veronika bere roušku s sebou zpět do Judska. V pozdějších verzích postava Veroniky upadá do pozadí a roste význam Ježíšova portrétu. Tento postup se zdá být v souladu se stoupající důležitostí relikvie: ve volusiánské edici se z Veroniky stává zbožná žena, která vlastní Ježíšův portrét, jenž podle rukopisu Saint-Omer vytvořila, a který ukrývá, aby jej mohla každý den uctívat. Postava Veroniky se tak stává pouhým „doplňkem“ relikvie a v závěru této verze zcela mizí ze scény. Císař se zajímá pouze o relikvii, která mu byla přinesena, a nechává si ji v Římě. Veroničin silný vztah k Ježíšovu portrétu popsaný ve volusiánské edici má se vší pravděpodobností posilovat úctu věřících vůči této pozoruhodné relikvii, která už nadále neléčí nikoho jiného než Tiberia.

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Abstract – ‘Vera Icon’? The Variable Veronica of Medieval England – Early reports of English responses to the Vernicle constitute some of the most significant evidence of the icon’s development. British travelers to Rome in the early-thirteenth century provided valuable observations on the relic’s appearance; Matthew Paris chronicled a crucial miracle affecting the Vernicle and Pope Innocent iii’s institution of indulgences; and thirteenth-century English manuscripts were illustrated with the earliest extant representations of the Vernicle. Yet, although the Vernicle’s unique claim is to preserve the direct impress of Christ’s features rather than a mere painted likeness, the Vernicle became

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familiar in quite diverse and even contradictory versions. After a review of how various narrative accounts develop of the Vernicle’s origin, this article surveys the disparities in accounts of the Vernicle in fourteenth- and fifteenth-century English texts and images. Taken together, they represent a kind of mouvance and coexistence of different understandings of the legend, the relic, and its replication. Keywords – Vernicle, Veronica, image, Holy Face, dark face Barry Windeatt University of Cambridge [email protected]

‘Vera Icon’?

The Variable Veronica of Medieval England Barry Windeatt

The unique fascination of the Vernicle – Christ’s likeness as received by St Veronica – is that it claims to preserve an unmediated likeness of the face of God, the direct impress of his features, not imagined and painted by anyone else, nor made by human hand, but something akin to a photographic self-portrait. The Vernicle became omnipresent in later medieval England: a universally known image of Christ, and an emblem of the individual’s eventual face-toface encounter with God at judgement. As such, the Vernicle’s identity poses questions about the act of representation itself and about devotion to the divine face, yet this supposedly uniquely authoritative record of Christ’s countenance became familiar in quite variant and even contradictory versions. This essay focuses on the story of the Vernicle’s development from an English perspective. In early phases of the Veronica legend, in Cura Sanitatis Tiberii (ca 600) and Vindicta Salvatoris

(ca 700), a woman possesses an image of Christ on cloth which has healing powers – but as yet there is no explanation of how the image was created. This woman becomes identified with the Haemorrhissa, the woman in Matthew 9, 20–22 who “diseased with an issue of blood twelve years, came behind him, and touched the hem of his garment”. Incompatible accounts develop of how Veronica’s image originated: it was variously miraculously impressed during Christ’s ministry, on the road to Calvary, or from his corpse. Veronica’s image is sought out to heal the leprosy of a Roman emperor or his son, and the Romans then set out to avenge the murdered prophet whose image has brought healing. The Vernicle thus becomes instrumental in medieval interpretations of the Roman campaign in Palestine in 70 ad as revenge on the Jews for their crucifixion of Christ. In a related development Veronica also becomes a key player in apocryphal accounts of how Pilate is subsequently punished for acquiescing in Christ’s

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1 / Veronica offers Christ her cloth (detail), alabaster, Church of St Bartholomew, Yarnton, Oxfordshire, England, late 15th century

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crucifixion. So she who has been miraculously healed by Christ becomes identified with an image of Christ which can effect Christ-like cures. Her touching of Christ’s hem is reciprocated by Christ’s later touching of her cloth with his face. The force that Christ feels go out of him in healing the woman (Mk 5, 30) is also invested in the image of his face. The name of the Vernicle is formed from Veronica’s name – itself understood to derive from vera icon, “true image” – and both woman and image may be called Veronica1. There are at least three “Veronicas”: her legend; accounts of the Vernicle as a material relic in Rome; and traditions of replicating the relic. Each of these Veronica/Vernicle traditions includes remarkable variation. The legend may be older than what passed for the relic, and the replicas become just as significant as the relic, or possibly more so. But the omnipresent success of the Vernicle evidently allowed its different forms to coexist and interrelate in a kind of “mouvance”: as either a beautiful or discoloured face, and with quite variant histories and originations. This is noticeable in English responses to the Vernicle, which are among the most significant in its development. It is some early thirteenth-century British travellers to Rome who record intriguing observations on the Vernicle’s appearance. It is a St Albans chronicler who ca 1245 records the key Vernicle miracle, and it is in thirteenth-century English manuscripts that the earliest extant depictions of the Vernicle appear. Even in the earliest surviving English response to the Veronica legend there is already singular variation. An eleventh-century Old English translation of the Vindicta Salvatoris identifies Veronica’s cloth with the garment of Christ whose hem Veronica previously touched in order to be cured: “They found a woman named Veronica […] the same Veronica who touched the Saviour’s garment […] she had a certain portion of the Saviour’s garment and held it in great honour, and kept it always because of Christ’s face”2. How the Lord’s face is identified with the garment touched by Veronica during her miraculous cure is never explained. This Old English version never enlarges on how Veronica comes to possess an image of Christ’s face, and unaccountably denies its special

powers. When the relic is presented first to Volusian and later to Tiberius this Old English version twice contradicts the assumption of Volusian and Tiberius that this is the face of Christ: Volusian “so allowed that it was the face of the Lord himself. But it assuredly was not so, but it was the garment which the Saviour himself wore” (p. 281). Similarly, back in Rome, “Tiberius saw the face and so thought that it was the face of the Lord. But it assuredly was not so, but it was the garment which the Lord himself wore. But it seemed to each of those heathen people, the first time they beheld it, that it was the Lord’s face” (p. 293). Despite this disputed identity to the cloth, Tiberius is nonetheless cured of his leprosy, and on this ambivalent note the text ends abruptly. It is around the beginning of the thirteenth century that the beginnings emerge of what will become variant traditions concerning the appearance of the image as preserved in Rome, together with variable explanations of how Veronica comes to possess her miraculous image. Such early thirteenth-century British visitors to Rome as Gerald of Wales and Gervase of Tilbury mention the Vernicle as just one among the relics of Rome, hence antedating its later celebrity, but little can be deduced about the appearance of the Veronica relic in St Peter’s from these two accounts. Gervase says that it presents “a true physical likeness of the Lord from the chest upwards”, presumably indicating a head-and-shoulders bust3. Gerald offers the first recorded etymology of the name Veronica from vera icon, and says that the Vernicle is seen by no one except through the curtains which are hung up before it, so that its appearance may always have been open to variable descriptions4. As to how Veronica came by her image, Gervase reports only that “this woman had a likeness of the Lord’s features imprinted on a linen cloth” (p. 605), but does not explain how this impression occurred. By contrast – in what reads like a transposal of the Gospel story of the woman touching Christ’s hem – Gerald explains how one day when Christ was coming out of the temple Veronica lifted her robe and pressed it to his face, and upon it he left his image as an imprint. Insofar as Gervase groups the Vernicle alongside images that were well-known

for depicting a darkened image of Christ – such as the Holy Face of Lucca – the implication is that Gervase believed the Vernicle presented a dark face. These early British accounts also help promote a sense that the Vernicle can be shifting in appearance. Gervase likens the Vernicle to another Roman image, which depicts half of Christ’s face in a process of change: “And one thing I know beyond a shadow of a doubt: if you examine carefully the image of the Lord in the Lateran Palace […] which a Jew wounded, and whose wound covers its right side with apparently fresh blood, you will find that it is not unlike the Veronica in St Peter’s Basilica (3.25)”.

Still more spectacularly memorable is Matthew Paris’s account (written after 1245) of the miracle in 1216 when the Vernicle relic, while being processed through Rome, turned upside down “of its own accord, so that it stood on its head with the forehead below and the beard at the top”5. The Pope, Innocent iii, was so shocked that he composed a prayer in honour of the image and granted a ten days’ indulgence to all who devotedly repeated a prayer in honour of the Holy Face. Crucially, this indulgence is not conditional upon a trip to Rome. An individual’s private devotion to the image suffices. Even those unable to recite the prescribed prayer received the same indulgence, provided they said the Lord’s Prayer and Hail Mary five times, and the Creed, while beholding an image of the Vernicle6. Not surprisingly, devotion to the Vernicle much increased, and another key development is the composition of the popular hymns Ave facies praeclara, for 1

2

3 4 5

6

In the alliterative Siege of Jerusalem (ca 1380) the Emperor formally names the Vernicle after Veronica: “The vernycle after Veronyk Vaspasian hit called”, in The Siege of Jerusalem, Ralph Hanna, David Lawton eds, Oxford 2003, p. 261. For a parallel-text edition which reveals where the Old English diverges from the Vindicta Salvatoris on the subject of Veronica’s veil, see Two Old English Apocrypha and their Manuscript Source: The Gospel of Nichodemus and The Avenging of the Saviour, James E. Cross et al. eds, Cambridge 1996, pp. 273–293. Otia Imperialia, S. E. Banks and J. W. Binns eds, Oxford 2002, 3.25. “Speculum Ecclesiae”, in Giraldi Cambrensis Opera, John S. Brewer ed., London 1873, pp. 278–279. Chronica majora, Henry R. Luard ed., London 1872–1883, 3.7–8. See Flora Lewis,“The Veronica: Image, Legend and Viewer”, in England in the Thirteenth Century: 1984 Harlaxton Conference, Mark Ormrod ed., Woodbridge 1986, pp. 100–106. “The picture here has broken free of the constraints of any text, and is an icon, not an illustration”, Eamon Duffy, The Stripping of the Altars: Traditional Religion in England 1400–1580, New Haven 1992, p. 227.

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2 / Veronica head, tinted drawing, ca 1360–1370 / Fitzwilliam Museum, ms 259, f. 32v

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recitation of which Innocent iv granted further indulgence of 40 days, and Salve sancta facies (attributed to John xxii), both of which hymns came to be included in books of hours7. At much the same time, in the early thirteenth century, two distinct – and incompatible – explanations emerge in French vernacular accounts of how Veronica acquired the image of Christ. In the first – the Venjance Nostre Seigneur, a French chanson de geste based on the Vindicta Salvatoris – Vespasian’s emissary hears tell how Veronica, herself afflicted with leprosy, arrives at the foot of the cross just after Christ’s death. Mary takes Veronica’s veil, placing it over Christ’s face so that his image is formed on the cloth. When Mary returns the veil and Veronica puts it back on, she is cured8. However, an altogether different explanation of how Veronica acquires the Vernicle appears contemporaneously in Robert de Boron’s Joseph of Arimathea. Learning of a prophet in Palestine who worked miracles of healing before being put to death, the Roman emperor sends messengers to bring back something belonging to this prophet with which to cure his son Vespasian of his leprosy. Veronica describes to the messengers how she happened to be carrying linen to market when she came across people leading a bound Christ through the streets: “He asked me to wipe away the sweat that was running down his face. So I took one end of the cloth at once and wiped his face […] And when I got home and looked at the cloth, I found this image of his face9”.

Once Vespasian sees the Vernicle he is restored to health and sets out for Palestine to avenge his saviour Christ. The special interest of this version for English readers is that in Jerusalem Vespasian discovers and liberates the long-imprisoned Joseph of Arimathea, who is thus free to bring the Grail to Glastonbury. Not much later, in Roger d’Argenteuil’s Bible en françois (ca 1265), many themes are deftly woven together, and this version evidently had an influence in England, well before the surviving fifteenth-century translation into English (which emphasizes the Veronica legend). Here Veronica does not wait to be asked but offers her kerchief, as depicted in an English alabaster [Fig. 1]:

“Therwithall sodeinly was the visage of oure Lord purtraied in the couerchif as like as it had ben his said visage fleishly 10 ”.

Now the miracle is immediately apparent, Christ himself predicts the cloth’s healing powers, and these are promptly proved. This version has Veronica refer back to her own recent healing by Christ, underlining the reciprocity between Christ’s healing of the woman with an issue of blood and the signing of the Vernicle with his own sweat and blood. Yet from much the same period when this tradition is establishing itself – of how the Vernicle is miraculously imprinted with the face of Christ on the way to Calvary – the influential Golden Legend (ca 1267) prefers an alternative explanation of how the Vernicle originated: not on the road to Calvary but during Christ’s ministry. Veronica explains to Tiberius’s messenger: “When the Teacher was going about preaching and I, to my regret, could not be with him, I wanted to have his picture painted so that when I was deprived of his presence I could at least have the solace of his image. So one day I was carrying a piece of linen to the painter when I met Jesus, and he asked me where I was going. I told him what my errand was. He asked for the cloth that I had in my hand, pressed it to his venerable face, and left his image on it 11”.

This version is designed to highlight how the Vernicle originates in a way that trumps and transcends the efforts of mere earthly artists and their painting of a likeness. The hymn Salve sancta facies perpetuates this idea by firmly attributing the creation of the Vernicle’s unpainted image of Christ’s face to the Supreme Artist himself, and Gerald of Wales had already associated the Vernicle with images that Mary commissioned St Luke to paint of her son. The nine various French prose re-tellings of the Venjance Nostre Seigneur between the thirteenth and fifteenth centuries witness to the Kathleen Kamerick, Popular Piety and Art in the Late Middle Ages: Image Worship and Idolatry in England, 1350–1500, New York 2002, p. 175. 8 The Oldest Version of the Old French Poem La Venjance Nostre Seigneur, Loyal A. T. Grytyng ed., Ann Arbor 1952, lines 233–261. 9 Merlin and the Grail, trans. Nigel Bryant, Cambridge 2001, p. 28. 10 The Middle English Prose Translation of Roger d’Argenteuil’s ‘Bible en francois’, Phyllis Moe ed., Heidelberg 1977, 13.20–22. 11 Jacobus de Voragine, The Golden Legend, trans. William G. Ryan, Princeton 1993, 1.212. 7

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3 / Chaucer’s Pardoner, ca 1400 –1405 / Huntington Library, ms el 26 c 9, f. 138r (detail) 4 / Veronica’s cloth receives the imprint of Christ’s face, The Carew Poyntz Hours, ca 1350 –1400 / Fitzwilliam Museum, ms 48, f. 75r (detail)

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coexistence of variant accounts of the Vernicle. In some cases, these prose versions coopt the other principal accounts of how the Vernicle came to be miraculously created, so that the standard Venjance account of how the dead Christ’s face is imprinted on the leper Veronica’s veil at the Crucifixion is replaced with accounts of how Christ’s face is imprinted on the veil on the way to Calvary, or imprinted on the cloth that Veronica is taking to a painter12. In another version, however, Veronica has an image of Christ painted in gratitude for his curing of her but with no mention of a miraculous origin, and in yet other versions Veronica becomes the artist and paints the image herself, again without miraculous intervention13. It is a handful of English manuscripts that contain the earliest known representations of the Veronica head in Western art, dated between the 1240s and 1270s, with the accompanying prayers to which an indulgence is attached14. Some of these images are added in to previously-existing manuscripts. But which Veronica is depicted? These handsome head-and-shoulders busts, with Christ gazing out forthrightly, are unlikely to represent likenesses copied from the relic itself. Indeed, an inscription by the image in bl ms Arundel 157, f. 2r – “Et ut animus dicentis devotius

excitatur, facies Salvatoris per industriam artificis expresse honoratur” [To attune the reader’s mind to prayer, the Saviour’s face is honoured by the painter’s art] – implicitly justifies a role for artistic license in depiction so as to encourage prayer. By ca 1360 –1370 a head-and-shoulders image which looks back to these Vernicles can still be included at the end of an illustrated Latin poem on the life of Christ (Fitzwilliam ms 259, f. 32v), accompanied by the prayer Ave facies praeclara [Fig. 2]. But by now, when the Veronica cult had really taken off, the irony is even more evident that a devotion focussed on a uniquely authentic likeness manifests itself through replication in coexistent, even incompatible, variations. The popularity of the Vernicle as a Roman pilgrimage destination and as a Station of the Cross generated a mass replication of Veronica souvenirs15. In Piers Plowman a pilgrim wears a Vernicle amongst his other pilgrimage souvenirs (b.5.523), and Chaucer’s Pardoner, returned from Rome, sports a Vernicle sewn jauntily on his cap (Canterbury Tales, 1.685), as depicted in the Ellesmere manuscript [Fig. 3]. Likenesses of this uniquely-derived likeness become a stylization of the idea of such an image, bounded within certain conventions. Older head-and-shoulders forms give way to simply a face, but if this ever aimed

at a more naturalistic depiction of what might actually be imprinted on a cloth by a wiped face this is soon overtaken by the wish to include the crown of thorns. From the fourteenth century too dates the earliest English depiction of Veronica the woman, in the scene on the road to Calvary in the Carew Poyntz Hours, Fitzwilliam ms 48, f. 75r [Fig. 4]. As to whether or how much Christ’s face was shown as discoloured, English instances point to a striking tolerance of alternatives. A dual notion of beauty and blackness in Christ’s image had been implicit in the two Veronica hymns, while a dark-faced Christ might have been known from reports of such relics as the Holy Faces of Edessa and Laon. The hymn Ave facies praeclara attributed the dark flesh colour of the Veronica to Christ’s face being darkened by fear on the Mount of Olives and then stained by blood, affirming that the face has kept its form in the linen cloth. By contrast, the hymn Salve sancta facies refers to the divine light in the face that was imprinted on the snow-white cloth. Echoing this, the fifteenth-century poet John Audelay in his Salutation to the Holy Face – which is preceded in Douce ms 302, f. 27v, by a drawing of the Vernicle – salutes the Saviour’s face which “schynth to us an hevenly fygure” on a whitish linen cloth:

Salve, I say, Holé Face of our Saveour, In the wyche schynth to us an hevenly fygure, An graceous on to se! Salve, thou settis thi prynt on lynin cloth of witlé coloure, And betoke hit Veroneca fore love and gret honoure Upon here sudoré …16

By contrast the n-Town Play dramatist implies that the impression of Christ’s image will be as black as his face before Veronica wiped it (while also confirming that the Vernicle will be a healing relic for those who behold it): 12 La Vengeance de Nostre-Seigneur: The Old and Middle French Prose Versions, Alvin E. Ford ed., Toronto 1984, pp. 145, 171–172. 13 La Vengeance (n. 12), pp. 46, 61, 71. 14 For these Vernicle heads, see Nigel Morgan’s essay in this volume. 15 For Veronica badges, see Brian Spencer, Pilgrim Souvenirs and Secular Badges, London 1998, pp. 250–252, figs 254a–c. By the fourteenth century the Vernicle was publicly exhibited at St Peter’s every Sunday, and pilgrims who had crossed the sea stood to gain 12,000 years of remission for every hour they gazed at it, The Stacions of Rome, Frederick James Furnivall ed., London 1867, p. 3. The English pilgrim William Wey records visiting the Stations of the Cross in Jerusalem during his 1462 pilgrimage, including the sixth Station “where Veronica took Christ’s face in her handkerchief”, The Itineraries of William Wey, Francis Davey ed., Oxford 2010, pp. 47, 75, 129. 16 John Audelay: Poems and Carols, Susanna Fein ed., Kalamazoo 2009, p. 17.

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5 / Vernicle cloth, ca 1480 / Fitzwilliam Museum, ms 55, f. 122v 6 / Black-faced Vernicle cloth held by St Veronica, ca 1410 / Cambridge, Trinity College, ms o.3.10, f. 11v

And sche whypyth his face with here kerchy.

jesus: Veronyca, thi whipyng doth me ese. My face is clene that was blak to se. I xal them kepe from all mysese That lokyn on thi kerchy and remembyr me 17.

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English ideas of the Vernicle tolerated different, even contradictory, appearances. Extremes of beauty and blackness in Christ’s face can be seen in the striking contrasts between some fifteenth-century English Vernicles. In a book of hours made in Norfolk ca 1480 (Fitzwilliam ms 55, f. 122v) the sensitively-drawn and finely-shaded head makes a solemnly arresting impression of Christ’s great earthly beauty [Fig. 5]. In complete contrast is an almost shockingly blackened Vernicle head of Christ in a psalter and prayer book made in York around 1410 (Trinity College, Cambridge, ms o.3.10, f. 11v), where the prayers are linked to prescribed indulgences and are meant to be read in close connection with the pictures [Fig. 6]. In one mid-fifteenth-century Suffolk book of hours Veronica holds up a dark-faced Vernicle cloth [Fig. 7], and in another an angel holds up a black Vernicle [Fig. 8]. One of very few Veronicas surviving from a rood screen (at North

Creake, Norfolk), and depicting Veronica holding the Vernicle, shows how the dark or black Vernicle might be familiar to any parishioner in a remote parish [Fig. 9]. Mid-fifteenth-century illuminations in Lydgate’s Life of St Edmund – showing the Pope in a chapel with a dark-faced Vernicle on an altar – suggest that the Roman relic was commonly thought to be black at this date in England [Fig. 10] 18. English familiarity with a variable Veronica is also witnessed by the number of extant copies of the Symbols of the Passion or Arma Christi: text with illustrations, both rolls and codices. The stanza to the Vernicle with associated image always comes first of these fragmented mementos of the Passion, highlighting how Christ’s body may be reproduced. Each image is briefly described and analysed with regard to the sins against which it might protect: O Vernicle, I honour hym and the That the made thorow his priuete, The cloth he sete to his face, The prent laft ther thorow his grace, His mouth, his nose, his eghen two, His berde, his here dede al so19.

This Vernicle imprint of Christ’s face will protect the penitent (“For the figure that I here se”) from particular sins committed by the mouth and tongue: sins of slandering, swearing of false oaths, backbiting and boasting. It may be such a devotionally useful text which is listed before 1479 in an inventory of the Pastons’ books as A Preyer to the Vernycle20. For the Vernicle was believed to have some very practical applications, and is invoked in charms for the staunching of blood, as is appropriate for the woman whose own discharge of blood was healed by Christ and whose veil (in some versions of her story) had absorbed the impress of his drops of bloody sweat. The English physician John Gaddesden in his Rosa medicinae recommends a charm whereby the user writes “Veronica” on the patient’s forehead and then says “we humbly implore you Lord Jesus Christ, who alone cures the sick, to lift the right hand of your power and holiness and restrict and stop the flow of blood of this person for whom we pour forth our prayers”21.

It is hardly surprising that the Vernicle, as the first image in the Arma Christi rolls, can become badly rubbed through sheer use (as in bl ms Add. 22029).

In the Arma Christi as elsewhere, it is conventional to display the Vernicle as held by angels on either side, or as if held up in front of herself by Veronica like a placard, with only her head and hands showing. Hers is literally a supporting role, subsumed by the image which has absorbed her name. The treatment of the Vernicle miracle in the York and Wakefield Mystery Plays shares such an emphasis on the relic rather than Veronica herself. In both play cycles Veronica is displaced in her role and ownership of her cloth by one of the three Maries. In the York Road to Calvary play one of the Maries offers to cleanse Christ’s face and then presumably holds up a Vernicle image to the audience as she exclaims “Behalde howe 17 The N-Town Play, Stephen Spector ed., Oxford 1991, p. 326. 18 See also The Life of St Edmund King and Martyr: A Facsimile of bl ms Harley 2278, London 2004, f. 12r. 19 For an edition, see Ann Eljenholm Nichols, “O Vernicle: A Critical Edition”, in The Arma Christi in Medieval and Early Modern Material Culture, Lisa H. Cooper, Andrea Denny-Brown eds, Farnham 2014. For a study of the mss, see Ann Eljenholm Nichols, “‘O Vernicle’: Illustrations of an Arma Christi Poem”,in Tributes to Kathleen L. Scott: English Medieval Manuscripts: Readers, Makers and Illuminators, Marlene V. Hennessy ed., London 2009, pp. 139–165; Sarah Noonan, “Private Reading and the Rolls of the Symbols of the Passion”, Journal of the Early Book Society, xv (2012), pp. 289–304. 20 Paston Letters and Papers of the Fifteenth Century, Norman Davis ed., Oxford 1971, 1.517. 21 Tony Hunt, Popular Medicine in Thirteenth-Century England, Cambridge 1990, p. 28.

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7 / St Veronica holding a dark-faced Vernicle, ca 1450 / British Library, ms Arundel 302, f. 163r (detail) 8 / Historiated initial d: an angel holds the Vernicle cloth drawn in black on silver, with a lady kneeling before, ca 1440 / Fitzwilliam Museum, ms 3-1979, f. 75r (detail) 68

he hath shewed his grace! […] This signe schalle bere witnesse!”22. Here the Vernicle itself is evidently more significant than the identity of the woman who received it. In the Wakefield Play of the Scourging it is Mary Magdalene whom a torturer roughly orders to go home “with that clowte (cloth)”, and Mary retorts saying “This thyng shall vengeance call/On you holly in fere”23, which underlines how instrumental the Veronica became in medieval interpretation of the Roman destruction of Jerusalem as just punishment for the Jews’ collective guilt for the murder of Christ. Her career subsequent to the Passion is no less part of medieval conceptions of Veronica. Various narratives, including The Siege of Jerusalem, recount the miracles when Veronica brings the Vernicle to Rome, where pagan idols topple and smash as the Vernicle is carried past, and where so many people press to see the Vernicle that it flies up and suspends itself in mid-air so as to be seen (an English Apocalypse of ca 1265 shows the Vernicle above to the right [Fig. 11]). The Cornish Ordinalia includes a major role for Veronica in its Resurrection Play, embroidering on Veronica’s story in the Golden Legend or similar sources24. After healing the emperor with her cloth Veronica is at hand as his chief adviser throughout the macabrely surreal comedy of trying and failing to dispose of Pilate’s corpse. The sheer variety in such English responses suggests that the Vernicle’s very multiplicity is its cultural significance. The miracle of the Vernicle becomes aligned with the most important Christian mysteries, as some illuminations in the Sherborne Missal suggest, where Veronica is shown displaying the Vernicle just below the illumination on the Resurrection page, and even more prominently just below an illumination devoted to the Eucharist25. Indeed, the imprinting of the Vernicle is cited as evidence, alongside Christ’s canonical miracles, in the Lollard Walter Brut’s argument for women’s ordination: “Think how many miracles Christ enacted for women and at their request. Didn’t he turn water into wine at Cana […]? Didn’t he bring Lazarus back to life […]? Isn’t it said that he imprinted the image of his face indelibly on a linen cloth for Veronica, to remember him by? How then can we say that Christ could not, or

would not, consecrate bread into his body at the request of a devout woman […]. Thus there seems to me no reason why women should not be able to be priests 26 ”.

Brut’s argument need not disclose to which account of the Veronica story he refers, and English authors and audiences evidently remain aware of competing versions. The author of a Northern Passion version reverts to a tradition that Veronica is really Martha of Bethany, and has Christ cure her of blindness instead of an issue of blood, although she gets the Vernicle in the end, with which to heal others27. The English poem Titus and Vespasian reveals a cleverly synthesizing author at work on combining a number of Veronica traditions so as to keep alternate versions in play. This Veronica reports to Volusian how she was just setting off with a piece of cloth to visit a painter to get Christ’s portrait painted as a memento for herself when she came across Christ bearing the cross on his way to Calvary. When Mary hears Veronica sorrowing over this spectacle Mary takes Veronica’s cloth from her and it is Mary who then wipes Christ’s face. Veronica duly follows, surreptitiously touching the garment that Christ is wearing. At the foot of the cross, Mary beckons Veronica over and hands her the cloth. Veronica feels herself cured, and discovers the image of Christ’s face on her cloth28. Here is a skilful amalgam of Veronica traditions – from the Golden Legend version, the Road to Calvary story and the Venjance Nostre Seigneur and its derivatives – which indicates an awareness of competing accounts while resolving them into one narrative. As elsewhere, the history of the Veronica resists any tidy evolutionary development in which earlier versions are superseded and forgotten. Among English authors it is Julian of Norwich who proves to have thought most deeply about the 22 The York Plays, Richard Beadle ed., Oxford 2009–2013, p. 326. 23 The Towneley Plays, Martin Stevens, A. C. Cawley eds, Oxford 1994, p. 284. 24 The Cornish Ordinalia, Third Play: Resurrection, Graham Sandercock ed., [n. p.] 1984, pp. 101–143. 25 Janet Backhouse, The Sherborne Missal, London 1999, pp. 22, 31. 26 Woman Defamed and Woman Defended, Alcuin Blamires ed., Oxford 1992, p. 260. 27 The Northern Passion, Frances A. Foster ed., Oxford 1913, pp. 181–182. For the identification with Martha, see Pseudo-Ambrose, Sermo 46, De Salamone in Patrologia Latina, 17.698. 28 Titus and Vespasian, John A. Herbert ed., London 1906, pp. 92–93.

9 / Painted panel from a rood screen of St Veronica holding a dark-faced Vernicle, Church of St Mary, North Creake, Norfolk, early 16th century 10 / John Lydgate, Life of Saints Edmund and Fremund, ca 1434–1443 / British Library, ms Harley 2278, f. 12r (right: Alkmund visits the Pope) 69

11/ Right: the Veronica sudarium with the head of Christ, The Gulbenkian Apocalypse, ca 1265 / Calouste Gulbenkian Museum, ms l.a. 139, f. 13r

Vernicle’s disconcerting darkness, its absence of beauty and possibly unfixed, unstable appearance. When analysing her revelations of 1373, Julian references the Roman Vernicle in order to validate her enigmatic second “shewing”, in which alternate halves of Christ’s face appear covered with dried blood. Both are images of Christ’s face miraculously vouchsafed to a woman: “It made me to thinke of the holy vernacle of Rome which he hath portrayed with his owne blissid face when he was in his herd Passion, wilfully going to his deth, and often chongyng of colour. Of the brownehede and blakehede, reulihede and lenehede of this image, many mervel how it might be, stondyng he portrayed it with his blissid face which is the fairehede of heavyn […]. Than how might this image be so discolouring and so fer fro faire? […] And there it seith of the vernacle of Rome, it mevyth be dyvers chongyng of colour and chere, sometyme more comfortably and lively, and sometime more reuly and deadly […] 29 ”.

What Julian sees here may recall something of Gervase of Tilbury’s account of the miraculous image in the Lateran where half the face is covered in blood, while with her “many marvel how it might be”, Julian implies a tradition of bewilderment at the baffling darkness and “mouvance” of the Vernicle as a likeness of Christ’s face. As Julian’s account suggests, the whole history of the Vernicle is full of equivocations, because the story of how the Vernicle originated is multiple and manifold in medieval memory. An image whose unique claim was that it was not a representation in the usual sense at all, not a likeness painted by an artist, and was hence irreplaceable and unrepeatable, became the subject of multiple reproduction. An image so specially created that it trumped any human artistic attempt at representation came to be one of the most commonly painted religious subjects. An image of Christ’s unearthly beauty and dignity came to have a darkness which mirrors back to us our stained humanity. 29 Julian of Norwich: Revelations of Divine Love, Barry Windeatt ed., Oxford 2016, pp. 45–46

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summary „Pravý obraz“? Proměnlivý Veraikon ve středověké Anglii

Článek Barryho Windeatta se zaměřuje na proměny Veraikonu v  anglickém prostředí. K nejvýznamnějším svědectvím těchto proměn patří rané doklady o reakcích na Veroničinu roušku z pera anglických autorů: Gerald z Walesu a Gervase z Tilbury, cestující z Británie do Říma, poskytují cenné postřehy o podobě relikvie, zatímco Matthew Paris zaznamenává klíčový zázrak Veraikonu a vyhlášení odpustků papežem Inocencem iii., které výrazně posílilo jeho uctívání. Anglické rukopisy ze třináctého století také obsahují nejstarší dochované znázornění Veraikonu. Přestože si Veraikon nárokoval jako hlavní atribut uchování přímého otisku Kristových rysů – tedy zpodobnění mnohem hodnotnější než skrze malbu lidskou rukou – je Veraikon známý v mnoha často si odporujících verzích. Autor shrnuje proměny různých příběhů o původu Veraikonu a odkazuje na staroanglický text Avenging of the Saviour, na verše Venjance Nostre Seigneur, na text Joseph of Arimathea Roberta z Boronu, na Bible en françois Rogera z Argenteuil, i na Zlatou Legendu a přepis Vengeance de Nostre Seigneur v próze. V  přehledu následují variace zmínek v anglických spisech a obrazech napříč čtrnáctým a patnáctým stoletím s důrazem na příklady tzv. roušek s „temnou tváří“. Citovaná jsou následující díla a autoři: John Audelay, The N-Town Play, Lydgatův Life of St Edmund, Arma Christi, The Paston Letters, The York Plays, The Wakefield Plays, cornwallská Ordinalia, soudní process Lollarda Waltera Bruta, The Northern Passion, Titus a Vespasian a Julián z Norwiche. Tyto texty spolu s obrazy představují jistou „pohyblivost” a koexistenci různých výkladů Veroničiny legendy i relikvie a jejich replik ve středověké Anglii.

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Abstract – De sacrosancto sudario Veronicae by Giacomo Grimaldi. Preliminary Investigations – As a cleric and notary in St Peter’s, Giacomo Grimaldi (1568–1623) was an indefatigable scholar of the history of the Basilica and its Chapter, compiling numerous archival and historical works. This article presents the preliminary investigations on Grimaldi’s Liber de sacrosancto Veronicae sudario, a compilation of all the information the author was able to trace in the Vatican Libraries and Archives about the Vatican Veronica. The article briefly considers the three Liber’s autographs (Biblioteca Vaticana, Biblioteca Nazionale di Firenze, Biblioteca Ambrosiana), the various sources of the work, and Grimaldi’s method of quoting. Keywords – Giacomo Grimaldi, Vatican Library, Vatican Archives, Vatican Chapter, Ambrosiana Library, St Peter’s Basilica, Veronica, Tiberio Alfarano, medieval history, sixteenth–seventeenth century scholarship Federico Gallo Biblioteca Ambrosiana [email protected]

De sacrosancto sudario Veronicae by Giacomo Grimaldi Preliminary Investigations Federico Gallo

Giacomo Grimaldi, born in Bologna in 1568, moved to Rome with his family at an early age and between 1581 and 1582 began to serve in the Vatican Basilica of Saint Peter’s, where he remained until his death on July 7, 16231. The Vatican Basilica, where the Prince of the Apostles was buried, intertwined with his life 2; here he undertook his whole cursus honorum until 1602, when he became a clericus beneficiatus; he was later also appointed public notary. Grimaldi was an indefatigable scholar of the history of the Basilica and its Chapter; by collecting illustrated descriptions and historical

* I thank Prof. Amanda C. Murphy and Prof. Marco Petoletti for inviting and helping me in the research. Following this paper, which was written for the conference in Cambridge, I have since been able to examine in depth and enlarge the scope of the research focusing not on the Veronica but on Grimaldi’s autograph manuscripts and copies. The resulting paper is now printed: “Compilazione archivistica, gusto antiquario e devozione: il Liber de sacrosanto sudario Veronicae di Giacomo Grimaldi”, in Miscellanea Bibliothecae Vaticanae  xxiii, Vatican City 2017, pp. 241–286. 1 Reto Niggl, Giacomo Grimaldi (1568 –1623), Munich 1971, pp. 6 –33; Massimo Ceresa, “Grimaldi, Giacomo”, in Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani, xlix, Rome 2002, pp. 516 –518. 2 The original curriculum vitae has not yet been found; it is quoted by Giovanni Fantuzzi, Notizie degli scrittori bolognesi, iv, Bologna 1784, pp. 307 – 308, n. 1; and by Niggl, Giacomo Grimaldi (n. 1), pp. 366 – 367 (from Rome, Biblioteca Angelica, ms 1589, fols 204v–205r). On St Peter’s Chapter: Dario Rezza, Mirko Stocchi, Il Capitolo di San Pietro in Vaticano dalle origini al xx secolo. Volume i: la storia e le persone, (Archivum Sancti Petri i, 1), Vatican City 2008.

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witnesses, he zealously recorded the history of the ancient building, which was demolished and rebuilt at the beginning of the seventeenth century, reaching completion in 1615. During his lifetime, he compiled numerous archival and historical works, almost exclusively about St Peter’s. These included inventories of the Chapter’s Archive, Library and Sacristy; transcriptions of medieval and renaissance manuscripts and epigraphs; documentation of the translation of the relics from the old to the new Basilica; archaeological and antiquarian news regarding Roman ruins. The texts are accompanied by a large number of drawings, primarily of the monuments inside St Peter’s 3. These works arose in part from Grimaldi’s role as assistant archivist, who planned a series of hand-written compilations for the Chapter’s Archive and Library4; in part from his position as a notary, which led to the Chapter of St Peter’s asking him to record, in notarial style, the history of the old Basilica that was gradually being demolished5. Finally, in part they were requested of him by important figures of the time, such as Cardinal Federico Borromeo and the Grand Duke of Tuscany, Cosimo ii 6. Grimaldi’s compilations were frequently used in subsequent centuries by the erudites, including Ludovico Antonio Muratori, Angelo Mai, Giovanni Battista de Rossi and Vincenzo Forcella 7. His only published work is the description of the Basilica of St Peter’s, from the rich and complex Vatican manuscript Barb. lat. 27338. Gaetano Marini was fulsome in his praise of the volume of work carried out by Giacomo Grimaldi: “It must be believed that he was a talented man, a tireless worker”9. The enthusiastic portrait Eugène Müntz sketched was also flattering: “ce travailleur modeste qu’on a tant copié et si peu cité, et dont les services, en ce qui concerne l’étude de l’art chrétien de la basse époque, sont vraiment incalculables”. According to him, Grimaldi was not an inventive, original erudite, but a precise and zealous collector of information10. In my view, in order to understand and evaluate the nature of Grimaldi’s writings, it would be misleading to consider them as the fruits of the intelligence of a learned, passionate scholar: what should be considered more carefully is the archivistic and

notarial method which lay behind them. Grimaldi’s aim was not to produce innovative works or interpretations of the data he collected: he was interested in the complete picture, in thorough research that could draw together into one work all the information available on a particular subject in the documents kept in the Vatican, using an archivistic style which came naturally to him as the sub-archivist in the Chapter of St Peter’s. One can presume he adopted the same criterion for adding meticulous drawings to his texts: they were meant to record an object, to keep the memory of it. He also added his notarial subscription next to the record of the information; in my view, the legal nature of the text prevented him from inserting any type of free interpretation of the data, as well as dictating a different writing style from that of a document. Grimaldi was not the first to create records of this type within the Basilica. He modeled him­self on a predecessor, the sub-archivist Tiberio Alfarano, who had been counseled and helped by another canon of St Peter’s, Giacomo 3 Fantuzzi, Notizie (n. 2), pp. 308 –310; Eugène Müntz, “Recherches sur l’œuvre archéologique de Jacques Grimaldi, ancien archiviste de la Basilique du Vatican d’après les manuscrits conservés à Rome, à Florence, à Milan, à Turin et à Paris”, in Louis Duchesne, Étude sur le Liber Pontificalis, (Bibliothèque des Écoles Françaises d’Athènes et Rome, 1), Paris 1877, pp. 234 –244; Stephan Waetzoldt, Kopien des 17. Jahrhunderts nach Mosaiken und Wandmalereien in Rom, Vienna/ Munich 1964, pp. 23 –24; Niggl, Giacomo Grimaldi (n. 1), pp. 97– 365. On the drawing of the Oratory of John vii in the ancient St Peter’s: Antonella Ballardini, “Il perduto Oratorio di Giovanni vii nella Basilica di San Pietro in Vaticano: architettura e scultura”, in Santa Maria Antiqua tra Roma e Bisanzio, Maria Andaloro, Giulia Bordi, Giuseppe Morganti eds, Milan 2016, pp. 220 –227, with previous bibliography. 4 Rezza/Stocchi, Il Capitolo (n. 2), p. 16, n. 28; p. 18, n. 32; pp. 499 –500. On the Chapter’s Archive and Library: Luigi Schiaparelli, “Le carte antiche dell’archivio capitolare di San Pietro in Vaticano”, Archivio della Società Romana di Storia Patria, xxiv (1901), pp. 393 – 418; Giovanni Mercati, “Digressione: per la storia dei codici di S. Pietro in Vaticano nei secoli xv e xvi”, in Codici Latini Pio Grimani Pio, (Studi e Testi, lxxv), Vatican City 1938, pp. 144 –168; Paul Canart, Catalogue des manuscrits grecs de l’Archivio di San Pietro, (Studi e Testi, ccxlvi), Vatican City 1966, pp. 3 –26; Rezza/Stocchi, Il Capitolo (n. 2), pp. 9 – 40. 5 Antonella Ballardini, “La distruzione dell’abside dell’antico San Pietro e la tradizione iconografica del mosaico innocenziano tra la fine del sec. xvi e il sec. xvii”, in Miscellanea Bibliothecae Apostolicae Vaticanae xi, Vatican City 2004, p. 17; Rezza/ Stocchi, Il Capitolo (n. 2), p. 77. 6 Niggl, Giacomo Grimaldi (n. 1), pp. 16 –18. 7 Müntz, Recherches sur l’œuvre archéologique (n. 3), pp. 233 –234. 8 Giacomo Grimaldi, Descrizione della Basilica antica di S. Pietro in Vaticano. Codice Barberini latino 2733, Reto Niggl ed., Vatican City 1972 (Codices e Vaticanis selecti, 32). 9 Fantuzzi, Notizie (n. 2), p. 308; Müntz, “Recherches sur l’œuvre archéologique” (n. 3), p. 228. 10 Ibidem, pp. 225 –228, sp. pp. 226, 231. See also Waetzoldt, Kopien des 17. Jahrhunderts (n. 3), p. 14.

1 / Giacomo Grimaldi, Liber de sacrosancto sudario Veronicae, frontispiece / Milan, Biblioteca Ambrosiana, ms a 168 inf., f. ir

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2 / Giacomo Grimaldi, Liber de sacrosancto sudario Veronicae, example of a page with text and drawing / Milan, Biblioteca Ambrosiana, ms a 168 inf., f. 80r 3 / Giacomo Grimaldi, Liber de sacrosancto sudario Veronicae, altar of the Veronica in the old St Peter’s / Milan, Biblioteca Ambrosiana, ms a 168 inf., f. 99r

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Ercolani 11. The latter suggested that Alfarano drew up a supplement12 to the famous descriptions of the Basilica compiled in the previous centuries by Petrus Mallius and Maffeus Vegius, the Descriptio Basilicae Vaticanae 13 and De rebus antiquis memorabilibus14 respectively. Grimaldi was to continue to work on compilations of various types and on various topics, all within the sphere of St Peter’s in the Vatican, including a description of the old Basilica, and historical research on the individual monuments15. Studies conducted by Fabio Della Schiava16 suggest that it would be promising to examine the whole question of notarial records and the collections of historical documents regarding St Peter’s in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, which constituted the basis of erudite research in the ensuing centuries 17. On the following lines, I will deal with the work of Grimaldi entitled Liber (also Opusculum) de sacrosancto Veronicae sudario. This compilation gathers together all the information Grimaldi was able to trace in the Chapter of St Peter’s Library and Archive, in the Vatican Apostolic Library, and in the Vatican Secret Archive, regarding the Veronica preserved in St Peter’s, as well as pictures of the Basilica’s monuments related to it 18. There are three autographs 19 of the Liber and six other coeval handwritten copies, dating back to after Grimaldi’s death20. The high number of preserved documents indicates the interest that the work aroused among contemporaries; I will only cite Muratori among the learned who drew on them for their own publications 21. I will take into consideration the three autographs: the Vatican, the Florentine and the Ambrosian, whose compilations were carried out respectively in 1618, 1620 and 162122. The strict correlation between them is shown by the correspondence (1617–1622) between Giacomo Grimaldi and Cardinal Federico Borromeo, which is kept in the Biblioteca Ambrosiana23. The two met for the first time in November 1610, at the time of the canonization of Saint Charles Borromeo 24. On this occasion, Grimaldi promised to send the cardinal accurate copies of documents preserved in the Vatican; the debt was only repaid seven years later 25. As far as the book on the Veronica and the Holy Spear is concerned, Grimaldi first compiled the

current Vatican autograph in 1618 and dedicated it to Cardinal Alessandro Peretti Damasceni26. Grimaldi proposed the same work to Cardinal Borromeo in the summer of 1618 27. In 1619 on the same topic he wrote the fols 70v– 97r of the Vatican manuscript Barb. lat. 2733, which – as I will explain in more detail below – look like a different draft of the same document28. In 1620, he compiled the Florentine autograph, which was probably intended for the Grand Duke of Tuscany 29. The Ambrosian autograph on the Veronica and the Holy Spear was composed and delivered to Cardinal Borromeo in 1621 30. Grimaldi died at the beginning of January 1623 31. It is quite clear from these notes that the work intensely occupied Grimaldi’s last years. Before moving on to the comparison of the three autographs, I will present the way in which Grimaldi deals with the theme of the Veronica in the fols 70v – 97 r of the ms Vat. Barb. lat. 2733 32. The manuscript contains a large quantity of heterogeneous material compiled by Grimaldi, but it is all antiquarian, historical or ceremonial material concerning Saint Peter’s. The first part, properly named Instrumenta autentica, contains notarial texts by Grimaldi concerning the translations of relics and the soon-to-be demolished monuments of the Basilica, the drafting of which was ordered by Pope Paul v; Grimaldi accompanied the notarial writings with texts or historical documents on the single monuments 33. The compilation process displayed in the Instrumenta autentica looks like the base model of Grimaldi’s work on the Veronica and the Holy Spear, and the time span is also the same. Nevertheless, in the Instrumenta autentica Grimaldi presents shorter texts and fewer documents. In particular, the Liber de sacrosancto Sudario opens with a section containing documents and witness descriptions from historians of the Veronica 11 Ballardini, “La distruzione” (n. 5), pp. 17–22. On Tiberio Alfarano (1525 –1596): José Ruysschaert, “Alfarano, Tiberio”, in Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani, ii, Roma 1960, p. 261; Fabio Della Schiava,“Per la storia della Basilica Vaticana nel ‘500: una nuova silloge di Tiberio Alfarano a Catania”, in Italia medioevale e umanistica, xlviii (2007), pp. 257–282. On Giacomo Ercolani (Hercolano, Hercolani, Ercolano) (1495 –1573): Tiberii Alpharani de Basilicae Vaticanae antiquissima et nova structura, Michele Cerrati ed., (Studi e Testi, xxvi; Documenti e ricerche per la storia dell’antica Basilica Vaticana, 1), Rome 1914, pp. xvi–xx. On both: Rezza/Stocchi, Il Capitolo (n. 2). 12 Alfarano’s Additione o vero supplimento alli libri de Maffeo Vegio e Petro Mallio canonico del San Pietro… is in Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana,

Arch. Cap. S. Pietro g 5, pp. 147–230 and Catania, Biblioteca Civica Ursino-Recupero, Fondo Civico b20: Mauro D’Arcangelo, Fabio Della Schiava, “Dall’antiquaria umanistica alla modellazione 3d: una proposta di lavoro tra testo e immagine, Camenae, x (février 2012), p. 2. 13 “Petri Mallii descriptio basilicae Vaticanae aucta atque emendata a Romano presbitero”, in Codice topografico della città di Roma, Roberto Valentini, Giuseppe Zucchetti eds, iii, (Fonti per la Storia d’Italia, 90), Rome 1946. 14 A critical edition is in preparation by Fabio Della Schiava: D’Arcangelo/Della Schiava, “Dall’antiquaria” (n. 12), p. 1, n. 3. 15 Grimaldi, Descrizione (n. 8). Grimaldi became notary on 20 May 1598, and became authorized to compile documents about St Peter’s on 31 May 1600: Ballardini,“La distruzione”(n. 5), p. 14, n. 12. On probable collaboration with Alfarano see Ibidem, p. 17. See also Niggl, Giacomo Grimaldi (n. 1), pp. 8, 12. 16 Della Schiava, “Per la storia” (n. 11). 17 Ibidem, pp. 257–258; D’Arcangelo/Della Schiava, “Dall’antiquaria” (n. 12), pp. 2–3. 18 The book also has a second part: the full title is, in fact, Liber de sacrosancto Veronicae sudario ac lancea quae Salvatoris nostri Iesu Christi latus aperuit in Basilica Vaticana maxima veneratione asservatis. This second part of the work, independent of the first, relates to another relic, the Spear used by a soldier to lacerate the chest of the dying Jesus (Jn 19, 34; the act is traditionally attributed to the centurion: cf. Mt 27, 54; Mk 15, 39; Lk 23, 47). 19 Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, Arch. Cap. S. Pietro h 3; Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale di Firenze, ii.iii.173 (olim Magl. Cl. xxxvii, num. 60); Veneranda Biblioteca Ambrosiana, a 168 inf. 20 Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, Arch. Cap. S. Pietro h 3 bis (1630); Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, Arch. Cap. S. Pietro h 70 (1635); Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, Vat. lat. 6439 (17th century); Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, Vat. lat. 8404 (17th century); Biblioteca Universitaria di Bologna, ms 2374 (17th century); Ajaccio, Bibliothèque Fesch, cod. 104 (17th century); a partial transcript of the text is in Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, Barb. lat. 3221 (17th century). See description of the manuscripts and bibliography in Niggl, Giacomo Grimaldi (n. 1), pp. 196 –205. I have not yet been able to see the manuscripts in Bologna and in Ajaccio, so I report Niggl’s datation. 21 Ludovico Antonio Muratori, Antiquitates Italicae medii aevi, ii, Mediolani 1739, col. 783; cf. Fantuzzi, Notizie (n. 2), p. 309, n. 3. 22 Niggl, Giacomo Grimaldi (n. 1), pp. 184 –195. See also a comparison between Florentine and Ambrosian, about the old apsis of the Basilica, in Ballardini, “La distruzione” (n. 5), pp. 7– 80, sp. pp. 54 –59. 23 Federico Borromeo, Indice delle lettere a lui dirette conservate all’Ambrosiana, (Fontes Ambrosiani, 34), Milan 1960, p. 189. Letters edited by Carlo Marcora, “Il cardinal Federico Borromeo e l’archeologia cristiana”, in Mélanges Eugène Tisserant, v. Archives Vaticanes. Histoire ecclésiastique. Deuxième partie, (Studi e Testi cccxxxv), Vatican City 1964, pp. 115 –154, and Niggl, Giacomo Grimaldi (n. 1), p. 289 (he writes “g 231 inf.” instead of “g 285 inf.”). 24 Veneranda Biblioteca Ambrosiana g 224 inf., 127 (17 settembre 1617): Marcora, “Il cardinal Federico” (n. 23), p. 136; cf. Borromeo, Indice (n. 23), p. 189. 25 Niggl, Giacomo Grimaldi (n. 1), pp. 207–214. 26 Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, Arch. Cap. S. Pietro h 3, fols ivr, 158r, 210r. 27 Veneranda Biblioteca Ambrosiana g 228 inf., 99 (4 agosto 1618) and g 228 inf., 344 (3 settembre 1618), cf. Borromeo, Indice (n. 23), p. 189. 28 Cf. Grimaldi, Descrizione (n. 8), pp. 103 –130. 29 Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale di Firenze, ii.iii.173, fols. viiir, xxiiv, 133r, 165r. On the address to the Grand Duke: Ballardini, “La distruzione” (n. 5), p. 54. 30 Veneranda Biblioteca Ambrosiana a 168 inf., fols ir, xviiv–xviiir, 144v, 182rv, 182v, 183r; g 231 inf., 63 (25 settembre 1621); g 234 inf., 97 (8 gennaio 1622); g 254 inf., 167 (25 febbraio 1622), cf. Borromeo, Indice (n. 23), p. 189. 31 About Federico Borromeo and Grimaldi see also Archivio Capitolare di San Pietro, Diario 9/2.2 (olim 11), fol. 89r: “Mandò anco in più volte al cardinale Borromeo, arcivescovo di Milano, molte belle memorie cavate dall’Archivio e dalla Biblioteca Vaticana etc. quale similmente gli usò molte cortesie con mandarli molti danari in più volte”; cf. Niggl, Giacomo Grimaldi (n. 1), pp. 368 –371. 32 Cf. Grimaldi, Descrizione (n. 8), pp. 103 –130. 33 Ibidem, p. xii.

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which pre-date the year 705, the year in which the documentary series of the Liber de sacrosancto Sudario begins. I infer from this comparison that the Instrumenta autentica, true to their title, had a strictly notarial nature and the Veronica was only one of the relics whose translation during the rebuilding of the Basilica is noticed, whereas the Liber de sacrosancto sudario was conceived as more of a documentary work with broader reach, focused only on the Veronica. The Instrumenta merely had to fulfill the task of recording, on behalf of the Vatican Chapter, the documentation regarding the monuments of the Basilica in simple chronological order. The Liber instead looks like an expansion of the Instrumenta as the number of documents is greater, probably due to the fact that Grimaldi was able to trace more of them as the months went by. The contents are also more wide-ranging, with more details being reported, as well as featuring the addition of devotional and poetic texts to the papal documents and chronicles. The register in these cases looks like that of historical narrative, rather than that of a notarial compilation, of which it was an offshoot 34. An important matter is the authorship of the copious drawings in Grimaldi’s works: the bibliography attribute them to him35. It could be also possible that Grimaldi didn’t draw the drawings himself, but commissioned them from different artists 36. Let us consider now the three autographs of the Liber.

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Città del Vaticano, Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, Arch. Cap. S. Pietro h 3 1618; Rome; paper; fols (i) + xxviii + 229 + i, 230 x 325 mm, 26 long lines; autograph; on the cover and f. v r Peretti coat of arms; 17th century binding. Fol. iir: “Ex libris Angeli Damasceni. Legatum r(everendi). d(omini) Iacobi Salvatorii cappellani Cappellaniae Sancti Angeli illustrissimi domini Damasceni olim nostri canonici in nostra Basilica sacrosancta. Anno 1686”; fol. iv r: “Opusculum de sacrosancto Veronicae sudario, ac lancea quae Salvatoris nostri Iesu Christi latus patuit, in Vaticana Basilica maxima veneratione asservatis. Editum per Iacobum Grimaldum eius Basilicae clericum beneficiatum. Anno Domini mdcxviii”; fol. viir: “Index capitum huius opuscoli de sacrosancto Veronicae sudario salvatoris nostri Iesu Christi ac lancea qua latus eius patuit in cruce”; fol. xxiiir: “De lancea qua Salvatoris nostri latus effossum est”; fol. 1r: “Incipit opusculum de sacrosancto sudario

Veronicae in Vaticana Basilica maxima veneratione asservato”; fol. 163r: “De lancea qua Salvatori nostri Iesu Christi latus in cruce apertum fuit”; fol. 209 print, inc.: “Ambarum vitinearum columnarum”; fol. 210r: dedication to Cardinal Alessandro Peretti Damasceni; fol. 213r: excerpt from Giacomo Salvatori’s last will; fols 214r–217v: “Breve memoria sopra il sagratissimo Sudario, o Volto Santo”; fols 220r–228v: “Relatione della processione fatta da S. Marco sino alla ss. Basilica di S. Pietro li 21 novembre 1528 delle ss. reliquie recuperate in diverse parti di Regno trafugate nel Sacco di Borbone”. Firenze, Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale, Fondo Nazionale, ii.iii.173 1620; Rome; paper.; fols xxv + 104 + 2 (not numbered) + 67 (numbered until 172, but 170 omitted) + i’, 230 x 335 mm, 33 long lines; autograph; fol. iiir: “Ex libris Antonii Magliabechii 4. Nonas Iulii 1714. Catalogus primus nostrae Bibliothecae”; fols viiir, xr, 1r: seal “Biblioteca Nazionale. 1883”; 17th century binding. Fol. viiir: “Opusculum de sacrosancto Veronicae sudario salvatori nostri Iesu Christi et lancea, qua latus eius apertum fuit in Vaticana Basilica maxima veneratione asservatis. Editum et scriptum per Iacobum Grimaldum eius Basilicae clericum beneficiatum. Romae anno Domini millesimo sexcentesimo vigesimo”, fols x r–xix r: “Index huius libri de sacrosancto Veronicae sudario salvatoris nostri Iesu Christi ac lancea qua latus eius patuit”; fols xx r–xxiiv: “‘Index huius libri’ de lancea qua salvatoris nostri Iesu Christi latus in cruce apertum fuit ad Innocentium octavum pontificem maximum Byzantio missa anno Domini mccccxcii”; fols 1r–133r: “Incipit opusculum de sacrosanto sudario Veronicae in Vaticana Basilica maxima veneratione asservato”; between fol. 104 and fol. 105 two unnumbered pieces of card both containing a photograph reproducing fol. 104r (19th century) and on the verso of the first card (19th century): “Fotografia estratta dal codice magliabechiano classe iii n. 173 a cura della Direzione della R. Galleria per uso del [empty line]. Copie due depositate in forza del Regolamento art. 42. 9 luglio 1877”; fols 133r–134r: “Appendix scribenda folio 32”; fol. 134rv: “Appendix fol. 73 scribenda”; fols 136r–165r: “De lancea qua salvatoris nostri Iesu Christi latus in cruce apertum fuit”; fols 166r–168r: “Brevis declaratio aliquarum monetarum antiquarum ex Archivo Vaticanae Basilicae et celeberrima Vaticana Bibliotheca aliisque autenticis scriptis collecta per Iacobum Grimaldum olim eius Basilicae Archivista, de quibus latius habetur in separato libro ab eodem edito anno Domini mdcxx . Hic solum appositum est valor monetarum, alia multa in dicto libro habentur”; fol. 169rv: printed map of St Peter’s Basilica (T. Alfarano) inc. “Sequens pagina demonstrat veram et fidelem plantam antiquae Vaticanae Basilicae”; fol. 171v Giacomo Grimaldi’s signature and notarial seal. Milano, Veneranda Biblioteca Ambrosiana, a 168 inf. 1621; Rome; paper; fols (i) + xviii + 183 + iii’; 230 x 335 mm, 33 long lines; autograph; 17th century binding.

Fol. ir: “Liber de sacrosancto sudario Veronicae salvatoris nostri Iesu Christi ac lancea, quae latus eius aperuit in Vaticana Basilica maxima veneratione asservatis editus et scriptus per Iacobum Grimaldum eiusdem Basilicae clericum beneficiatum Romae anno Domini mdcxxi”; fols vr–xviiir: “Index huius libri de sacrosancto Veronicae sudario salvatoris nostri Iesu Christi, ac lancea, quae latus eius aperuit, in Vaticana Basilica maxima veneratione asservatis”; fols 1r–144v: “Incipit opusculum de sacrosancto sudario Veronicae in Vaticana Basilica maxima veneratione asservato”; fols 146r–174r: “De lancea qua salvatoris nostri Iesu Christi latus in cruce apertum fuit”; fols 175r–176v: printed map of St Peter’s Basilica (T. Alfarano) inc. “Sequens pagina demonstrat veram et fidelem plantam antiquae Vaticanae Basilicae”; fol. 177: “Appendix ad fol. 69”; fol. 178r: “Imago sanctissimi crucifixi Caroli Magni tempore et Leonis tertii, cuius mentio in hoc libro fol. 69”; fols 179r–180r: inc. “Ante hunc sanctissimum crucifixum” exp. “bitam atque bictoriam Carulo dona”[sic]; fol. 181: colophon; fol. 182rv: Giacomo Grimaldi’s signature and notarial seal; fol. 183: print (“Henricus Van Schoel excudit”) inc. “Exemplum columnae vitineae”.

The comparison between the three autographs – the Vatican (1618), the Florentine (1620) and the Ambrosian (1621) – shows the way the work developed as documents and witnesses were added. The second manuscript contains additions and supplements in respect to the first one, as does the third in respect to the second one. At this point, Müntz’s opinion on the matter seems relevant: “L’auteur semble avoir pris plaisir à varier les matières… de manière à conserver à chacune des copies exécutées de sa main son caractère d’original” 37. In my opinion, Grimaldi had indeed wanted to present different works in the case of the Instrumenta and the Liber, one in a documentary style and the other in a more historical style, but I cannot seem to find the “plaisir à varier les matières” between the three copies of the latter. Instead, I see the progressive enrichment of the corpus with witnesses as he collected them during the months of the drafting of the autograph. I will continue with a brief presentation of the sources quoted by Grimaldi in the Liber and the way in which the author uses them 38. The text is organized according to a strict chronological order, already systematically stated in the table of contents which precedes the text (Index: fols vr–xvr); the events relating to the renowned relic are narrated by fully quoting the authors and the relevant documents, starting from 34 ad until the years of the manuscript compilation 39. The sources are

nearly all from after the eleventh century; their number increases and is fairly constant from the second half of the thirteenth century, gradually increasing further. As Reto Niggl has already demonstrated, for his compilations Grimaldi used – almost exclusively – volumes and documents he was able to trace in the Vatican: in the Archive and Library of the Chapter, in the Secret Archive and in the Apostolic Library 40. The first part of the tract quotes the texts that report the legendary story of the “Veronica”, that is of the woman who wiped Jesus’ face as he ascended to Calvary, the miraculous image that was imprinted on the cloth, and of her later arrival in Rome during the year following Christ’s resurrection (fols 1r–16r). Grimaldi shows a clear desire for completeness and quotes as many authors as he can trace in the manuscripts and in the prints kept in the Vatican: among them are Cassius Dio, Tertullianus, Eusebius, Otto Frisingensis, Martinus Polonus, Gregory of Tours, Iacopus de Varagine, Leonardus Aretinus, Giacomo Filippo Foresti, Girolamo Muzio and Cesare Baronio; the quotes are usually relevant and simply repeat the same legend. The next part of the text is dedicated to two testimonies of the eighth century taken from Vatican monuments (fols 16r – 23v). Here we find the description of the altar of the Veronica built in 705 by Pope John vii and the interpretation of a headstone dating back to Pope Adrian i (772 – 795). The text then continues homogeneously presenting a series of historical documents dating from 1011, which all recall, in 34 Both the part of Instrumenta autentica relating to the Veronica and the Liber contain Grimaldi’s notarial sign. The first is used to confirm the notarial report of the translation of the relic from the old basilica, and it is repeated after all similar reports in the volume; the second one is on the last page of the volume, to confirm the correctness of its whole content. I thank Prof. Herbert Kessler for his suggestion to examine this matter. 35 Müntz, “Recherches” (n. 3), pp. 11, 242; Niggl, Giacomo Grimaldi (n. 1), pp. 49 –55; Ceresa, Grimaldi, Giacomo (n. 1), p. 518. 36 I thank Prof. Giulio Bora, Capo Gabinetto della Collezione dei Disegni of the Veneranda Biblioteca Ambrosiana, for sharing my opinion. The issue of the authorship of the drawings in Grimaldi’s manuscripts deserves to be accurately examined by art historians. 37 Müntz, “Recherches” (n. 3), pp. 234 –235. 38 In this first investigation, I present the content of Grimaldi’s work only up until 1527, the year of the “sacco”in Rome; in the second part of the Conference, planned for 2018, I will present the contents from 1527 to the years of the edition of the Liber. I quote Grimaldi’s texts from the last of the three autographs, the Ambrosian one (Ambr. a 168 inf.). 39 Grimaldi, Descrizione (n. 8), pp. 105 –113. 40 Ibidem, pp. xiii–xvi.

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4 / Giacomo Grimaldi, Liber de sacrosancto sudario Veronicae, pope John vii’s mosaic portrait / Milan, Biblioteca Ambrosiana, ms a 168 inf., f. 127r

different ways, the Veronica in St Peter’s (fols 23v–91v). Among the sources quoted by Grimaldi are, above all, the Liber Pontificalis by Anastasius bibliothecarius, the Liber politicus by Benedictus canonicus, the Descriptio basilicae Vaticanae by Petrus Mallius, the Formularium by Marino da Eboli, the Diarium by Antonio di Pietro, the Descriptio Urbis Romae by Niccolò Signorili, and the De rebus antiquis memorabilibus basilicae Sancti Petri Romae by Maffeo Vegio. Reto Niggl recognizes the manuscripts used by Grimaldi; they are originals or copies made by Grimaldi himself, and they are all preserved in the Vatican41. The works are mostly chronicles, closely linked to the history of St Peter’s Basilica, and lend themselves to a chronological compilation such as that drafted by Grimaldi. Grimaldi quotes directly, without comment, usually with a simple introductory formula such as “Anno Domini mclx” (fol. 26v) or “Alia memoria tempore Alexandri iii” (fol. 27v). The testimonies transcribed by Grimaldi for the most part deal with processions, public or private ostensions, celebrations, concessions of indulgences, notices on the monuments, jubilees, historical or poetical texts, or simply references that testify to the existence of the altar and the relic. The last part of the dissertation contains a reproduction of the mosaics, the ancient altar, the reliquary and the canopy, other stories of the relic, ceremonies and vestments, the Missal’s texts on the Veronica, and numismatics notes (fols 91v – 144v).

I will give a typical example, where the natu­re of the sources he used and his method will demonstrate the characteristics that I have tried to outline so far. In about 1278 (fols 39r – 42r), Grimaldi writes “Anno Domini millesimo ducentesimo septuagesimo octavo. In capsula vii fasciculo 267 in dicto Archivo Sancti Petri habetur bulla magna plumbata Nicolai tertii pontificis maximi atque in regestis eiusdem anno secundo numero 110 Bibliothecae Vaticanae”, then a short biography of Pope Nicholas  iii, a summary of the bulls mentioned, a digression on the meta Sancti Petri, other information on what that pope commanded for St Peter’s, finally “Inter alia igitur quae statuit haec de sanctissimo sudario censuit”, another digression on Boccea (a small village near Rome), other orders from Nicholas iii for St Peter’s and further digressions on the Vatican Chapter and on the Roman basilicas. Grimaldi usually quotes the documents without any commentary, in an acritical way; he copies the information he found without any evaluation. Sometimes he imitates the ancient characters of diplomatic documents and of epigraphs. Often, he diverges from his theme because of his love for antiquity and his great commitment for St Peter’s 41 Niggl even points out the notes in the margin added by Grimaldi on the pages of these manuscripts: Grimaldi, Descrizione, pp. xiii–xvi. See also Della Schiava, “Per la storia” (n. 11), pp. 267–268. On the Descriptio Urbis Romae of Niccolò Signorili, not quoted by Niggl: Codice topografico della città di Roma, Roberto Valentini, Giuseppe Zucchetti eds, iv, Rome 1953, pp.  151–208; Roberto Weiss, La scoperta dell’antichità classica nel Rinascimento, (Medioevo e Umanesimo, lxxiii), Padova 1989, pp. 70 –71.

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Basilica and its history. In the aforementioned text of 1278, the information about Pope Nicholas  iii and his work or about the Roman basilicas are a typical example of this kind of digression associated with the information on the Veronica stricto sensu. Such a varied and rich compilation is the result of the accurate research of Grimaldi, always combined with his love for St Peter’s. The title of this paper is “Preliminary Investigations”: after this initial overview on the Liber de sacrosancto sudario, I hope that in the future scholars will accurately edit this work of Grimaldi’s, as Reto Niggl edited the Descrizione della Basilica Vaticana 42. Scholars will have a precious source for their research and can follow and discover more fully the many paths of the European fortune of the Roman Veronica in the Middle Ages. 42 I edited the Index of Grimaldi’s work in the quoted Compilazione archivistica (n. *), pp. 273–283.

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summary

De sacrosancto sudario Veronicae Giacoma Grimaldiho: předběžný výzkum

Giacomo Grimaldi (1528–1623) prožil svůj život poblíž baziliky sv. Petra ve Vatikánu jako klerik a notář. Jakožto znalec dějin baziliky a její kapituly sestavil mnoho děl archivního a kompilačního charakteru, která však z velké většiny nebyla vydána. S výhledem na podrobnější výzkum zde Federico Gallo představuje první souhrnný průzkum díla Liber de sacrosancto Veronicae sudario, v němž Grimaldi shromáždil všechny informace o vatikánské relikvii zvané Veraikon, jež mohl vypátrat ve vatikánských knihovnách a archivech. Autor stručně popisuje tři exempláře díla (rukopisy uchované v Biblioteca Vaticana, Biblioteca Nazionale di Firenze a Biblioteca Ambrosiana), které

Grimaldi sestavil mezi lety 1618 a 1621 pro věhlasné mecenáše. Existuje také šest kopií, které vznikly jen krátce po Grimaldiho smrti, a které tak svědčí o zájmu, jenž Grimaldiho dílo vzbudilo u zbožných věřících i sběratelů. Po přehledu pramenů, z nichž Grimaldi čerpal – jedná se převážně o historická pojednání, kroniky a archivní dokumenty – předkládá autor několik příkladů Grimaldiho metody citace a sestavování textu. Grimaldi citoval nekriticky, ale přehledně a přesně, s touhou předat co nejvíce poznatků. K samotným textům přidával značné množství kreseb, což je důvodem, proč jeho dílo doposud přitahovalo pozornost pouze historiků umění a dějepisců baziliky sv. Petra.

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Abstract – ‘Veronica’ Images and the Office of the Holy Face in Thirteenth-Century England – All surviving images of the Veronica Image of Christ from thirteenth-century England are considered in regard to the involvement of the St Albans monk and chronicler Matthew Paris in disseminating this icon of the Holy Face and the accompanying prayers of the Office. This article rejects the attribution of some of the images to Matthew as well as the theory that Matthew was the propagator of the Veronica in England. It suggests instead that he may have derived his Veronica image from London’s Westminster Abbey or Palace, and that St Albans Abbey was not the place where the icon first appeared in England. Analysis

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concludes that the English thirteenth-century form of the Veronica most likely derived from the Holy Face in the Sancta Sanctorum in the Lateran Palace rather than the Veronica image in Old St Peter’s, possibly through a drawing or painting including the text of the Office of the Holy Face that was acquired by Westminster Abbey or Palace. Keywords Matthew Paris, Veronica image, Sancta Sanctorum, Holy Face Nigel Morgan University of Cambridge [email protected]

‘Veronica’ Images and the Office of the Holy Face in Thirteenth-Century England Nigel Morgan

The largest number of early so-called Veronica images of the Holy Face to survive from any European country are those from England in the years between c. 1240 and c. 1280 1. Apart from one on an embroidered opus anglicanum cope of c. 1265–1276 in Ascoli Piceno, all these images are as drawings or paintings in manuscripts. Unfortunately, only a few of these “Veronica” heads of Christ have been discussed extensively in the literature without any overall examination of all the extant examples as will be presented in this article. Equally unfortunate has been a concentration solely on those of them attributed (or mis-attributed) to the St Albans monk, chronicler and artist, Matthew Paris, who has been credited with introducing the image into England. In this article both the

1

An important article by Flora Lewis, “The Veronica: Image, Legend and Viewer”, in England in the Thirteenth Century, Proceedings of the 1984 Harlaxton Symposium, William Mark Ormrod ed., Grantham 1985, pp. 100–106, has discussed some of these English thirteenth-century images but regrettably has been overlooked in most of the subsequent literature. The only other discussions of many, but not all, of these images is by Suzanne Lewis, The Art of Matthew Paris in the Chronica Maiora, Berkeley/Los Angeles 1987, pp. 126–130, 421, 489–490, nn. 195–121; Flora Lewis, “Rewarding Devotion: Indulgences and the Promotion of Images”, Studies in Church History, xxviii (1992), pp. 179–194, sp. pp. 179, 188–189, 190; Alexa Sand, Vision, Devotion and Self-Representation in Late Medieval Art, Cambridge 2014, pp. 30–51. The only other parallel European context for devotion to the “Veronica” Holy Face in the thirteenth century is among Cistercian nuns in Germany and North France. On this see: Marie-Noël Bouchard, “La dévotion à la Sainte Face chez les cisterciennes du xiiie siècle”, Collectanea Cisterciensia, lxi (1999), pp. 122–147; Jeffrey F. Hamburger,“Frequentant memoriam visionis faciei meae: Image and Imitation in the Devotions to the Veronica attributed to Gertrude of Helfta”, in The Holy Face and the Paradox of Representation, Herbert L. Kessler, Gerhard Wolf eds, Bologna 1998, pp. 229–246; Anne L. Clark, “Venerating the Veronica: Varieties of Passion Piety in the Later Middle Ages”, Material Religion, Journal of Objects. Art and Belief, iii/2 (2007), pp.164–189, sp. pp. 173–175.

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attribution of Veronica images to Matthew Paris will be examined, and also the issue of whether he really was the originator of this image in thirteenth-century England. Any discussion of the work of Matthew as an artist has to be seen against the reassessment of his work in the past fifty years by Richard Vaughan, George Henderson and myself 2. It should be said that fairly recent writings on the Veronica Holy Face by Gerhard Wolf, Peter Klein and some contributors to this present volume have not fully recognized the results of this re-assessment of Matthew’s position in the art of book illustration in mid-thirteenth century England3. The old literature up to the 1960s had established the myth of a “School of St Albans” as a group of artists working at the Benedictine Abbey of St Albans under the direction of the monk, Matthew Paris, which illustrated Apocalypses, chronicles, lives of saints, psalters and other texts4. Closer examination of the extant manuscripts has revealed that most of them are in a different drawing style and script from that of Matthew Paris and were made elsewhere, probably in London. Although the illustrations of some of the lives of saints’ manuscripts can indeed be attributed to Matthew, others are not in any way connected with him or are interpretative copies of simpler versions originated by Matthew 5. The illustrated Apocalypses of this period are now considered in no way to be by Matthew or to have been made at St Albans, and similarly all but one of the psalters produced in the middle years of the thirteenth century in England6. Matthew’s artistic oeuvre is now restricted to his Chronica Maiora, Historia Anglorum, Abbreviatio Chronicorum Angliae, Chronicle of John of Wallingford, Bernardus Silvestris’ Liber Experimentarius, Lives of the Offa’s and his Vie de St Auban7. The Vie de St Aedward li Rei (Cambridge, University Library, ms ee.3.59) is now thought to be an interpretative copy of a lost illustrated life of the saint by Matthew Paris and was produced in London in connection with Westminster Abbey and Palace 8. The four earliest extant images of the “Veronica” in England probably date from the decade c. 1240–1250 although precise dating is not possible and some of the manuscripts may date closer to 1240 and others to 12509. There are two examples

in the Chronica Maiora of Matthew Paris (Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, mss 16, 26), only that in ms 16 having the accompanying prayers, and both images are assuredly attributable to Matthew Paris [Figs 1, 2], one in an added drawing of c. 1240–1250 with accompanying prayers to a c. 1200 Psalter made for the Benedictines 2

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4

5

6

7

8

9

Richard Vaughan, “The Handwriting of Matthew Paris”, Transactions of the Cambridge Bibliographical Society, i/5 (1953), pp. 376–394 and Idem, Matthew Paris, Cambridge 1958, pp. 225–226, 232–233; George Henderson, “Studies in English Manuscript Illumination, i, ii”, Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes, xxx (1967), pp. 71–137, sp. pp. 71–85; Nigel J. Morgan, Early Gothic Manuscripts i, 1190–1250, Survey of Manuscripts Illuminated in the British Isles, iv.1, London 1982, nos 61, 85; George Henderson, ”Studies in English Manuscript Illumination, i, ii”, in George Henderson, Studies in English Bible Illustration, ii, London 1985, pp. 73–151, sp. pp. 73–87; Nigel J. Morgan, Early Gothic Manuscripts ii, 1250–1285, Survey of Manuscripts Illuminated in the British Isles, iv.2, London 1988, nos. 95, 96, 123, and “Matthew Paris, St Albans, London and the Leaves of the ‘Life of St Thomas Becket’”, Burlington Magazine, cxxx (1988), pp. 85–96; Nigel J. Morgan, Michelle Brown, The Lambeth Apocalypse. Manuscript 209 in Lambeth Palace Library, London 1990, pp. 23–24. Gerhard Wolf, “From Mandylion to Veronica: Picturing the ‘Disembodied’ Face and Disseminating the True Image of Christ in the Latin West”, in The Holy Face (n. 1), pp. 153–179, sp. pp. 166–171; Peter K. Klein, “From the Heavenly to the Trivial: Vision and Visual Perception in Early and High Medieval Apocalypse Illustration”, in ibidem, pp. 247–278, sp. pp. 269–274, Fig. 9. As late as 1988 Janet Backhouse and Christopher de Hamel still perpetuated this discredited theory writing “Matthew Paris apparently supervised book production at his own abbey and probably at Westminster Abbey too [...] prepared under his direction by monks or professional artists in either royal abbey”. Janet Backhouse, Christopher de Hamel, The Becket Leaves, London 1988, p. 18. The illustrated life of St Thomas Becket (J. Paul Getty Collection, Wormsley) probably produced in the 1230s is stylistically in no way connected with Matthew Paris and probably pre-dates any of his artistic activity. On the problems of dating and place of production of this book see Morgan, Early Gothic Manuscripts i (n. 2), pp. 107–108, no. 61, and Morgan, “Matthew Paris, St Albans, London” (n. 2). This is London, bl ms Royal 2.b.vi, a Psalter with calendar and litany of St Albans Abbey, although not illustrated by Matthew it is in a drawing style close to his, and almost certainly made within the Abbey itself. On this Psalter see Morgan, Early Gothic Manuscripts i (n. 2), no. 86. For discussions of Matthew’s involvement in these see Morgan, Early Gothic Manuscripts i (n. 2), nos 85, 87, 88, 89, 91, 92, 93, and Lewis, Art of Matthew Paris (n. 1), pp. 15–33, 377–438, 441–442. In Morgan, “Matthew Paris, St Albans, London” (n. 2) I attempted to argue that the original text and illustrations of the model for this manuscript might not be by Matthew Paris, but am now convinced by Binski’s arguments that both are due to him. Paul Binski, “Reflections on La estoire de Seint Aedward le Rei: Hagiography and Kingship in thirteenth century England”, Journal of Medieval History, xvi (1990), pp. 335–350; Martin R. Kauffmann, Hagiography, Pictorial Narrative and the Politics of Kingship: Studies in the Matthew Paris’ Lives and Illustrations to the Life of Saint Louis, PhD thesis, (University of London), London 1992. Some have considered the image in the Psalter, London, bl ms Arundel 157, as the earliest but no more precise dating than c. 1240–1250 can be given. All but that in Cambridge, Corpus Christi Coll. 26 have the accompanying prayers of the Office of the Holy Face, but with slightly different text contents. For a general study of this Office and its variant forms see Solange Corbin, “Les Offices de la Sainte Face”, Bulletin des études portugaises, xi (1947), pp. 1–65, sp. pp. 17, 19, 27–29. Corbin was not aware of all the English thirteenth-century examples. As these all have slightly different text content I have reconstructed the full text of the Office in an Appendix to this article, and also the texts of the indulgence offered by Pope Innocent iii for recitation of the Office while contemplating the image.

1 / Veronica Head of Christ and Office of the Holy Face, Matthew Paris, Chronica Maiora, c. 1240–1250 / Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, ms 16, fol. 53v 2 / Veronica Head of Christ, Matthew Paris, Chronica Maiora, c. 1240–1250 / Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, ms 26, fol. viir

3 / Veronica Head of Christ and Office of the Holy Face, Psalter, c. 1240–1250 / London, bl ms Royal 2 a.xxii, fol. 221v

of Westminster Abbey (London, bl ms Royal 2 a. xxii) assuredly not by Matthew Paris [Fig. 3], and another, also with accompanying prayers, in a section added c. 1240–1250 to a c. 1210 Psalter for the use of Augustinian Canons (London, bl ms Arundel 157) which by the 1240s had passed into Benedictine hands, also assuredly not by Matthew Paris [Fig. 4] 10. From the 1250s, there is a Veronica Holy Face with accompanying prayers in the Evesham Psalter (London, bl ms Add. 44874) made for the Benedictine Abbey of Evesham [Fig. 5], from the 1260s with accompanying prayers in the Lambeth Apocalypse (London, Lambeth Palace, ms 209) made for Eleanor de Quincy, Countess of Winchester [Fig. 6], and from the Sarum Missal of the London diocese (Paris, Bibl. Arsenal 135) [Fig. 7], and finally from the 1270s in a Psalter with accompanying prayers made for the Benedictine Cathedral priory of Norwich (London, Lambeth Palace 368) [Fig. 8] 11. A special case of a representation of the “Veronica” head is in a narrative image illustrating the one of the commentary illustrations in the Gulbenkian Apocalypse (Lisbon, Museu Gulbenkian, l.a. 139) of c. 127012. That is nine examples in total in manuscripts to which can be added a tenth on the opus anglicanum Ascoli Piceno embroidered cope of the late 1260s or early 1270s [Fig. 9], a gift to or a commission from either Pope Clement iv (1265–1268) or Pope Gregory x (1271–1276)13. There is one additional intended thirteenth-century image with the accompanying prayers in a Psalter for the Augustinian canons of Guisborough (Oxford, Bodleian Library, ms Laud Lat. 5) of c. 1280 which contains the Office of 10 On these, see Morgan, Early Gothic Manuscripts i (n. 2), nos 24, 88, and Morgan, Early Gothic Manuscripts ii (n. 2), no. 1; Lewis, Art of Matthew Paris (n. 1), pp. 127, 489 n. 200, misattributed the image in Arundel 157 to Matthew Paris – “a hand unmistakably that of Matthew Paris”. She also considered the text below and on the opposite page to be written by Matthew – “Matthew’s early small fastidious script”, but I do not agree with this. This misattribution, also made in Otto Pächt, “The ‘Avignon Diptych’ and its Eastern Ancestry”, in De artibus opuscula xl: Essays in Honor of Erwin Panofsky, Millard Meiss ed., New York 1961, pp. 402–421, sp. pp. 405–407. Fig. 21, has caused subsequent confusion as in Il Volto di Cristo, catalogue of the exhibition (Milan, Palazzo dello Esposizioni / Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, 9 December – 16 April 2001), Giovanni Morello, Gerhard Wolf eds, Milan 2000, p. 117; Sand, Vision (n. 1), pp. 38–41. It seems to me incredible that anybody could consider the Arundel 157 to be in the drawing style of Matthew Paris. Alexa Sand, in her otherwise good discussion of English Veronica images in the thirteenth century, goes so far as to attribute the image tradition as stemming from Matthew Paris: see p. 65, “the bust-length type popularized by Matthew Paris”.

11 Morgan, Early Gothic Manuscripts ii (n. 2), pp. 49, 76–78, 101–106, 185–186, nos. 111, 126, 181. For the London provenance of the Missal, Arsenal 135, see Christopher Hohler, “Reflections on Some Manuscripts Containing 13th-Century Polyphony”, Journal of the Plainsong and Medieval Music Society, i (1978), pp. 2–38, sp. pp. 25–28. 12 The Gulbenkian Apocalypse image is within a narrative image and is therefore quite separate in iconographic context from the isolated “iconic” images associated with the Office of the Holy Face. As it is a special case it will not be discussed in this article, but see Morgan, Early Gothic Manuscripts ii (n. 2), pp. 108–110, no. 128, and Nigel J. Morgan et al., Apocalipsis Gulbenkian, Barcelona 2002, pp. 144–147, 262–263. 13 On the Ascoli Piceno cope, see Rosalia Bonito Fanelli, Il pievale duecentesco di Ascoli Piceno: storia e restauro, Florence 1991; English Medieval Embroidery Opus Anglicanum, catalogue of the exhibition (London, Victoria and Albert Museum, October 2016 – February 2017), Clare Browne, Glyn Davies, Michael A. Michael eds, New Haven 2016, pp. 144–146, n. 22; Nigel J. Morgan, “Some Iconographic Aspects of Opus Anglicanum”, in The Age of Opus Anglicanum, Michael A. Michael ed., London/Turnhout 2016, pp. 86–111, sp. pp. 22, 100–101, Figs 1, 21.

4 / Veronica Head of Christ and Office of the Holy Face, Psalter, c. 1240–1250 / London, bl ms Arundel 157, fol. 2r (detail on p. 90)

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the Holy Face leaving a space for the image which was only filled at a later date by a crude drawing of the Holy Face in the late fourteenth or fifteenth centuries14. To these images can be added a 1290 seal of Peter of Chester which has the “Veronica” head, (pro dl 25/1904)15. Matthew Paris has been considered the source of these Veronica images but, even though his images are among the earliest, it will be argued that the English version of the image in Rome may have originated at Westminster Abbey which provided Matthew with a pictorial source rather than vice-versa. Whether either Westminster Abbey or Matthew Paris had any drawing or painted image from Rome giving them a prototype image is of course a matter of speculation. Did the English artists perhaps invent images of the Holy Face or did they have a model which established an iconographic tradition? If there was a model, did it derive from the Veronica relic itself or was it from some other icon of the Holy Face in Rome? These questions have not been sufficiently raised before and are the basis of the discussion presented in this paper16. The English Veronica images of the period c. 1240–1280 differ in several details between themselves and these differences of course may result from creative interpretations by different artists, only the two by Matthew Paris, which differ slightly, being by the same artist. An essential question to ask is whether these various images are in an iconographic tradition deriving from a single prototype or whether some are independent creations. There is no evidence to date the two by Matthew with any precision, or even to know which is the earliest, save that it is generally accepted that both were made at some time in the 1240s. One is on a page of coloured drawings in the first volume of his Chronica Maiora (Cambridge, Corpus 26) which covers the period up to the annals for 1188, but there is no reason to consider that the page of coloured drawings was included in the ms at the time of completion of its text [Fig. 2]. Also the purpose and intention of this page of drawings which resembles pages in “model-book” compilations of drawings such as that of his contemporary, Villard de Honnecourt, has to be questioned17. Were they fair copies of

drawings made by Matthew from other works of art, possibly wall or panel paintings, perhaps seen elsewhere? As a Benedictine monk, Paris 14 Morgan, Early Gothic Manuscripts ii (n. 2), p. 178, no. 175. 15 Elizabeth A. New, “Christological Personal Seals and Christocentric Devotion in Later Medieval England and Wales”, Antiquaries Journal, lxxxii (2002), pp. 47–68, sp. p. 58, Fig. 7. 16 Exceptions are Lewis, “Veronica” (n. 1), p. 102 who does question whether some of the English “Veronica” images, such as Arundel 157, derive from the established English iconographic traditions of busts of Christ, and also Lewis, Art of Matthew Paris (n. 1), in her discussion of these images on pp. 128–129. 17 Hans R. Hahnloser, Villard de Honnecourt. Kritische Gesamtausgabe des Bauhüttenbuches ms fr 19093 der Pariser Nationalbibliothek, Graz 1972. Paul Binski has suggested that Matthew assembled these three images together as a theological and devotional statement for contemplation, and that the “Veronica”head may not be intended as such; Paul Binski, “The Faces of Christ in Matthew Paris’s Chronica Maiora”, in Tributes in Honor of James H. Marrow. Studies in Painting and Manuscript Illumination of the Late Middle Ages and Northern Renaissance, Jeffrey F. Hamburger, Anne S. Korteweg eds, London/ Turnhout 2006, pp. 85–92.

5 / Veronica Head of Christ and Office of the Holy Face, c. 1250–1260 / London, bl ms Add. 44874, fol. 6v

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spent most of his life enclosed in the Abbey of St Albans, but on occasions visited another Benedictine house, Westminster Abbey in London18. His second “Veronica” head is a framed picture within the text of the second volume of his Chronica maiora which covers the period from 1186 to 1253 (Corpus 16) [Fig. 1]. The head of Christ is on a separate piece of vellum pasted in the chronicle, but obviously purpose-made because it is approximately the size of the column width of the text. It accompanies the annals from 1216 in which Matthew records: “Pope Innocent iii […] carried the image of the face of the Lord which is called the Veronica from the Church of St Peter to the Hospital of the Holy Spirit. That having been done, the effigy while standing in its place, turned around upon itself and was reversed in such a way that the forehead was below and the beard above. Very much taken aback, the pope sadly believed that a foreboding prophecy had occurred, and in order that he might be reconciled to God, on the advice of his brothers he composed an elegant prayer in honour of this effigy called the “Veronica”19. This prayer (or Office of the Holy Face), known in full from other manuscripts, begins on the third line below the image but in heavily abbreviated form with only part of the first versicle given. The full text of the verse is “Signatum est super nos lumen vultus tui Domine Deus dedisti leticiam in corde meo” (Ps 4, 7). There seems little doubt that Matthew Paris is likely to have copied this from a manuscript in which the image and the text were an integral unit. There are differences between the Veronica heads in the two volumes of the Chronica which suggests they either derived from two sources, one perhaps from a panel or wall painting and the other more likely from a manuscript with the text of the Office of the Holy Face beside it, or that both were invented by Matthew as independent images. The “Veronica” Head and Office in Arundel 157 was added c. 1240–1250, perhaps nearer to c. 1240 [Fig. 4], as a bifolium to a much earlier Psalter of c. 1210 made for Augustinian canons of Oxford, either of St Frideswide’s or Osney20. It is an unfortunate misattribution to Matthew Paris by Otto Pächt and Suzanne Lewis which has been followed

by almost all scholars and subsequently has led to much misunderstanding. Those who have followed this opinion seem never to have made a codicological, palaeographical, and liturgical analysis of the original manuscript. The leaf containing on fol. 1v a Latin rubric concerning the indulgence of Innocent iii faces on fol. 2r the “Veronica” head and accompanying prayers as a bifolium added at the beginning of the manuscript which is part of an adaptation of the book which includes, on fols 132–185, a text section with illumination containing an Office of the Dead, Psalter of the Virgin, and Hours of the Virgin which includes at Lauds a memoria for St Frideswide of Oxford. Although the illumination of the “Veronica” head is by a different artist from that of the added section on fols 132–185, the script is close to that section and it is very likely that both sections were added to the book at the same time, perhaps c. 1240. Suzanne Lewis erroneously ascribed both the “Veronica” head and the script to the hand of Matthew Paris. The head is not in the drawing style of Matthew Paris and the script does not show the unique features of his script (e.g. his form of “g”) which have been analysed in very great detail by Richard Vaughan in his study of Matthew’s handwriting21. Lewis took no account of the liturgical use of the Office of the Virgin Mary and Office of the Dead in the added section at the end of the manuscript. These are not of the use of Augustinian canons as are the calendar and litany of the c. 1210 part, neither are they of the use of St Albans as might be expected if Matthew Paris had been involved in drawing and writing the “Veronica” section22. The Office of the Dead is clearly of Benedictine use 18 Vaughan, Matthew Paris (n. 2), p. 3. 19 For the Latin text, see Henry Richards Luard, Matthæi Parisiensis, monachi Sancti Albani, Chronica Majora, iii, a. d. 1216 to a. d. 1239, London 1876, pp. 7–8; Karl Pearson, Die Fronica: Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte des Christusbildes im Mittelalter, Strassburg 1887, pp. 51–54, 97. For Innocent iii and the cult of the Veronica handkerchief relic in St Peter’s in Rome, see: Christoph Egger,“Papst Innocenz iii. und die Veronica. Geschichte, Theologie, Liturgie und Seelsorge”,in The Holy Face (n. 1), pp. 181–203. 20 The text evidence for this is discussed at length in Morgan, Early Gothic Manuscripts i (n. 2), p. 73, n. 24; Idem, The Munich Golden Psalter, Luzern 2011, pp. 336–340. 21 Vaughan, “The Handwriting of Matthew Paris” (n. 2), where he reconstructs an alphabet of Matthew’s script. I have closely compared the letters with the script in Arundel 157 and cannot conclude that it could be by the hand of Matthew as Suzanne Lewis has claimed. 22 The Office of the Virgin is not at all similar to that in the c. 1530 Office of the Virgin in the c. 1530 printed Breviary of St Albans, London, British Library, c.110.a.27.

6 / Veronica Head of Christ and Office of the Holy Face, c. 1260–1267 / London, Lambeth Palace, ms 209, fol. 53v 7 / Veronica Head of Christ, Sarum Missal, c. 1260–1280 / Paris, Bibliothèque de l’Arsenal, ms 135, fol. 152v

8 / Veronica Head of Christ, Psalter, c. 1270–1280 / London, Lambeth Palace, ms 368, fol. 95v

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with its responsories and versicles to the Matins lessons close to the Benedictine houses of Amesbury, Chester and Fécamp23. The Office of the Virgin has proved unidentifiable but again is closer to Benedictine uses having little resemblance to uses of the Augustinian canons24. Therefore, it has to be concluded that by the time of these additions of c. 1240 to the text of the c. 1210 Psalter of the Augustinian canons of St Frideswide’s Oxford or Osney (just outside of Oxford) the book had evidently passed into Benedictine hands. On fols 167r–173r at the end of Lauds of the Virgin Mary are suffrages for the saints. All are well known saints with only Frideswide, whose relics were at Oxford, among the virgins being a saint more rarely found. The conclusion from the added texts on fols 132–185 is that the book was adapted for a Benedictine house in the region of Oxford, of which there are only two candidates, Abingdon and Eynsham. The Office of the Dead is very close but not identical to that of Abingdon, but the Office of the Virgin is quite unlike, so Abingdon has to be excluded. Unfortunately, no liturgical texts survive from Eynsham for comparison so there can be no proof, but it is suggested that Arundel 157 had passed perhaps to Eynsham and it was there that the “Veronica” bifolium was added. The final remaining “Veronica” head and Office of the 1240s, probably closer to c. 1250, is that in the Westminster Psalter, bl Royal 2 a.xxii. The original manuscript was produced c. 1200 with a calendar

and litany of Westminster Abbey. In the middle years of the thirteenth century on pages originally left blank at the end on fols 219r–221v were added five tinted drawings of a standing king, a kneeling knight, St Christopher, a standing archbishop, and ending with the “Veronica” head of Christ with the accompanying prayers [Fig. 3] 25. These additions must have been made at Westminster Abbey because the Psalter was still there in 1388 when it was listed in an inventory. The drawings are monumental in scale and may have been copied from wall or panel paintings, although the Veronica prayers and perhaps the accompanying image may derive from a manuscript. The style of the heads is very close to the wall paintings in the cloister of Windsor Castle and very probably similar paintings were in Westminster Palace adjacent to the abbey26. From the 1250s there is only the image in a Benedictine Psalter made for the abbot of Evesham (Worcestershire) with a calendar and litany of the abbey [Fig. 5] 27. The “Veronica” head with accompanying prayers is placed on the verso of a fullpage miniature of the Crucifixion with the abbot kneeling at the foot of the cross. From the 1260s the image is in a set of pictures of saints, the life of St John the Evangelist, and miracles of the Virgin supplementary to an illustrated Apocalypse made c. 1263–1267 for Eleanor de Quincy, Countess of Winchester and ending with the “Veronica” head and accompanying prayers [Fig. 6] 28. There is no certainty where this Apocalypse was made, but London has been suggested29. From the 1270s there is a drawing of the Head of Christ without accompanying prayers in a Sarum Missal with supplements of the Diocese of London in its calendar placed at the end of the Ordinary of the Mass [Fig. 7] 30. The London aspects of the text suggest the Missal was made there. Also from that decade comes a full-page painting with prayers on the opposite page placed before psalm 109 in the Psalter made for the Benedictines of Norwich cathedral priory [Fig. 8] 31. The somewhat provincial style of the illumination may suggest that this psalter was made in Norwich itself. There are significant iconographic differences between the ten “Veronica” heads surviving from thirteenth-century England. If the artists were

deriving their image from a single model, as some scholars have suggested, then these differences are significant32. In view of the iconic status of images from paintings in Rome it might be expected that an English artist would faithfully copy any drawing or painting that had come to England claiming to represent the appearance of the image on the relic of Veronica’s handkerchief. If any of these artists only knew text accounts of the impression of Christ’s head on the handkerchief of Veronica then they might invent an appropriate image. The various forms are: (1) as a bust with head and full shoulders in Arundel 157; (2) as head with only the upper parts of the shoulders in Corpus 16, Corpus 26, Evesham, Lambeth 209, Arsenal 135 (on the right the shoulder extended); (3) as head and neck only in Royal 2.a.xxii, Lambeth 368, the Gulbenkian Apocalypse, the Ascoli Piceno cope and the 1290 seal. In Rome, the Sancta Sanctorum Holy Face as framed by Innocent iii’s cover of the early thirteenth century showed the head and neck only as evidenced by the early fourteenth-century copy of this at Palombara Sabina, San Biagio Vescovo e Martire [Fig. 10] 33. At times when the cover of the Sancta Sanctorum image was under conservation, photographs have been taken after the temporary removal of the Renaissance and baroque accretions revealing an appearance very close to that in the Palombara Sabina copy34. Insomuch as these can be seen as deriving from an image prototype obtained as a drawing or painting from Rome, the image in Arundel 157 in contrast could perhaps come independently from the established tradition in earlier English art of a bust of Christ. However, the bust form of the head of Christ with full or upper shoulders in Rome was a tradition established in the Early Christian period and in the thirteenth century would most famously be the Holy Face in the now completely remade apse mosaic of San Giovanni in Laterano35. Gervase of Tilbury in his Otia Imperialia, written after 1214, reports the Veronica image “in St Peter’s basilica near the door on the right-hand side of the entrance” as “a figure from the chest upwards” which suggests it may have been a bust, but evidently included the shoulders36. Giraldus 23 See Knud Ottosen, The Responsories and Versicles of the Latin Office of the Dead, Aarhus 1993, pp. 146–147. He erroneously claims the Office of

the Dead is of St Frideswide’s, Oxford, evidently basing this conclusion on the earlier c. 1210 ownership of the Psalter. Ottosen’s Responsory Catalogue indicates it is also related to St Albans, but he fails to include the versicles, and the Arundel 157 versicle for the ninth lesson of Matins is Dies illa whereas at St Albans it is Clamantes et dicentes. 24 The late Erik Drigsdahl (d. 2015) in an online website on uses of Hours of the Virgin regrettably no longer available erroneously claimed, for the same reason as Ottosen, that the use was of St Frideswide’s Oxford. 25 Morgan, Early Gothic Manuscripts ii (n. 2), pp. 49–50, n. 95, ills 1–5. See also Paul Binski, Westminster Abbey and the Plantagenets: Kingship and the Representation of Power 1200-1400, New Haven 1995, p. 81. 26 On the paintings at Windsor castle see Ernest W. Tristram, English Medieval Wall Painting. The Thirteenth Century, Oxford 1950, pp. 622–623, pls 26–27, suppl. pl. 18. 27 Morgan, Early Gothic Manuscripts ii (n. 2), pp. 76–78, no. 111. 28 Ibidem, pp. 101–106, no. 126; Morgan/Brown, Lambeth Apocalypse (n. 2), pp. 67–70, 260, for a full discussion of the image and prayer. 29 Morgan/Brown, Lambeth Apocalypse (n. 2), pp. 73–82 for discussion of the patron and place of production. 30 The textual problems of this Missal are discussed by Hohler, “Reflections on some manuscripts” (n. 11), pp. 25–28. The image of the Holy Face has not previously been published. 31 Morgan, Early Gothic Manuscripts ii (n. 2), pp. 185–186, no. 181. 32 Lewis, Art of Matthew Paris (n. 1), pp. 127–128, seems to imply that they all derive from Matthew Paris’s images. 33 Morello/Wolf, Volto di Cristo (n. 10), pp. 56, 61. 34 Marina Di Berardo, “Roma Suntuaria: Note in margine al rivestimento argenteo dell’acheropita lateranense”, Annali della Scuola Normale Superiore di Pisa. Classe di Lettere e Filosofia, iii/24 (1994), pp. 661–681, pl. ccxxxii; Francesco Paganini, “Dalla seta all’argento: nuove ipotesi sul rivestimento dell’acheropita lateranense”, Arte Cristiana, ciii/891 (2015), pp. 401–416, sp .p. 403, Fig. 2. There is also a photograph of Innocent iii’s cover without its later additions in Giuseppe Wilpert, “L’Acheropita ossia l’immagine del Salvatore nella cappella del Sancta Sanctorum”, L’Arte. Archivio storico dell’arte, x (1907), pp. 161–177, 247–262, sp. p. 175, Fig. 9; Serena Romano, “L’icône acheiropoiete du Latran. Fonction d’une image absente”, in Art, Cérémonial et Liturgie au Moyen Âge, Nicolas Bock et al. eds, Rome 2002, pp. 301–314, Fig. 1 opposite p. 314, where the nimbed head is surrounded by gold stars as in the Palombara Sabina copy. The Sancta Sanctorum and Palombara Sabina images are also discussed by Kirstin Noreen, “Revealing the Sacred: The Icon of Christ in the Sancta Sanctorum, Rome”, Word and Image, xxii/3 (2006), pp. 228–237; Kirstin Noreen, “Re-Covering Christ in Late Medieval Rome: The Icon of Christ in the Sancta Sanctorum”, Gesta, xlix/2, pp. 117–135. 35 Rainer Warland, Das Brustbild Christi: Studien zur spätantiken und frühbyzantinischen Bildgeschichte, Römische Quartalschrift, suppl. xli, Rome 1986, pp. 31–41, 70, 92, 96, 141, 212, figs 15, 19, for the Early Christian tradition and for the San Giovanni in Laterano mosaic image before its drastic restoration after 1886. See also Pächt, “The ‘Avignon Diptych’” (n. 10), pp. 407–408, on this type of a bust of Christ in Rome. 36 S. E. Banks, J. W. Binns, Gervase of Tilbury Otia Imperialia: Recreation for an Emperor, Oxford 2002, pp. 606–607. Gervase also mentions the Holy Face in the Sancta Sanctorum in the Lateran Palace. His texts on both images are analyzed in detail by Vinni Lucherini, “Gervasio di Tilbury, Giraldo di Barri e il Salvatore lateranense: una nuova proposta interpretativa sulla funzione delle teste tagliate”, RolSa, Rivista on line di Storia dell’arte, i (2009), pp. 7–32, pp. 8–132; Vinni Lucherini, “L’immagine del Salvatore nel Sancta Sanctorum a Roma e il concetto di ’Uronica’”, in Il potere dell’arte nel medioevo. Studi in onore di Mario d’Onofrio, Manuela Gianandrea, Francesco Gangemi, Carlo Costantini eds, Saggi di storia dell’arte, xl (2014), pp. 107–118, sp. pp. 8–13. Edgar Breitenbach, “The Tree of Bigamy and the Veronica Image of St Peter’s”, Art Institute of Chicago Museum Studies, ix (1978), pp. 30–38, sp. pp. 36–37, went so far as to suggest that the “Veronica” Head of Christ might have been transmitted to England by Gervase of Tilbury on one of his diplomatic visits to England when in the service of the Emperor Otto iv. Sand, Vision (n. 1), p. 38, considered that Matthew Paris was familiar with the Otia Imperialia and created the bust image in Arundel 157 (not by him as explained earlier) from Gervase’s text. On the appearance and location of the Veronica image in St Peter’s at the time of Gervase see Ann van Dijk, “The Veronica, the Vultus Christi and the Veneration of Icons in Medieval Rome”, in Old St Peter’s, Rome, Rosamund McKitterick et al. eds, Cambridge 2013, pp. 229–256, sp. pp. 237–242.

9 / Veronica Head of Christ, Ascoli Piceno cope, c. 1265–1276

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Cambrensis, who also saw the Veronica image, with Westminster Abbey and Palace is likely. If, reports in his Speculum Ecclesie of c. 1215 that “No as seems likely, the “Veronica” image derived one can see it except through the veil hanging in from a drawing or painting with accompanying front of it”, so presumably Gervase of Tilbury was text brought to England from Rome, then this privileged to look beneath the veil37. The Head of picture very probably came to Westminster AbChrist showing just the head and neck, which is bey or Palace, and derived from the image of the essentially a new form in thirteenth-century En- Holy Face in the Sancta Sanctorum rather than of gland, is very similar to the appearance of the Holy the Veronica handkerchief relic in St Peter’s. The Face of the Sancta Sanctorum after it was isolated “Veronica” image and text, as has been argued, from all the remaining form of the seated Christ by seems more likely to disseminate from Westminthe gilt-silver cover ordered by Innocent iii c. 121538. ster rather than St Albans. As a counterpart to the The Sancta Sanctorum image is also described by abandonment of the idea of Matthew Paris and Gervase of Tilbury in his Otia imperialia but in the his supposed workshop of artists, the so-called form with a cloth over the figure placed by Pope “School of St Albans”, as being at the centre of Alexander iii (1159–1181), and he must have seen English art in the middle years of the thirteenth it before Innocent iii’s gold and silver cover was century, similarly the view of him and St Albans placed over the image c. 121539. as the fons et origo of the “Veronica” image and The head with only the upper part of the text should be reconsidered. shoulders could be seen as the Matthew Paris 37 John Sherren Brewer, Giraldi Cambrensis Opera, London 1873, p.  279. St Albans Abbey image tradition, and the head Giraldus’s text is discussed by Lucherini, “Gervasio di Tilbury” (n. with the neck only from the Westminster Abbey 36), pp. 13–19, and Lucherini,“L’immagine del Salvatore”(n. 36), pp. 110–114. It should be noted that before Innocent iii had the silver image tradition. Of course, it is quite possible cover placed over the Sancta Sanctorum image it too had a silk cloth that an artist added shoulders to the head and covering it put in place by Pope Alexander iii. On this see Paganini, “Dalla seta all’argento” (n. 34). neck only image, and this may well have been 38 On the image in the Sancta Sanctorum, see: Wilpert, “L’Acheropita” (n. 34); Maria Andaloro, “L’Acheropita”, in Carlo Pietrangethe case with Matthew Paris, who could have li, Il Palazzo Apostolico Lateranense, Florence 1991, pp. 80–89; Di adapted the Westminster image showing the neck Berardo, “Roma Suntuaria” (n. 34); Morello/Wolf, Volto di Cristo (n. 10), pp. 36–45, 51–52; Gino Zaninotto, “L’Acheropoita del only in this way. Certainly, Matthew quite often SS. Salvatore nel Sancta Sanctorum del Laterano”,in Le icone di Cristo visited Westminster Abbey and it is entirely plaue la Sindone, Lamberto Coppini, Francesco Cavazziuti eds, Milan 2000, pp. 164–180; Enrico Parlato, “Le icone in processione”, in Arte sible that he gained knowledge of both the image e iconografia a Roma dal tardo antico alla fine del medioevo, Maria Anda40 and accompanying prayers there . It should be loro, Serena Romano eds, Milano 2002, pp. 55–72, 201–203; Romano, “L’icône acheiropoiete du Latran”(n. 34); Nino Zchomelidse,“The Aura noted that all the early images in England with of the Numinous and its Reproduction: Medieval Paintings of the the single exceptions of the Lambeth Apocalypse Savior in Rome and Latium”, Memoirs of the American Academy in Rome, lv (2010), pp. 221–263. See also additional references in n. 34, and Arsenal Missal, both almost certainly made 36. The panel painting of the seated Christ was completely covered by Innocent iii’s cover except for the head and neck. The original in London, are in books belonging to English figure, now almost completely illegible, of the seated Christ is of the Benedictines of St Albans, Westminster, Eveshform found on the panels of Sutri and Tivoli. On these, see: Wolfgang F. Volbach,“Il Cristo di Sutri e la venerazione del SS. Salvatore am, Norwich, and the unidentifiable Benedicnel Lazio”,Rendiconti della Pontificia Accademia Romana di Archeologia, tine house, possibly Eynsham near Oxford, of the xvii (1940/41), pp. 97–126. Another problem with the discussion of English thirteenth-century Veronica images in Sand, Vision (n.1), is added image to Arundel 157. The Ascoli Piceno that she fails to make the important distinction between the bust cope, possibly a commission of Henry iii or Edtype and the head and neck type. 39 Banks/Binns, Otia Imperialia (n. 35), pp. 606–607. ward i for Pope Clement iv (1265–1268) or Pope 40 Vaughan, Matthew Paris (n. 2), p. 3, for Matthew Paris’s presence at Gregory x (1271–1276), was very probably made in Westminster on October 13, 1247, the feast of St Edward the Confessor. It may well have been at that time that he saw the Westminster London, and if it was a royal commission as a gift “Veronica” image and copied it and its accompanying text which he subsequently reproduced in his Chronica Maiora. from Henry iii or Edward i to the pope a link

summary

10 / Copy of the Central Part of the Acheropita Reliquary Triptych of the Sancta Sanctorum, Palombara Sabina, S. Biagio, c. 1300

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appendix Reconstruction of Full Text of the Indulgence and Office of the Holy Face in ThirteenthCentury English Manuscripts None of the English mss contains the full text of the Office of the Holy Face, but a combination of the various incomplete or highly abbreviated readings in Add 44874, Arundel 157, Corpus 16, Lambeth 209, Lambeth 368, Laud Lat. 5 and Royal 2 a.xxii enables the complete office to be reconstructed41. Also, the indulgence rubrics in Anglo-Norman and Latin in Corpus 16, Laud lat. 5 and Lambeth 368, only that of Corpus 16 already having been published, have been included. In Corpus 16 the image of the Veronica Head of Christ and the Office are commented upon by Matthew Paris. Directly above the image is the text: “Many people therefore commit this prayer with its memoriae to memory, and so that a greater devotion may inflame them they make images in this way”42. He precedes the Office with the words Signans se igitur homo dicat which of course indicates its private devotional function instructing the reader to first sign himself with the cross43. Office of the Holy Face Vers. Signatum est super nos lumen vultus tui Domine: dedisti leticiam in corde meo (Ps. 4 v. 7). Ps. Deus misereatur nostri (Ps. 66 in toto). Gloria Patri. Kyrieleison. Christeleison. Kyrieleison. Pater noster. Et ne nos inducas in tentationem sed libera nos a malo. Vers. Fac mecum signum in bono ut videant qui oderunt me et confundantur: quoniam tu Domine adiuvisti me et consolatus es me (Ps. 85 v. 17). Vers. Tibi dixit cor meum exquisivit te facies mea faciem tuam Domine requiram (Ps. 26 v. 8). Vers. Quaerite Dominum et confirmamini quaerite faciem ejus semper (Ps. 104 v. 4). Vers. Ora pro nobis beata Veronica. Resp. Ut digni efficiamur promissionibus Christi. Vers. Domine exaudi orationem meam (Ps. 101 v. 1). Resp. Et clamor meus ad te veniat (Ps. 101 v. 1). Vers. Domine Deus virtutum converte nos et ostende faciem tuam et salvi erimus (Ps. 79 v. 20). Dominus vobiscum. Et cum spiritu tuo. Oratio. Deus qui nobis signatis lumine vultus tui memoriale tuum ad instantiam Veronice sudario impressam ymaginem relinquere voluisti. Per passionem et crucem tuam tribue nobis quaesumus ut nunc in terris per speculum et in enigmate adorare venerari et honorare ipsam imaginem tuam valeamus ut facie ad faciem venientem iudicem te securi super nos videamus. Per Dominum nostrum Ihesum Christum qui vivis et regnas cum Deo Patre in unitate Spiritus Sancti Deus per omnia secula seculorum. Amen. Indulgences

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In his valuable book on indulgences in late medieval England, Robert Swanson surprisingly, in view of its importance, gives very little information about the indulgence for reciting prayers before the “Veronica” head44.

Arundel 157, f. 1v Hec oracio composita est in honore effigiei vultus Dominici que Rome habita Veronica nuncupatur. Et sortitur tale nomen ex quadam muliere sic vocata. Ad cuius instantiam ipse Dominus dum ad crucis patibulum duceretur istam fecit impressionem. Et sciendum quod dicenti hanc oracionem decem dierum ex auctoritate apostolica conceditur indulgentia et quotienscunque iteratur tantundem iterate conceditur indulgentie. Et ut animus dicentis devocius excitetur facies salvatoris per industriam artificis expresse figuratur45. Corpus 16, f. 53v Dominus papa ... in honore ipsius effigiei quae Veronica dicitur, quandam orationem composuit elegantem; cui adjecit quendum psalmum cum quibusdam versiculis et eadem dicentibus decem dierum concessit indulgentiam, ita scilicet, ut quotienscunque repetatur, totiens dicenti tantumdem indulgentiae concedatur. Multi igitur eandem orationem cum pertinentiis memoriae commendarunt, et ut eos major accenderet devotio picturis effigiarunt hoc modo. Lambeth 368, f. 96r Li apostoile Innocent fit icest confirmament a tuz iceus ki cest oreisun dient en bon entenciun: quarante jurs de pardun averunt ki chescun jor le dira46; deus cent jurs e quarante la semeine i ad de rente. Laud Lat. 5, f. 10v Li apostoile Innocent a duné, e graunté, e de sa bulle confermé quaraunt jurs de pardun chescun jurs; ceo est asaver deus cenz e quater47 jurs la semayne a touz iceus que cest oraisun o la psalme dirunt cheascun48 jurs devotement devaunt la croiz. 41 For a version derived from Matthew Paris, but expanding the text, see Corbin, “Les Offices de la Sainte Face”(n. 9), pp. 28–29. 42 For the Latin text see Luard, Matthæi Parisiensis, monachi Sancti Albani, Chronica Majora, iii (n. 19), p. 7; Clark, “Venerating the Veronica” (n. 1), pp. 176, 185 n. 21, makes the perceptive comment: “Yet, the Chronica makes clear that his picture is not an attempted record of the Roman sudarium; it is an attempted record of the popular activity of making images for devotional practice”. One might add that Matthew’s comment also implies that he was aware that the devotional practice of viewing the Veronica image while reciting the prayers was already established in England in the 1240s when he was writing this section of his chronicle. 43 The verb “signare” had been used from the Early Middle Ages onward to mean to sign with the cross. 44 Robert N. Swanson, Indulgences in Late Medieval England, Cambridge 2007, pp. 257–259, 269. 45 This text is very damaged and difficult to read in parts. I am very grateful to Dr Berthold Kress for helping me to make an accurate transcription, correcting some of my mistakes. 46 I am very grateful to Dr Daron Burrows for checking my transcriptions from the Anglo-Norman. He has pointed out that it should be “dirunt”in order to agree with “averunt”, rather than “dira”which the scribe wrote. 47 The scribe should have written “quaraunt”. 48 The scribe should have written “chescun” or “chascun” but evidently uncertain of the spelling wrote “cheascun”.

summary

Veraikony a oficium Svaté Tváře v Anglii třináctého století

V posledních šedesáti letech přehodnotili někteří badatelé roli, již v umělecké produkci Anglie třináctého století sehrál tzv. Matthew Paris, benediktinský mnich z opatství sv. Albana. Podle dřívějších teorií řídil tento mnich práce klášterních i soukromých iluminátorů ve svém opatství, jejichž dílna byla označována jako „škola sv. Albana“. Tato teorie však ustoupila názoru, že téměř všechny malby a kresby připisované škole sv. Albana byly dílem profesionálních umělců pocházejících většinou z Londýna. Podobnost Parisova stylu s pracemi těchto profesionálů lze tedy vysvětlit spíše tím, že si Matthew Paris osvojil jejich způsob kresby, než aby tomu bylo naopak. Tento názor zastávali Richard Vaughan v roce 1958, George Henderson v roce 1967 a v osmdesátých letech jej dále rozvedl autor tohoto článku Nigel Morgan. Navzdory přehodnocení role Matthewa Parise

se i ve dvacátém prvním století řada badatelů stále přiklání k původní hypotéze „školy sv. Albana“. V první části článku Nigel Morgan předkládá argumenty pro odmítnutí Matthewa Parise jako fons et origo anglických variací Veraikonu a jako možný zdroj těchto vyobrazení navrhuje namísto kláštera sv. Albana Westminsterské opatství. Ve druhé části autor dále navrhuje, že původ těchto anglických Veraikonů je pravděpodobně odvozen z obrazu v Sancta Sanctorum, a ne přímo z Veraikonu v bazilice sv. Petra. Podle Morgana by jejich inspirací mohla být kresba či malba vyhotovená podle obrazu v Sancta Sanctorum, přivezená z Říma do Westminsteru. Od třináctého století do dnešních dnů sice obraz v Sancta Sanctorum prošel řadou změn, nicméně jeho tehdejší podobu lze odvodit od kopie ze čtrnáctého století v Palombara Sabina.

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II.

The Devotion and Cult of the Veronica

Abstract – Signatis... vultus tui: (Re)impressing the Holy Face before and after the European Cult of the Veronica From the outset, the Veronica was framed as an impressed image of the Holy Face, a treatment that contributed to the Roman relic’s auratic status as a cult object and encouraged, if not demanded, its replication and dissemination in the form of images and objects. This essay explores how the Veronica was itself authorized by and functioned in a long, far-reaching medieval tradition of (re)impressing Christ’s face in the lowrelief forms of coins, seals, communion wafers, and méreaux (tokens). Materially instantiating the trope of the sacred impression, such objects reveal how people in the Middle Ages actively participated in the project of re-impressing the Holy Face, thus establishing a material and conceptual tradition conducive to the thirteenth-century explosion of the Veronica’s cult and its enduring vitality into the early modern period. Keywords Veronica, Holy Face, indexicality, coin, seal, Eucharist, token, méreau, impression, stamp Aden Kumler University of Chicago [email protected] 102

Signatis... vultus tui: (Re)impressing the Holy Face before and after the European Cult of the Veronica1 Aden Kumler

Introduction The Veronica, the sudarium thought to preserve the impressed trace of Christ’s visage2, enjoys a quasi-paradigmatic status in art historical accounts of European images made by indexical means, not least early modern prints3. The analogic association of the Veronica and printed images has an excellent provenance: as Charles Talbot put it, “[...] the analogy between the Sudarium and the nature of prints was not overlooked by those artists who made woodcuts and engravings of the pained face of Christ as if it were beheld 1

This essay has benefited from the other papers and lively discussions that animated the conference on The European Fortune of the Roman Veronica in the Middle Ages convened by Amanda Murphy at Magdalene College, University of Cambridge in 2016. I am grateful to Amanda Murphy and to Herbert L. Kessler for their kind invitation to take part in the conference, to my fellow participants for their questions and instructive comments, and to the two anonymous reviewers for Convivium for their generous critiques and suggestions.

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Throughout this essay I employ “the Veronica”to refer to the Roman relic rather than the saint and her cult. From a vast literature, with further bibliographic references: Joseph Koerner, The Moment of Self-Portraiture in German Renaissance Art, Chicago/London 1993, pp. 80–126; Lisa Pon, A Printed Icon in Early Modern Italy: Forlì’s Madonna of the Fire, Cambridge 2015, pp. 39–79; David S. Areford, The Viewer and the Printed Image in Late Medieval Europe, Farnham/Burlington 2010, pp. 9–16, 238–257; David S. Areford, “Multiplying the Sacred: The Fifteenth-Century Woodcut as Reproduction, Surrogate, Simulation”, Studies in the History of Art (Symposium Papers lii: The Woodcut in Fifteenth-Century Europe), lxxv (2009), pp. 119–153; Jeffrey Hamburger, “’In gebeden vnd in bilden geschriben’: Prints as Exemplars of Piety and the Culture of the Copy in Fifteenth-Century Germany”, Studies in the History of Art (Symposium Papers lii: The Woodcut in Fifteenth-Century Europe), lxxv (2009), pp. 154–189; Suzanne Karr, “Marginal Devotions: A Newly Acquired Veronica Woodcut”, Yale University Art Gallery Bulletin (2002), pp. 99–103; Gerhard Wolf, Schleier und Spiegel: Traditionen des Christusbildes und die Bildkonzepte der Renaissance, Munich 2002, pp. 316–324; Elina Gertsman, “Multiple Impressions: Christ in the Winepress and the Semiotics of the Printed Image”, Art History, xxxvi/2 (2013), pp. 310–337, Herbert L. Kessler, “Face and Firmament: Dürer’s An Angel with the Sudarium and the Limit of Vision”, in L’immagine di Cristo dall’acheropita alla mano d’artista: Dal tardo medioevo all’età barocca, Christoph L. Frommel, Gerhard Wolf eds, Vatican City 2006, pp. 143–165. On auratic indexicality in the early modern period, see Christopher S. Wood, Forgery, Replica, Fiction: Temporalities of German Renaissance Art, Chicago 2008.

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1 / Hans Schlaffer of Ulm, The Sudarium, hand-colored woodcut; block: 25.7 x 19.4 cm; sheet: 28.1 x 20.6 cm., 1470–1475 / Metropolitan Museum of Art, Harris Brisbane Dick Fund 1941 (Acc. No. 41.47).

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upon the veil”4 [Fig. 1]. Given the investments of artists and art historians in the theological and aesthetic stakes of the “miraculous reproducibility”5 of the sudarium and the early printed image, it is striking that the Veronica’s relation to other image-objects produced by processes of imprinting or stamping in medieval and early modern Europe has received comparatively little scrutiny6. As a vast, and ever growing body of historical analysis has explored, the Veronica’s terrific success within the spiritual (and terrestrial) economies of medieval cult, pilgrimage, and image-focused devotional practices had much to do with papal, monastic, and popular promotion of the relic’s powers7. Believed to be an indexical trace or image-imprint of Christ’s face, the Veronica’s proliferation in the form of “authentic copies” amounted to a theologically charged re-enactment of its sacred ontology. Accordingly, both the Roman relic and its re-instantiations have been productively parsed in relation to the medieval Eucharist, the sacramental body of Christ repetitively re-instantiated in every Mass. However, the Eucharistic wafer was but one, arguably paramount, instance of an indexically produced image-object in the medieval period. What has not yet been sufficiently recognized is how the Veronica and the Eucharist – notwithstanding their respective exceptional sacred ontologies – were part of a much broader and long-lived medieval tradition of producing and thinking with imprints. In this essay, I explore how the Veronica was framed, from the outset, as an impressed image of the Holy Face and how that framing contributed to the Roman relic’s auratic status as a cult object and encouraged – if not demanded – its widespread replication and dissemination in the form of images and objects beginning in the thirteenth century8. My aim is to make the case that the Veronica was itself authorized by and participated in a far-ranging, long medieval tradition of impressing, or rather re-impressing Christ’s face in a variety of media9. In what follows, I take up several classes of objects featuring low relief images of Christ’s face that circulated, were held, beheld, and variously employed in the cultures of medieval Europe. In these works, we encounter materialized instantiations of the trope of the

sacred impression, a trope that we have come to strongly associate with the Veronica, but whose history before and after the Veronica burst onto the European scene is still not yet fully understood. I will first briefly examine the trope of the imprint or impression in the para-liturgical office in honor of the Veronica attributed to Innocent  iii (1198–1216), before sketching how the concept of a sacred impressed image – so crucial to the fortunes of the Veronica in medieval Europe – was well established long before the flowering of the Veronica’s European cult in the thirteenth century10. Moving from this discursive tradition to material works, I examine a number of objects 4

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Charles Talbot, “Prints and the Definitive Image”, in Print and Culture in the Renaissance: Essays on the Advent of Printing in Europe, Gerald P. Tyson, Sylvia S. Wagonheim eds, Newark 1986, pp. 189–205, sp. p. 201. I borrow this phrase from Pon, A Printed Icon (n. 3), p. 57. The pioneering, provocative analyses of Georges Didi-Huberman and Gerhard Wolf are important exceptions to this general rule: Georges Didi-Huberman, La Ressemblance par contact: Archéologie, anachronisme et modernité de l’empreinte, Paris 2008, pp. 71–91; Wolf, Schleier und Spiegel (n. 3). The following studies are exemplary, not exhaustive: Christoph Egger, “Papst Innocenz iii. und die Veronica. Geschichte, Theologie, Liturgie und Seelsorge”, in The Holy Face and the Paradox of Representation, Herbert L. Kessler, Gerhard Wolf eds, Bologna 1998, pp. 181–203; Flora Lewis, “Rewarding Devotion: Indulgences and the Promotion of Images”, in The Church and The Arts (Studies in Church History xxviii), Diana Wood ed., Oxford 1992, pp. 179–194; Flora Lewis, “The Veronica: Image, Legend and Viewer”, in England in the Thirteenth Century: Proceedings of the 1984 Harlaxton Symposium William M. Ormrod ed. , Woodbridge 1986, pp. 100–106; Solange Corbin, “Les Offices de la Sainte Face”, Bulletin des études portugaises et de l’Institut français au Portugal, xi (1947), pp. 1–65; Anne L. Clark, “Venerating the Veronica: Varieties of Passion Piety in the Later Middle Ages”, Material Religion, iii/2 (2007), pp. 164–189; Jeffrey Hamburger, The Visual and the Visionary: Art and Female Spirituality in Late Medieval Germany, New York 1998, pp. 317–382; Brenda Bolton, “Advertise the Message: Images in Rome at the Turn of the Twelfth Century”, in The Church and The Arts, Diana Wood ed., Oxford 1992, pp. 117–130; Karl Pearson, Die Fronica. Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte des Christusbildes im Mittelalter, Strasbourg 1887. The Veronica’s status as a relic and presence in Rome is attested in written sources starting in the tenth century. The advent of the European Veronica’s cult, however, is usually dated to 1216, when, as Matthew Paris reports, the relic performed a miraculous rotation in a procession organized by Innocent iii, thus catalyzing new cultic attention and promotion: for further discussion of the twelfth- and early thirteenth-century history of the Veronica and its cult, see Wolf, Schleier und Spiegel (n. 3), pp. 45–51. On the distorting effects of modern iconographic distinctions, with particular reference to Christ’s face, see John Hand, “Salve sancta facies: Some Thoughts on the Iconography of the Head of Christ by Petrus Christus”,Metropolitan Museum Journal, xxvii (1992), pp. 7–18; Paul Binski,“The Faces of Christ in Matthew Paris’s Chronica Majora”, in Tributes in Honor of James H. Marrow: Studies in Painting and Manuscript Illumination of the Late Middle Ages and Northern Renaissance, Jeffrey Hamburger, Anne S. Korteweg eds, London 2006, pp. 85–92. The place of the Keramion (or “Holy Tile”) in this European dynamic remains obscure and I regret that I cannot deal with it here. I thank Herbert Kessler for drawing my attention to the potential relevance of the Keramion to the concept and practices of sacred imprinting I sketch in this essay.

in which Christ’s face was evocatively realized as a low-relief material form. These works, I will suggest, testify to the dissemination of theological discourse in the register of quotidian material culture. More specifically and pointedly, they reveal how medieval people actively participated in the project of re-impressing the Holy Face, thus establishing a horizon of possibility conducive to the explosion of the Veronica’s cult in the thirteenth century and its enduring vitality into the early modern period.

Signatis... vultus tui: Theorizing Divine Impression

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The “office”in honor of the Veronica, often attributed to Innocent iii, frames the Roman Veronica as one of a series of sacred impressions11. In the Psalm verses that make up much of the office’s verbal substance the action of stamping or impression plays a crucial role both as generative process and as theologically charged analogy. The versicle that opens the office in British Library, Arundel ms 157 (hereafter Arundel 157), the earliest known witness to the text, employs the language of Psalm 4, 7 to describe Christ’s “vultus” as sealing or impressing devotees with its light 12. This initial emphasis on the impressed mark or sign is extended by a further Psalm verse incorporated into the office (Ps 85, 17), in which the devotee asks God: “Fac mecum signum in bono” (Make with me a sign [or seal, token] for good). In the words of the versicle, the devotee, imprinted by the light of God’s face, in turn becomes a token of God’s help and consolation. Both Psalm verses establish a resonant groundwork for the newly composed prayer that concludes the short office. Here a powerful theological statement is articulated in nuce. Further developing the trope found in the office’s opening Psalm verse (i.e., Ps 4, 7), the prayer begins by identifying God as having stamped or sealed (signatis) human beings with the light of his countenance (vultus). God, the prayer continues, wished to leave behind an impressed or imprinted image (an ymaginem impressam) as a memorial. This image, we are told, was imprinted on the sudarium at the urging of St Veronica. Invoking Christ’s passion and cross,

as well as the Veronica, next in the prayer has devotee beseech the deity in emphatically Pauline language: “quaesumus ut nunc in terris per speculum et in enigmate ipsam adorare et venerari valeamus” (we ask that we might be able now on earth, in a mirror and obscurely, to adore and venerate that very thing [ipsam])13. The object of the devotee’s adoration and veneration, identified as a medium or means by which he or she worshipfully encounters God on earth, is itself shrouded in a bit of a grammatical enigma by the language of the prayer. The crucial ipsam that is the object of the verbs of adoration and veneration, must, I think, be understood to refer to the ymaginem impressam previously referenced in the office. At once an image, an impression, a trace on a cloth, a memorial, and a material form, the Veronica is framed by the devotional text’s Pauline gloss as reflecting and obscuring the deity’s presence to the devotee, even as it receives the adoration and veneration by which the devotee secures a future, beatific vision14. Devotion organized in relation to this ymaginem impressam, the office promises, is a powerful means to a soteriological end. The text of the prayer effectively recasts the versicles that precede it. Having strongly emphasized the Veronica’s status as an impressed image of God’s face and thus a suggestive analog to the human being, likewise sealed by the light of God’s vultus, the concluding prayer invites the devotee to understand the text’s references to sealing or imprinting as part of an allusive, even descriptive nexus. Not least, the Psalm verses incorporated into the office encourage the devotee to understand him or herself as similar to the Veronica. We too, the office asserts, are imprints generated by the deity; we too are memorial signa or tokens made from and by the divine presence15. The paradigm of the impression plays a crucial role in the office. The Veronica and the human devotee are evocatively framed as works whose facture as imprints or impressions enduringly bears witness to their origin in the matrix of divine being or presence. Just as the Veronica preserves the impressed trace of God’s vultus, so too his human creations bear an impressed sign of their creator: the imago dei.

A Tradition of Thinking with Impressions The two Psalm verses in the office that I have emphasized, namely Psalm 4, 7 and Psalm 85, 17, were touchstones for a medieval tradition of conceiving of the imago dei as an imprinted or impressed mark16. Thus Augustine, in his Enarrationes in Psalmos, glosses Psalm 4, 7 in the following terms: “Quis ostendit nobis bona? Signatum est, inquit, in nobis lumen uultus tui, Domine. Hoc lumen est totum hominis et uerum bonum, quod non oculis, sed mente conspicitur. Signatum autem dixit in nobis, tamquam denarius signatur regis imagine. Homo enim factus est ad imaginem et similitudinem Dei, quam peccando corrupit; bonum ergo eius est uerum atque aeternum, si renascendo signetur. Et ad hoc credo pertinere, quod quidam prudenter intellegunt, illud quod Dominus uiso Caesaris nummo ait: Reddite Caesari quod Caesaris est, et Deo quod Dei est. Tamquam si diceret: Quemadmodum Caesar a uobis exigit impressionem imaginis suae, sic et Deus; ut quemadmodum illi redditur nummus, sic Deo anima lumine uultus eius illustrata atque signata”17. “Who shows us good things? The light of your countenance, he says, is stamped upon us, O Lord. This light is the whole and true good of man, which is seen not with the eyes, but with the mind. But he says, stamped on us, just as a denarius is stamped with image of the king. For man was made after the image and likeness of God, which in sinning he defaced; therefore his is a true and eternal good, if in being reborn he is stamped. And to this point, I believe, pertains what some prudently understand, that the Lord seeing Caesar’s coin said: Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s. As if he had said, just as Caesar asks for the impression of his image from you, so too does God: so that just as the tribute money is rendered to that one, so to God is rendered the soul, illuminated and stamped with the light of his countenance”.

Augustine also took up this topos in his fortieth Tractatus on John, writing: “Si credis, mercedem exige fidei; si autem non credis, fidei mercedem qua fronte quaeris? Si ergo manseritis in uerbo meo, uere discipuli mei eritis, ut contemplemini ipsam ueritatem sicuti est; non per uerba sonantia, sed per lucem splendentem, cum satiauerit nos, quod legitur in psalmo: Signatum est super nos lumen uultus tui, Domine. Moneta Dei sumus, nummus a thesauro oberrauimus. Errore detritum est quod in nobis fuerat impressum; uenit qui reformet, quia ipse formauerat; quaerit et ipse nummum suum, sicut Caesar nummum suum; ideo ait: Reddite Caesari quae Caesaris sunt, et Dei quae Dei sunt: Caesari nummos, Deo uos ipsos. Tunc ergo exprimetur ueritas in nobis”18.

“If you believe, demand the reward of faith; but if you do not believe, with what face can you seek the reward of faith? If therefore you abide in my word, truly you shall be my disciples, so that you may behold that very truth just as it is, not through sounding words, but through shining light, when he shall have satisfied us: as it is read in the psalm, Oh Lord, the light of thy countenance is stamped upon us. We are God’s money: a coin, we have wandered from the treasury. In error, the impression that was made in us has been rubbed out; there comes 11 The text (spuriously) attributed to Innocent iii and often referenced as an office, is not a true liturgical office, but rather a devotional text composed of a prayer with responses. For the sake of expediency, I will, nevertheless, employ the word "office" to designate this textual assemblage. For a critical analysis of the “office” and its attribution to Innocent iii see Egger, “Papst Innocenz iii.” (n. 7). For discussion of this set of texts associated with the Veronica, as well as other (actual) liturgical offices devised in honor of the Holy Face, see Lewis, “Rewarding Devotion” (n. 7); Solange, “Les Offices” (n. 7). 12 London, British Library, ms Arundel 157, fol. 2r. The manuscript, the earliest known extensively illuminated Psalter-Hours with an Oxford provenance, has been dated by Nigel Morgan to c. 1200–1210; the image of Christ’s face with accompanying prayer was likely added c. 1240: Nigel Morgan, Early Gothic Manuscripts 1190–1250, A Survey of Manuscripts Illuminated in the British Isles, 4 vols, London 1982, vol. i, pp. 72–73, cat. 24. For further discussion, see also Alexa Sand, Vision, Devotion, and Self-Representation in Late Medieval Art, New York 2014, pp. 27–83; Heike Schlie, “Vera Ikon im Medienverbund: Die Wirksamkeit der Sakramente und die Wirkung der Bilder”, in Medialität des Heils im späten Mittelalter, Carla Dauven-van Knippenberg, Cornelia Herberichs, Christian Kiening eds, Zurich 2009, pp. 61–82, sp. pp. 66–70; Wolf, Schleier und Spiegel (n. 3), pp. 52–53; Idem, “From Mandylion to Veronica: Picturing the ‘Disembodied’ Face and Disseminating the True Image of Christ in Latin West”, in The Holy Face and the Paradox of Representation, Herbert Kessler, Gerhard Wolf eds, Bologna 1998, pp. 153–179, sp. p. 170. 13 ms Arundel 157, fol. 2r; emphasis mine. English translations mine, unless otherwise noted. 14 On the Veronica and the beatific vision, with further bibliography, see Maria G. Muzj,“La Veronica e i temi della visione faccia a faccia”, in L’immagine di Cristo dall’acheropita alla mano d’artista: Dal tardo medioevo all’età barocca, Christoph L. Frommel, Gerhard Wolf eds, Vatican City 2006, pp. 91–116. On medieval conceptions of beatific vision, see Christian Trottmann, La Vision béatifique: Des disputes scholastiques à sa definition par Benoit xii, Rome 1995. 15 For further discussion in relation to the Veronica, see Hamburger, The Visual and the Visionary (n. 7), pp. 338, 354–359; Idem, “’Frequentant Memoriam Visionis Faciei Meae:’ Image and Imitation in the Devotions to the Veronica Attributed to Gertrude of Helfta”, in The Holy Face and the Paradox of Representation, Herbert Kessler, Gerhard Wolf eds, Bologna 1998, pp. 229–246; Wolf, “From Mandylion to Veronica” (n. 12), pp. 153–156. 16 The complex tradition of exegesis on the Psalm verses integrated into the office cannot be treated here, but it should be noted that in patristic and medieval exegeses of these verses the concept of baptismal character looms equally large and, likewise, in Trinitarian-focused discussions of the imprinting of the human soul the concept of ratio plays a dominant role. My brief discussion is indebted to Robert Javelet, Image et ressemblance au douzième siècle: De Saint Anselme à Alain de Lille, Paris 1967; Wolf, Schleier und Spiegel (n. 3), pp. 3–22, 106–109; Herbert Kessler,“The Object as Subject in Medieval Art”, The Haskins Society Journal, xxiii (2011), pp. 205–228, sp. pp. 225–226; Idem, Spiritual Seeing: Picturing God’s Invisibility in Medieval Art, Philadelphia 2000, pp. 64–87. 17 Emphasis in the original: Augustine of Hippo, Enarrationes in Psalmos 4, 8 (ccl 38), D. E. Dekkers, I. Fraipont eds, Turnhout 1990, pp. 17–18. 18 Emphasis in the original: Augustine of Hippo, In Iohannis Evangelium Tractatus, xl (ccl 36), D. R. Willems ed., Turnhout 1954, pp. 355–356.

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2 / Merovingian tremissis by the moneyer Agiulfus, mint of Aventicum (Avenches, Switzerland); ca 625 / London, British Museum, b.11257 3 / Solidus of Justinian ii, 685–711 / London, British Museum, 1918,0204.164 9

one who will refashion us, for it was he himself who fashioned us; he himself searches for his coin, just as Caesar for his coin. And so he says, Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and unto God the things that are God’s: to Caesar his coins, to God you yourselves. Then therefore shall the truth be expressed in us”.

Augustine was not alone in understanding the psalm verse’s evocation of the impression made by the light of God’s vultus as addressing the imago dei by way of the exemplum of Caesar’s coin. So too, in his exegesis of the Psalm, Cassiodorus noted: “The light of thy countenance, O Lord, is stamped on us. Just as coins carry an image of the emperor, so the signs of the heavenly Emperor are imprinted on the faithful. This is the protection by which the devil of many shapes is driven off [...]”19.

Closer in time to the efflorescence of devotion to the Veronica, Thomas of Chobham put his own spin on the topos, writing in his Summa de arte praedicandi (ca 1220)20:

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“Item totus decor anime est ymago Dei sibi inpressa, sicut legitur in Psalmo: signatum est super nos lumen uultus tui Domine. Et iterum in ymno Salua Redemptor: plasma tuum nobile signatum sancto uultus tui lumine. Nec umquam admittet Dominus in conuiuium suum aliquem hominem nisi inueniat in eo ymaginem suam integram et claram. Si enim fuerit deformata, statim dicet Dominus: amen amen dico uobis, nescio uos, ut Mathei xxvo, quia non uideo ymaginem meam per quam debui uos cognoscere. Hoc autem totum facit peccatum, quia cum homo peccat

statim dissipat et deturpat ymaginem Dei in homine ne ulterius eum agnoscat. Sicut in denario materiali cui inpressa est forma regis, si deleretur forma illa uel figura illa ymaginis, statim falsus esset denarius ille nec inueniretur qui eum reciperet”21. “Likewise, the whole beauty of the soul is the imago dei impressed in it, just as it is read in the Psalm: the light of your countenance is stamped upon us, O Lord. And again in the Salva Redemptor hymn: your noble creation stamped with the light of your countenance. Nor would the Lord ever admit into his banquet any man unless he could find in him his image, whole and lustrous. For if (the image) shall have been deformed, at once the Lord will say: amen amen I say to you, I know you not, as in Matthew 25, because I do not see my image, through which I should recognize you. But sin does all of this, for when man sins, immediately he dissipates and disfigures the image of God in man so that he (i.e., God) cannot recognize him anymore. Just as with a material denarius, in which the form of the king is impressed, if that form or figure of the image is worn away, immediately that denarius would be false and no one could be found who would accept it”.

For Augustine, Cassiodorus, and a long tradition of medieval theologians after them, the human creature stamped or impressed with the light of God’s countenance is a kind of divine monetiform. Taking the coin as an analog for other divinely created imagines, this theological tradition put the facture and appearance of the impression or imprint at the center of its soteriology, with all that this implied in terms of causality, relations

of ontological priority and dependence, a dialectic of sameness and difference, and, not least, a sophisticated conception of authenticity and aura bound to the paradigm of a singular productive matrix and multiple “true” copies22. But if the model of the coin, a material object belonging to the world of lived experience, was crucial to this account of salvation, what then are we to make of medieval re-iterations of this motif in the register of material culture?

Impressing the Holy Face The sustained connection made by patristic and medieval exegetes between the effigy bearing coin and Psalm 4, 7 – understood as a gloss on both the vultus Christi and the imago dei – was given concrete, material expression starting at least by the late seventh century. As Lucia Travaini has shown, the first known coin to bear an image of Christ was a Merovingian tremissis, issued by the mint of Aventicum (Avenches), ca 625 [Fig. 2] 23. Better known are the solidi featuring two different Christic types, minted by Justinian ii at Constantinople first in 692–695 and then again 705–711 [Fig. 3] 24. These solidi seem to have stimulated loosely imitative issues throughout Europe, including the pseudo-imperial solidus issued by Duke Gisulf i of Benevento (689–706)25, the ducalis minted by Roger ii of Sicily (1130–1154)26, a series of coins issued in

the Latin East over the course of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries27, and the grossi issued by the Commune of Lucca starting in 1209 that featured the Volto Santo, metonymically condensed into the image of Christ’s crowned face [Fig. 4] 28. 19 Emphasis in the original; translation slightly modified: Cassiodorus, Explanation of the Psalms, Patrick. G. Walsh trans., 3 vols, New York 1990, vol. 1, pp. 77–78. 20 For a succinct orientation to this text, see Medieval Grammar and Rhetoric: Language Arts and Literary Theory, ad 300–1475, Rita Copeland, Ineke Sluiter eds, Oxford 2009, pp. 614–616. I thank one of the anonymous reviewers for bringing this volume to my attention. 21 Emphasis in the original: Thomas de Chobham, Summa de arte praedicandi, 6 (cccm 82), Franco Morenzoni ed., Turnhout 1988, p. 151. 22 For further discussion see Wolf, Schleier und Spiegel (n. 3), pp. 43–105; Anca Vasilu, “L’Image-empreinte, identifiant visuel du Dieu-Homme (Réflexions sur la trace, le portrait antique et le Mandylion byzantin)”, in Sacre impronte e oggetti ‘non fatti da mano d’uomo’ nelle religioni, Adele Monaci Castagno ed., Alessandria 2011, pp. 129–151; Herbert Kessler, Spiritual Seeing (n. 16), pp. 64–87. 23 Lucia Travaini, “La zecca merovingia di Avenches e le prime monete con il volto di Cristo”, Quaderni ticinesi di numismatica e antichità classiche, xxxii (2003), pp. 291–301; Lucia Travaini,“Coins, Images, Identity, and Interpretation: Two Research Cases – A Seventh-Century Merovingian Tremissis and a Fifteenth-Century Ducat of Milan”, in Medieval Coins and Seals: Constructing Identity, Signifying Power, Susan Solway ed., Turnhout 2015, pp. 65–80. 24 Wolf, Schleier und Spiegel (n. 3), pp. 16 –22. 25 Philip Grierson, Mark Blackburn, Medieval European Coinage, 14 vols, Cambridge 1986, vol. i, pp. 69, 575 (cat. 1086). 26 Philip Grierson, Lucia Travaini, Medieval European Coinage, 14 vols, Cambridge 1998, vol xiv, part 3, pp. 120–121, 626 (cat. 212–213). 27 The relevant coins, issued in Frankish eastern Mediterranean territories, closely emulated Byzantine issues; for further discussion see Lisa Mahoney,“A Byzantine Pedigree: The Design of Coins and Seals in the Latin East”,in Medieval Coins and Seals: Constructing Identity, Signifying Power, Susan Solway ed., Turnhout 2015, pp. 131–152. 28 Michael Matzke, “Der Volto Santo auf Münzen”, in Il Volto Santo in Europa, Michele C. Ferrari, Andreas Meyer eds, Lucca 2005, pp. 209–228; Franca M. Vanni, “L’iconografia del Volto Santo nella monetazione di Lucca”, in Il Volto Santo in Europa, Michele C. Ferrari, Andreas Meyer eds, Lucca 2005, pp. 527–547.

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Medieval coins bearing Christ’s vultus mobilized an established visual schema for the authentication of coinage by visual reference to its issuer in order to imply that a given Christomorphic currency circulated in the name and image of the King of Kings, and, by implication, that infringements upon that coinage would, in effect, be grave trespasses against divine authority29. Each of these coin types was issued in accordance with contingent, in some cases even quite local concerns. Collectively, however, they indicate that in different parts of Europe, beginning in the early Middle Ages and continuing after the thirteenth-century efflorescence of interest in the Veronica, coinage was taken as a medium for the making of Christological impressions. The power of the impressed image of the Holy Face seems also to have been selectively appropriated for the practice of sealing: another medium for the assertion of authority, in which the legal perfection or confection of presence – despite conditions of phenomenal, corporeal absence – was accomplished in medieval culture. Medieval seal matrices engraved with Christ’s visage are not common, but they do survive. In wax seals generated from such matrices Christ’s face appeared as an impressed, low relief form emerging out of the surface of the wax [Figs 5, 6]. As Brigitte Bedos-Rezak has elucidated, starting in the eleventh century, medieval seals enacted a powerful autopoetic mode of representation in which the sealed wax imago at once signified and embodied the presence of the sealer in a quasi-sacramental (more specifically, Eucharistic) fashion30. Seal matrices featuring the Holy Face strikingly thematize this semiotics of real presence. To seal with such a matrix was to re-impress and thus re-actualize Christ’s presence, by way of the auratic synecdoche of his face. The human subject who sealed with a Christic impression thus enacted a radical act of imitatio Christi that both re-iterated and re-affirmed the theological conception of the human being as formed after God’s image and sealed with his vultus. To employ Christ’s face as the central device of one’s seal was to impress and re-impress that imago dei upon the material supports for written words – not least legal documents – that enacted

and distributed one’s efficacious presence in the world. At once tokens of a relationship of spiritual mimesis and ontological dependence, and performative materializations of that state of existence, seal matrices engraved with the vultus Christi and the wax seals they produced allowed sealers to self-represent in Christ’s image: a juridical expression of deiformitas whose audacity was completely licensed by a long tradition of conceiving of the imago dei according to the paradigm of other imagines impressae. And the Eucharistic paradigm that was informed by and in turn informed conceptions of the seal as an authentic and efficacious imago was itself transformed, in the most literal and material sense, by late medieval interest in re-impressing the Holy Face. Several scholars have remarked how the office in honor of the Veronica contained in the Psalter-Hours of Yolande of Soissons is prefaced by a rubric indicating that “[…] qui conkes dira cheste orison au sacrement il ara .lx. iours de pardon” (whoever says this prayer to the sacrament shall have sixty days of pardon)31. Gerhard Wolf has gone so far as to argue that the image of the Holy Face that appears on the recto facing the rubric should be seen as a representation of Christ as the Eucharistic sacrament32. Certain late medieval host presses, the ironwork tools employed in fabricating Eucharistic hosts in medieval Europe, made palpable the association of the Holy Face and the sacrament of the altar [Fig. 7] 33. Although the Holy Face is a rarity among the motifs impressed upon communion wafers by medieval host presses, at least two extant medieval host presses reveal that communion wafers could be and occasionally were imprinted with Christ’s vultus in the period34. Devotees receiving communion wafers made from such presses would have both seen the impressed image of the deity and physically incorporated it into themselves. Yet other impressions of Christ’s face were made for the medieval Mass [Figs 8, 9]. Méreaux – coin-like tokens distributed to clergy assisting in the celebration of the Mass and sometimes also to Mass-goers – also took the form of re-impressions of the Holy Face35. Having negligible substantial value, the méreaux distributed by churches and confraternities would be exchanged for measures

of bread, wine, and sometimes other necessities, thus facilitating extra-monetary charitable 29 These coins effectively invert the very logic of the Caesar’s coin episode in the Gospels and as it was taken up by medieval exegetes; limitations of length prevent me from addressing this point here. It should be noted that other early Christic coins, seemingly un-related to Justinian ii’s issues, have recently been noted by scholars, including a unique Series q Sceatta (today on deposit at the Fitzwilliam Museum) and tremisses issued by the Visigothic king Ervigio (Erwig) and his successors: for further discussion see Lord Stewartby, David M. Metcalf, “The Bust of Christ on an Early Anglo-Saxon Coin”, The Numismatic Chronicle, clxvii (2007), pp. 179–182; Grierson/Blackburn, Medieval European Coinage (n. 25), pp. 51–52, 448 (cat. 267); Ruth Pliego Vásquez, La moneda visigoda, 2 vols, Seville 2009, vol. i, pp. 392–324 (cat. 656–658), 417 (cat. 706–708), 468–489 (cat. 764–765); Anna Gannon, “Coins, Images, and Tales from the Holy Land: Questions of Theology and Orthodoxy”, in Studies in Early Medieval Coinage ii: New Perspectives, Tony Abramson ed., Woodbridge 2011, pp. 88–103. 30 Brigitte Bedos-Rezak, When Ego Was Imago: Signs of Identity in the Middle Ages, Leiden 2011, pp. 3–6, 27–32, 95–107, 159, 161–205; Brigitte Bedos-Rezak, “Replica: Images of Identity and the Identity of Images in Prescholastic France”, in The Mind’s Eye: Art and Theological Argument in the Middle Ages, Jeffrey Hamburger, Anne-Marie Bouché eds, Princeton 2006, pp. 46–64; Brigitte Bedos-Rezak, “Medieval Identity: A Sign and a Concept”, American Historical Review, cv (2000), pp. 1489–1533; Brigitte Bedos-Rezak, “Une image ontologique: sceau et ressemblance en France préscholastique (1000–1200)”, in Études d’histoire de l’art offertes à Jacques Thirion: des premiers temps chrétiens au xxe siècle (Matériaux pour l’histoire iii), Alain Erlande-Brandenburg, Jean-Michel Leniaud eds, Paris 2001, pp. 39–50; Brigitte Bedos-Rezak, “L’empreinte. Trace et tracé d’une médiation (1050–1300)”, Matérialité et immatérialité dans l’Église au Moyen Âge. Actes du colloque international de Bucarest (Bucarest, 22–23 octobre 2010), Stéphanie D. Daussy, Cătalina Gîrbea, Brinduşa Grigoriu, Anca Oroveanu, Michaela Voicu eds, Bucarest 2012, pp. 127–141. 31 New York, Pierpont Morgan Library, ms m.729, fol. 14v. For further discussion of this text and the facing full page miniature (fol. 15r), see Sand, Vision, Devotion (n. 12), pp. 54–55; Schlie, “Vera Ikon” (n. 12), pp. 61–82, 70–73; Hamburger, The Visual and the Visionary (n. 7), pp. 338, 355–358; Wolf, “From Mandylion to Veronica”(n. 12), pp. 153–179, 171–172; Karen Gould, The Psalter and Hours of Yolande of Soissons, Cambridge 1978, pp. 81–94. Alison Stones has challenged the consensus that this manuscript was made for Yolande of Soissons: Alison Stones,“The Full-Page Miniatures of the Psalter-Hours New York, pml, ms m. 729: Programme and Patron”, in The Illuminated Psalter: Studies in the Content, Purpose and Placement of its Images, Frank O. Büttner ed., Turnhout 2004, pp. 281–307. 32 Wolf, Schleier und Spiegel (n. 3), p. 60. Jeffrey Hamburger substantiates the point further, with reference to other works of art: Hamburger, The Visual and the Visionary (n. 7), pp. 333–340. 33 On medieval host presses, with further bibliography, see Aden Kumler, “The Multiplication of the Species: Eucharistic Morphology in the Middle Ages”, res: Anthropology and Aesthetics, lix-lx (2011), pp. 179–191; Max Wahren, “Zur Geschichte der Hostienbäckerei”, in Panis angelorum – Das Brot der Engel: Kulturgeschichte der Hostie, Oliver Seifert ed., Ostfildern 2004, pp. 11–22. 34 In addition to the press reproduced here (Musée de l’Hôtel Goüin, Tours, hg. 888.004.0002), photographic documentation shows that a press once preserved at the church of St Barthélémy, Confolens (France) also included the motif of the Holy Face; I have not yet traced the current location of this press. 35 Méreaux, whose ecclesiastical use was well established by ca 1200, were usually made in molds: although they have the appearance of impressed monetiforms they were not, in processual terms, impressions. For further discussion, see Michael Mitchiner, Anne Skinner, “English Tokens, c. 1200–1425”, British Numismatic Journal, liii (1984), pp. 29–77; Michel Pastoureau, Jetons, Méreaux et Médailles (Typologie des sources du Moyen Âge occidental xlii), Turnhout 1984, pp. 38–40; Jacques Labrot, Une histoire economique et populaire du Moyen Age: les jetons et les méreaux, Paris 1989.

4 / Reverse of Grosso issued by the Commune of Lucca, 1209–1300 / Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Münzkabinett, 18204378 5 / Modern cast from medieval seal matrix with Holy Face, late 13th–14th century / Portable Antiquities Scheme, Record id: nms-d1ac25 6 / Medieval seal matrix with Holy Face, ca 1200– 1400 / Portable Antiquities Scheme, Record id: ess-26b3a7

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Conclusion 7 / Host Press, ca 1375–1400 / Tours, Musée de l’Hôtel Goüin, hg.888.004.0002 8 / Obverse of a méreau with the Holy Face, ca 1300–1500 / Paris, bnf, Dept. de Médailles et monnaies, Mer.403 9 / Obverse of a méreau with the Holy Face, ca 1300–1500 / Paris, bnf, Dept. de Médailles et monnaies, Mer.404

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economies. Méreaux also played an important role in contemporary theological discussions: as William Courtenay has shown, token coinage was taken up as a conceptual model by a series of thirteenth- and fourteenth-century theologians interested in accounting for sacramental efficacy as a mode of covenant or pact between God and humanity36. Méreaux bearing the impressed image of the Holy Face thus performed an astounding visual and material condensation, even reification of medieval soteriological thought and practice. The image of Christ’s face on the surfaces of certain méreaux aligned those tokens with the form and occasion of the Eucharist and, more subtly, with the greatest of rewards in the economy of salvation: the visio dei. Serving as the fiat currency of charitable economies, these tokens transformed the Holy Face into a medium of exchange that could be converted into goods necessary to human life. Concretely and allusively, they marked the practice of clerical ministry, Mass attendance, and charitable (re)distributions as a form of imitatio Christi that rendered unto God what was owed in the way of Christian service and obligation, all the while acknowledging – through the image of the Holy Face such méreaux bore – that it was the redemptive divine presence that guaranteed the validity of the sacraments, the soteriological value of charity, and the beatific vision that awaited the devout as an ultimate reward.

Devout engagement with the Holy Face took a variety of material and visual forms in medieval Europe before the Roman Veronica appeared on the cultic scene. Just as patristic and medieval theorizations of the imago Dei as an impressed mark or trace established a crucial conceptual framework for the Veronica, so too, I have argued, a theoretically charged tradition of materially (re)impressing the Holy Face, attested as early as the seventh century, played a formative role in how the Veronica was received and disseminated starting in the thirteenth century. As the sampling of objects briefly discussed above reveals, medieval Christians actively participated in the indexical re-production of Christ’s vultus, thus making impressed forms of the Holy Face a powerful presence throughout Europe. In the forms of the coins and token coinage they struck, in the seals they employed, in the impressed surfaces of the Eucharistic wafers they produced and consumed, and in countless low-relief objects made to be worn on the body – including modest pilgrim badges and precious jewelry – medieval people (re)impressed and circulated Christ’s vultus, again and again, in a collective, pan-European form of imitatio Veronicae, both before and after the Roman relic burst onto the cultic scene. 36 William J. Courtenay, Covenant and Causality in Medieval Thought: Studies in Philosophy, Theology, and Economic Practice, London 1984, pp. 187–209, 275–295.

summary Signatis... vultus tui (znovu)obtiskování svaté tváře před evropským kultem Veraikonu a po něm

Veraikon, tedy zobrazení roušky, která měla uchovat otisk Kristovy tváře, zaujímá výjimečné postavení v uměleckohistorických pojednáních o evropských obrazech-kopiích, která jí v této tradici připisují obdobnou důležitost jako raně novověkým tiskům. Umělci i historici umění věnovali mnoho úsilí teologickým a estetickým aspektům „zázračného množení“ sudaria i raných tištěných obrazů. Je proto udivující, že se doposud dostalo jen malé pozornosti vztahu Veraikonu k ostatním předmětům, které vznikly ve středověké a raně novověké Evropě obtiskem či tiskem. Aden Kumler zkoumá prezentaci Veraikonu, a to od samého počátku, jako otištěného obrazu Svaté Tváře a sleduje, jak tato představa přispěla k jejímu výjimečnému kultovnímu statutu. Dále se zabývá tím, jak římská relikvie na počátku třináctého století podporovala, ne-li přímo vyžadovala, vlastní množení a rozšiřování v podobě obrazů a předmětů. Autorka tvrdí, že Veraikon byl součástí rozsáhle středověké tradice otiskování – nebo spíše druhotného otiskování – Kristovy tváře v celé řadě materiálů.

Kumler nejprve krátce představuje  tropus o otiskování či tisku v paraliturgii k poctě sv. Veroniky, který se připisuje Inocenci iii. (1198–1216). Následně načrtává myšlenku, že koncept svatého otištěného obrazu – tak zásadní pro uctívání Veroničiny roušky ve středověké Evropě – byl vybudován dlouho před samotným rozkvětem kultu Veraikonu. Poté již autorka přesouvá pozornost od diskurzu k předmětům. Zkoumá celou řadu středověkých objektů, na nichž je nízkým reliéfem znázorněna Kristova tvář: mince, pečeti, razidla hostií, méraux. Tyto předměty cirkulovaly, pohlíželo se na ně, byly uchovávány a různým způsobem používány a zpřítomňovaly tak tropus o posvátném otisku a rozšiřovaly teologický diskurz na úrovni každodenní materiální kultury. Přesněji řečeno, zmíněné předměty ukazují, jak se středověcí lidé aktivně podíleli na opakovaném otiskování svaté tváře, a tak vytvářeli prostor pro prudký nárůst kultu Veroničiny roušky ve třináctém století, který nadále přetrvával až do raně novověkého období.

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Abstract —Innocent iii and the Roman Veronica: Papal pr or Eucharistic Icon? — Propagated by Pope Innocent iii (1198–1216), the cult of the Roman Veronica became an important focus of pilgrimage to Rome during the thirteenth century through the Jubilee Year of 1300. This paper analyses whether Innocent’s perpetuation of the Veronica cult was part of a religious program of reform and renewal to emphasize the Eucharist at the center of Catholic life, or a public relations stunt designed to enhance the status of Rome, the papacy, and his pontificate. It argues that the cult of the Veronica was not just an exercise in public relations to foster the growth of papal power, nor was it a mere symbol of the religious climate of an age which saw the formalization of sacramental theology. Rather, the cult should also be understood in the light of Innocent’s personal devotion to the Eucharist manifested through both public preaching and private prayers. Furthermore, the paper explores how devotion to the Veronica soon took on a life of its own independent of Innocent iii’s original aims. Hence, the phenomenon of the Veronica not only tells us much about the nature of medieval piety but also gives us insight, via the icon, into one of the most formidable and complex popes of the High Middle Ages. Keywords Roman Veronica, Innocent iii, Corpus Christi, Fourth Lateran Council, pilgrims, sudarium, Jubilee Year, Holy Face, Eucharist, transubstantiation

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Rebecca Rist University of Reading [email protected]

Innocent iii and the Roman Veronica Papal pr or Eucharistic Icon? Rebecca Rist

This article examines Pope Innocent iii’s propagation of the cult of the sudarium, which we often refer to as “Veronica’s Veil” or, more accurately, the “Roman Veronica”. Was Innocent’s support for the Roman Veronica an exercise in public relations aimed to enhance the status of Rome, the papacy and his own pontificate? How far was it part of a religious program of reform and renewal to emphasize the Eucharist at the center of medieval Catholic life? Should we understand the influence of Innocent iii on the propagation of the cult of the Veronica as one particular aspect of the pope’s personal devotion to the Eucharist manifested in his sermons and letters? To what extent did devotion to the Veronica take on a life of its own divorced from the pope’s original aims? By attempting to answer such questions we can

better understand not only the nature of medieval piety, but also the religious agenda of one of the most influential popes of the High Middle Ages. The Roman Veronica – the sudarium or cloth attributed to St Veronica with the imprint of Christ’s Holy Face – was one of the most venerated of medieval images1. In 1300, Pope Boniface viii (1294–1303) would proclaim a Jubilee year in

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See the descriptions in Dante Alighieri, La Divina Commedia, vol. 3: Paradiso, Florence 1945, canto xxxi, 103–108, p. 832; Francesco Petrarca, Canzoniere, vol. 1, Ugo Doti ed., Rome 1996, canto xvi, 9–11, p. 36; see Gerhard Wolf, “From Mandylion to Veronica”, in The Holy Face and the Paradise of Reputation, Herbert L. Kessler, Gerhard Wolf eds, Bologna 1998, pp. 153–179, sp. pp. 165, 174, 176; Christoph Egger, “Papst Innocenz iii. und die Veronica, Geschichte, Theologie, Liturgie und Seelsorge”, in Ibidem, pp. 181–203, sp. p. 201; Herbert L. Kessler, “Afterword: Pilgrimage and Transformation”, in Architecture and Pilgrimage, 1000–1500. Southern Europe and Beyond, Paul Davies, Deborah Hood, Wendy Pullan eds, Burlington 2013, pp. 231–272, sp. p. 233.

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his general letter Antiquorum habet Fida relatio, and French chronicle, associated with the sudarium of although he did not specifically mention the Ve- Christ’s Passion, on which, according to tradition, ronica, we know it was an important incentive for Jesus wiped away the sweat and blood from his pilgrims who visited Rome that year2. Much has face as he carried his cross to Golgotha10. A homily been written about the relationship of medieval of the Archdeacon Gregorius (written circa 944) popes to Christological relics in the context of made specific reference to the Veronica11, and both theological and doctrinal issues. With regard to the Venerable Bede (672/673–735)12, and the chronthe Veronica in particular, historians have exam- icler Benedict of Soracte (ca 1000 ad), the Italian ined it in connection with the celebration of Holy author of the Ecclesiastical Annals (ca 968), state that Years, private devotional ceremonies emphasizing it was kept in a chapel in St Peter’s dedicated to its sacramental nature, and its association with the Virgin Mary built by Pope John vii (705–707)13. the beatific vision and the cult of Corpus Christi 3. We have a number of twelfth-century refer-​ Before the thirteenth century Christians in the ences. According to the Ordo of Benedictus West generally seem to have shown little curiosity Canonicus (ca 1140/1145) there is a relic of a suabout what Jesus the man looked like, choosing darium “which is called the Veronica”14. In his to focus rather on his divinity4. The pontificate of mid-twelfth-century Descriptio basilicae Vaticanae, Innocent iii (1198–1216) saw a change and a new Petrus Mallius (ca 1145–1181), canon of St Peter, emphasis on Christ’s visual appearance in the states that in the time of Pope Alexander iii Veronica. It was Innocent who ensured the trans- (1159–1181), there was a chapel to the Virgin Mary formation of the sudarium of St Peter’s into the where the Veronica was kept15, next to the chapel iconic image of the Veronica which revealed to of John vii and notes that: “As it is attested by oral pilgrims the face of Christ. Furthermore, as we tradition, Christ wiped off his Holy Face with it shall see, it is during Innocent’s pontificate that before his Passion, when his sweat became like not only the Veronica itself, but its ownership by drops of blood flowing to the ground”16. The late Rome and the theology surrounding it becomes twelfth-century French chronicle already mendeeply significant5. tioned claimed that Pope Celestine iii (1191–1198) In order to appreciate the impact of Innocent showed a holy cloth which carried the impression iii’s pontificate on devotion to the Veronica we of Christ’s face to the French king Philip ii Auneed to understand its history. The Roman Veron- gustus (1180–1223) when he returned from the ica was a Christian symbol throughout the medie- Third Crusade17. Finally, the English chronicler val period and seems to have been very similar to Roger of Hoveden (1174–1201) remarks that the the so-called Mandylion, which was also, accord- Veronica was enclosed in a ciborium commising to legend, believed to offer a direct impression sioned by Celestine iii18 – referring to the fact 6 of Christ’s face . Mid-twelfth-century accounts of that in 1197 Celestine had a special tabernacle the sudarium kept in Rome seem to suggest that built for the relic19. for many medieval people the Veronica was reSuch identifications of the Veronica as the Rogarded as either connected to or as an alternative man sudarium continue in thirteenth-century to this Mandylion7. texts. Gervasius of Tilbury (ca 1150–1228) and GerNevertheless, despite its association with the ald of Wales (ca 1146–1223), two English travelers Mandylion, we do not know very much from writ- to Rome ca 1200, mention the legend of the Veronten sources about what the Roman Veronica actu- ica as an imprint of Christ20. Sometime between ally looked like8. According to an eighth-century 1209 and 1214 Gervasius21 reports in his Otia Impelegend, the Cura Sanitatis Tiberii, a certain Veronica, rialia that: “This Veronica is a true physical picture possibly the woman recorded as cured of a hem- of the Lord represented as an effigy from the chest orrhage in Matthew 9, 20–22, brought the Roman upwards”22. Gerald of Wales, who visited Rome emperor Tiberius, a likeness of Christ impressed on several occasions between 1198 and 1203, deon a cloth which miraculously healed his illness9. scribes it in his Speculum ecclesiae as an “iconam”: This likeness was later, in a twelfth-century “a true icon, that is to say, a true image”, but one

that it was not easy to get access to: “Nobody can examine it except through a veil that hangs in front of it”23. Yet he too noted that “it retained in it the expression of his [Christ’s] image”24. We know of Innocent iii’s interest in promoting the Veronica from one of the pope’s own letters, Ad commemorandas nuptias of 3 January 120825, and from one of his many sermons entitled On the Sunday after Epiphany26. According to Ad commemorandas nuptias, in 1208 Innocent determined that every year on the Sunday following the Octave of the Epiphany – i.e. on the second Sunday after Epiphany – the holy cloth kept in St Peter’s was to be carried from its home in a chapel at the west end of St Peter’s Basilica down through the streets to the Hospital of Santo Spirito in Sassia as part of the commemoration of the Gospel account of 2 Boniface viii, “Antiquorum habet fida” (22 February 1300), Regesta ponitficum Romanorum, vol. 2, August Potthast ed., Berlin 1874, no. 24917; Alexa Sand, Vision, Devotion and Self-Representation in Late Medieval Art, Cambridge 2014, p. 30; Godefridus Snoek, Medieval Piety from Relics to the Eucharist: A Process of Mutual Interaction, Leiden/ New York 1995, p. 282. 3 There is a huge amount of scholarship on the Veronica and only a small proportion of the literature pertaining specifically to Innocent iii is discussed in this article. For example, Wolf,“From Mandylion to Veronica” (n. 1), p. 178; Ann Clark, “Venerating the Veronica: Varieties of Passion Piety in the Later Middle Ages”, Material Religion, iii/2 (2007), pp. 164–189; Snoek, Medieval Piety (n. 2), pp. 166–189; Miri Rubin, Corpus Christi. The Eucharist in Late Medieval Culture, Cambridge 1991, p. 277. 4 Sand, Vision, Devotion (n. 2), p. 27. 5 Egger, “Papst Innocenz iii. und die Veronica” (n. 1), pp. 181–203ff.; Sand, Vision, Devotion (n. 2), p. 32. 6 The Veronica was a Christian relic – a piece of cloth which bore the likeness of the face of Jesus. The Mandylion, or Image of Edessa, according to Christian tradition, was also a piece of cloth upon which the miraculous image of Jesus was said to have been imprinted. According to the Narratio de imagine edessena attributed to Constantine vii Porphyrogennetos it was moved to Constantinople in the tenth century and was an icon of the Greek Orthodox Church. See Sand, Vision, Devotion (n. 2), p. 33. When the crusaders sacked Constantinople in 1204 they brought such relics and sacred images back to Western Europe. See Ibidem, p. 34. We know from the records of the Byzantine clergyman Nicolaus Mesarites (1163/1164 – after 1216) that relics from Constantinople included not only the Mandylion, which the French king Louis ix (1226–1270) bought from the Latin Emperor Baldwin ii (1118–1131), but the crown of thorns and the lance and rod attributed to Christ’s Passion. See Wolf, “From Mandylion to Veronica” (n. 1), p. 163; Sand, Vision, Devotion (n. 2), p. 33. 7 Wolf, “From Mandylion to Veronica” (n. 1), p. 158. 8 Ibidem, p. 170. 9 Sand, Vision, Devotion (n. 2), pp. 31, 303, n. 19. 10 Monumenta Germaniae historica. Scriptores, Georg H. Pertz ed., Hannover 1859–1874, xxii; Sand, Vision, Devotion (n. 2), pp. 31, 304, n. 20. 11 Wolf, “From Mandylion to Veronica” (n. 1), p. 157. 12 Bede, Chronica, Theodor Mommsen ed., Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Auctores antiquissimi 13, Berlin 1898, p. 317, n. 574: “Cui successit alius Iohannes, qui inter multa operum inlustrium fecit oratorium sanctae Dei genitrici opere pulcherrimo intra ecclesiam beati apostoli Petri”. See also the description in the “Vita Iohannis vii” in Liber Pontificalis, i, Louis Duchesne ed., Paris 1886, p. 385; Egger, “Papst Innocenz iii. und die Veronica” (n. 1), p. 193.

13 Benedikt von S. Andrea in Monte Soracte, Chronicon, Giuseppe Zucchetti ed., Fonti per la storia d’Italia, lv, Rome 1920, p. 41: “Iohannes preerat papa, qui, inter multa operum inlustrium, fecit oratorium Sancte Dei genitricis, opere pulcerrimo, intra ecclesia Beati Petri apostoli, ubi dicitur a Veronice”. See Egger, “Papst Innocenz iii. und die Veronica” (n. 1), pp. 192–193. 14 Benedictus Canonicus, Ordo Romanus in Liber Censuum de l’Eglise Romaine, Paul Fabre, Léopold Duchesne eds, Paris 1910, vol. 2, p. 143: “sudarium Christi quod vocatur Veronica”; Wolf, “From Mandylion to Veronica” (n. 1), p. 167. See also Petrus Diaconus cited in Ernst von Dobschütz, Christusbilder. Untersuchungen zur christlichen Legende, Texte und Untersuchungen zur Geschichte der altchristlichen Literatur, Leipzig 1899, p. 283: “Sudarium vero, cum quo Christus faciem suam extersit, quod ab aliis Veronyca dicitur, tempore Tiberii Caesaris Romae delatum est”. 15 Petrus Malleus, Descriptio basilicae Vaticanae aucta atque emendate a Romano presbitero, c. 27, in Codice topografico della Citta di Roma, Roberto Valentini, Giuseppe Zucchetti eds, vol. 3, Fonti per la storia d’Italia, xc, Rome 1946, p. 420: “[…] ubi sine dubio est sudarium Christi, in quo ante passionem suam sanctissimam faciem, ut a nostris maioribus accepimus, extersit, quando sudor eius factus est sicut guttae sanguinis decurrentis in terram”. See Egger, “Papst Innocenz iii. und die Veronica” (n. 1), p. 193. 16 Petrus Malleus, Descriptio basilicae Vaticanae (n. 15), p. 420. See Wolf, “From Mandylion to Veronica” (n. 1), p. 167. 17 For the description in the French Chronicle see Monumenta Germaniae historica. Scriptores, xxii, p. 131: “acsi vultus adesset”. See Wolf, “From Mandylion to Veronica” (n. 1), p. 167; Claudia Bolgia, “New Settings for the Sacred in Medieval Rome”, in Architecture and Pilgrimage (n. 1), pp. 113–164, sp. p. 116; Ann Van Dijk, “The Veronica, the Vultus Christi and the Veneration of Icons in Medieval Rome”,in Old Saint Peter’s, Rome, Rosamond McKitterick, Carol M. Richardson, Joanna Story eds, Cambridge 2013, pp. 229–256, sp. p. 239. 18 Roger of Hoveden, Gesta regis Ricardi, in Rerum Britannicarum Medii Aevi Scriptores, xlix, vol. 2, William Stubbs ed., London 1867, pp. 228–229: “Et ostendit regi Franciae et suis…et Veronicam, id ist, pannum quendam linteum, quem Jesus Christus vultui Suo impressit; in quo pressura illa ita manifeste apparet usque in hodiernum diem ac si vultus Jesu Christi ibi esset; et dicitur Veronica quia mulier cujus pannus erat dicebatur Veronica”. See Egger, “Papst Innocenz iii. und die Veronica” (n. 1), p. 194; Van Dijk, “The Veronica, the Vultus Christi” (n. 17), p. 237. 19 Wolf, “From Mandylion to Veronica” (n. 1), p. 167; Dobschütz, Christusbilder (n. 14), p. 290; Bolgia, “New Settings for the Sacred in Medieval Rome”, (n. 17), pp. 115–116. 20 Gerard of Wales, Speculum Ecclesiae, in Rerum Britannicarum scriptores, John S. Brewer ed., London, 1861–1891, vol. xxi, book 4, pp. 278–280; Gervasius of Tilbury, Otia Imperialia, iii, 25, quoted in Dobschütz, Christusbilder (n. 14), pp. 292–293; Wolf,“From Mandylion to Veronica” (n. 1), p. 169. 21 Egger, “Papst Innocenz iii. und die Veronica” (n. 1), p. 196. 22 Gervase of Tilbury, Otia Imperialia: Recreation for an Emperor, S. E. Banks, J. W. Binns eds and trans, Oxford 2002, book 3, p. 606: “Est ergo Veronica pictura, Domini ueram secundum carnem repraesentans effigiem a pectore superius, in basilica sancti Petri iuxta ualuam a parte introitus dextra recondite”.See Dobschütz, Christusbilder (n. 14), p. 292. 23 Gerald of Wales, Speculum Ecclesiae (n. 20), p. 279: “veram iconiam, id est imaginem veram,” and “[…] a nemine, nisi per velorum quae ante dependent interpositionem inspicitur;”. See Sand, Vision, Devotion (n. 2), p. 32. 24 Gerald of Wales, Speculum Ecclesiae (n. 20), p. 279: “reliquit in eo expressam imaginem suam”. See Egger, “Papst Innocenz iii. und die Veronica” (n. 1), pp. 194–195. For the full text see Gerald of Wales, Speculum ecclesiae (n. 20), pp. 278–279: “ipse [Christus] peplum ejus [Veronice] accipiens impressit vultu suo, et reliquit in eo expressam imaginem suam. Haec in magna similiter reverentia, et a nemine, nisi per velorum quae ante dependent interpositionem inspicitur; et haec est apud Sanctum Petrum”. 25 Innocent iii,“Ad commemorandas nuptias”(3 January 1208), pl 215, cols 1270–1271. See also in the more recent edition Innocent iii,“Ad commemorandas nuptias”(3 January 1208), Die Register Innocenz’iii, vol. 10, Pontifkikatzjahr 1207/1208, pp. 297–299. 26 Innocent iii, “In Eadem Dominica”, Sermones de Tempore, pl 217, cols 341–346.

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the Wedding Feast of Cana27. The pope promised to the pilgrims themselves an indulgence of the remission of one year of penance:

of Wendover (d. 1236)37. After Roger’s account of the rebellion of the English barons in 1216, Paris inserted this digression about Innocent iii38:

“Because indeed man does not live on bread alone, but on every word which proceeds from the mouth of God, the Roman pontiff ought to be present at this station [of the Veronica] with his cardinals, in order that he may also celebrate there the solemn things of masses, and he may make an exhortatory sermon from this solemnity; lest the faithful population should return famished from these nuptials, he should provide, besides the material and doctrinal, also spiritual food, by the granting of an indulgence of the remission of one year from the penance enjoined on him28”.

“While Fortune’s dice aggravated the turbulent state of the English realm, Lord Pope Innocent, uneasy and full of care for a shaken Church, caused the image of the face of the Lord, habitually called the Veronica, to be carried reverentially in procession from the church of Saint Peter to the hospital of the Holy Ghost. Which being done, this image while being displayed turned all by itself, so that it was upside down: namely, it was positioned with its forehead below, its beard above. This filled the Lord Pope with dread, for he believed that this was an ill omen for him, and so to make full reconciliation with God upon the advice of his fellows he composed an elegant prayer in honor of this image called the Veronica. To this he added several Psalms and versicles, and to those who say it he conceded ten days’ indulgence, that is to say that those who repeat the whole thing daily are given indulgence. Many people therefore memorized the prayer and those things that go with it, and in order to more greatly inflame their devotion made an image in this manner39”.

The Hospital of Santo Spirito in Sassia was preCarolingian, but, according to the Chronica apostolicorum et imperatorum Basileensia, Innocent had overseen its rebuilding between 1202 and 1204 and had granted it to the monastic Order of the Holy Spirit founded by a certain Guy de Montpellier to look after the destitute, sick and orphaned, as well as regular pilgrims. Now Innocent arranged for the Veronica to be carried from St Peter’s to this hospital in an annual procession to commemorate the Feast of the Wedding of Cana29. According to the chronicle30:

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It is striking that Matthew Paris thought it is worth inserting this anecdote about Innocent iii and the incident of the Veronica turning upside down in 1216. In general, he disliked Innocent iii’s papacy and made this clear in his chronicle40. Here he “…he [Innocent] built among others the hospital of Santo Spirito and he enlarged it with generous annu- deliberately associated Innocent with this miracities. Indeed he instituted that there the Veronica of ulous story in which the Veronica turned upside the Lord should be publicly shown on the Sunday of down during its procession, therefore implying the Octave of the Epiphany31”. that the Veronica was displeased with the pope, Innocent hoped that if the Veronica was brought who was aware of this and accepted that he needed to the needy and downtrodden it would bring to make amends41. Even more importantly, Matthem comfort and healing32. It seems he also thew’s chronicle confirms not only that there was wished to harmonize the cult of the holy image great fervor to see the Veronica, which was kept of the Veronica with that of an icon of Mary also – but not necessarily displayed – in St Peter’s Bakept at the church of Santa Maria in Sassia33. silica, but corroborates our other evidence – Ad Particularly important for our knowledge of commemorandas nuptias and the Chronica apostolInnocent iii’s relationship with the Veronica is the icorum et imperatorum Basileensia – that it was the thirteenth-century Benedictine writer Matthew pope himself who created for it both a liturgical Paris (ca 1200–1259) who describes an important station in the Hospital of Santo Spirito in Rome event in its history in the Chronica Majora34. Accord- and its own procession42. ing to Matthew, in 1216, as every year, Innocent How therefore should we interpret the uniii had the “effigy of the face of the Lord, which is doubted evidence for Innocent iii’s interest in called the Veronica”35, carried in procession from increasing devotion to the Veronica in Rome? If, St Peter to the Hospital of Santo Spirito36. We know as Christoph Egger has argued, his propagation that this description of the Veronica is one of sev- of the cult of the Veronica was a “public magnet” eral of Matthew’s additions to the Chronica Majora to promote Rome and the papacy, to what extent originally composed by his predecessor, Roger was it also a public relations exercise aimed to

enhance the status of Innocent’s own pontificate43? During the High Middle Ages, the papal curia at Rome was not only the religious but arguably also the political and legal center of western Europe44. The city of Rome in which that curia was usually based was the seat of a number of medieval and ancient icons which continued to have a great impact on pilgrims45. Gerhard Wolf has argued that the Veronica housed in Rome, like the Mandylion in Constantinople, was no ordinary icon there to represent an object of devotion’s physical presence, nor even just a cult image like the many miracle-working images which were symbolically hugely important for individual medieval communities; rather it was a “universal symbol” that the Roman Church was also the universal Church46. According to Wolf, just as the Byzantine Mandylion was connected in men’s minds to the emperor at Constantinople as a sacred symbol of his reign, so the Veronica was an icon deliberately associated with the pope, the “Vicar of Christ” (vicarius Christi) – as Innocent iii very deliberately described himself – through its preservation in St Peter’s47. If so, it is not surprising that not only in the spirit of devotion of his predecessor Celestine iii, but as part of a public relations exercise for the city of Rome and an affirmation of his own pontificate, Innocent organized for the procession of the Veronica “a case of gold and silver with precious gems, made especially to carry it reverently”: in other words a monstrance or ostensory in which the Veronica could be transported from St Peter’s to the Hospital of Santo Spirito48. Nevertheless, although Innocent’s project to promote devotion to the Veronica was probably connected to the articulation of the supremacy of Rome and its pope, the Veronica itself was primarily a symbol not of the political, but of the religious climate of the age. It encouraged the idea of a true image of the Holy Face at a time when people were particularly attuned to such devotional images49. In this context Innocent’s promotion of its cult in 27 See Innocent iii,“Ad commemorandas nuptias”,(3 January 1208), pl 215, cols 1270–1271. See also the reference in his sermon,“Dominica Prima Post Epiphaniam”, Sermones de Tempore (n. 26), cols 345–350. See Wolf, “From Mandylion to Veronica” (n. 1), p. 167. 28 Innocent iii, “Ad commemorandas nuptias” (n. 27), cols 1270–1271: “Quia vero non in solo pane vivit homo, sed in omni verbo quod procedit

ex ore Dei, debet huic stationi Romanus pontifex cum suis cardinalibus interesse, ut et missarum soemnia ibi celebret, et exhortatorium faciat de hac celebritate sermonem, neve fidelis populus famelicus ab his nuptiis revertatur, praetor materialem et doctrinalem, spiritualem quoque sibi cibum impendat, remissionem unius anni de injunctis sibi paenitentiis indulgendo”. 29 Clark, “Venerating the Veronica” (n. 3), p. 166. 30 Sand, Vision, Devotion (n. 2), pp. 30–31. 31 “Cronica Apostolicorum et Imperatorum Basileensia”, in Monumenta Germaniae Scriptores, Georg Heinrich Pertz ed., Hannover 1859–1874, vol. xxxi, p. 295: “fecit namque [Innocentius] inter cetera hospitale sancti Spiritus et illud magnis redditibus ampliavit. Instituit siquidem, ut ibi veronica Domini publice monstraretur dominica qua cantatur Nuptie facte sunt”. See Egger,“Papst Innocenz iii. und die Veronica”(n. 1), p. 192. 32 The papal curia’s concern for the poor and sick of Rome during Innocent iii’s pontificate is also shown by the fact that the same year (1208) Ugolino di Conti, the future Pope Gregory ix (1227–1241), founded the hospital of Sant’Ascenzo in Anagni. See Paschal Montaubin, “Bastard Nepotism: Niccolo di Agnani, A Nephew of Pope Gregory ix, and Camerarius of Pope Alexander iv”, in Pope, Church and City. Essays in Honour of Brenda M. Bolton, Frances Andrews, Christoph Egger, Constance M. Rousseau eds, Leiden/Boston 2004, pp. 129–176, sp. pp. 163–164. 33 Van Dijk, “The Veronica, the Vultus Christi”, (n. 17), p. 239. 34 Matthew Paris, Matthaei Parisiensis Monachi Sancti Albani, Chronica Majora ad a. 1216, Henry R. Luard ed., London 1964, vol. 3, p. 8: “tribue nobis quaesumus, ut ita nunc in terris per speculum et in enigmate ipsam [imaginem] adorare et venerari valeamus, ut facie ad faciem venientem judicem Te securi videamus”.See Egger,“Papst Innocenz iii. und die Veronica” (n. 1), p. 202. 35 Matthew Paris, Chronica Majora (n. 34), p. 7: “effigiem vultus Dominici, quae Veronica dicitur”; Egger, “Papst Innocenz iii. und die Veronica” (n. 1), p. 197. 36 Matthew Paris, Chronica Majora (n. 34), p. 7: “ipsa effigies, dum in loco suo aptaretur, se per se girabat, ut verso staret ordine; ita scilicet, ut frons inferius, barba superius locaretur”. See Egger,“Papst Innocenz iii. und die Veronica” (n. 1), p. 198. 37 Sand, Vision, Devotion (n. 2), p. 43. 38 Ibidem, pp. 43–44. 39 Matthew Paris, Chronica Majora (n. 34), p. 7: “Dum vero fortunalis alea statum regni Angliae talibus turbinibus exagitaret, dominus Papa Innocentius, quem vacillantis ecclesiae cura sollicitabat, effigiem vultus Dominici, quae Veronica dicitur, ut moris est, de ecclesia Santi Petri usque ad hospitale Sancti Spiritus reverenter cum procesione bajulabat. Qua peracta, ipsa effigies, dum in loco suo aptaretur, se per se girabat, ut verso staret ordine; ita scilicet, ut frons inferius, barba superius locaretur. Quod nimis abhorrens dominus Papa, credidit illud in triste sibi praesagium evenisse, et ut plenius Deo reconciliaretur, consilio fratrum, in honore ipsius effigiei, quae Veronica dicitur, quandam orationem composuit elegantem; cui adjecit quendam Psalmum, cum quibusdam versiculis, et eadem dicentibus decem direum concessit indulgentiam, ita scilicet, ut quotienscunque repetatur, totiens dicenti tantumdem indulgentiae concedatur. Multi igitur eandem orationem cum pertinentiis memoriae commendarunt, ut eos major accenderet devotio, picturis effigiarunt hoc modo”. See Sand, Vision, Devotion (n. 2), p. 44. Note however, that Sand mistranslates the phrase: “vacillantis ecclesiae cura sollicitabat”. Literally this should read: “whom the concern of a tottering Church was disturbing”. 40 Joseph Clayton, Pope Innocent iii and His Times, with a new Introduction by Philip Campbell, Milwaukee 1941 ca, p. 40. 41 Wolf, “From Mandylion to Veronica” (n. 1), p. 166. 42 A letter dated January 1208 from Innocent to the rector and the brothers of the Hospital of S. Spirito commemorates the institution of this procession. See pl 215, cols 1270–1271. See also Benedictus Canonicus, Ordo Romanus (n. 14), p. 143; Sand, Vision, Devotion (n. 2), p. 30. 43 Egger, “Papst Innocenz iii. und die Veronica” (n. 1), p. 191. 44 Ibidem, p. 183. 45 Sand, Vision, Devotion (n. 2), p. 36. 46 Wolf,“From Mandylion to Veronica”(n. 1), p. 177: “Rather it became an ‘universal symbol’ of the ‘Ecclesia Romana, id est universalis’”. 47 Wolf, “From Mandylion to Veronica” (n. 1), p. 175. 48 Innocent iii,“Ad commemorandas nuptias”(n. 27), col. 1270: “capsam ex auro et argento et lapidibus pretiosis ad hoc specialiter fabrefactam venerabiliter deportetur”; Sand, Vision, Devotion (n. 2), p. 32. 49 Ibidem.

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Rome can be seen as part of a wider reform and renewal of the cult of images. We should therefore regard the Veronica as a sacramental “effigy”, set within a very particular setting of medieval spirituality which drew its origins not least from the twelfth-century devotional writings of St Bernard of Clairvaux (1090–1153) on the Eucharist50. Innocent iii’s actions in propagating the cult of the Veronica were about much more than public relations. They were also about encouraging devotion and in particular penance through pilgrimage to Rome, which would continue for centuries to come [Fig. 1]. According to the anonymous Deeds of Pope Innocent iii, by instituting an indulgence to encourage devotion to the Veronica, Innocent not only used it as an example of how one might gain a spiritual privilege when in Rome through a “work of charity” (ad opera misericordie)51, but deliberately tied its veneration to the idea of penance. In his famous sermon On the Sunday after Epiphany he wrote: “[T]hose who come together for this intention, as in other matters they show themselves more liberal and pious should be remitted one year of the enjoined penance for the greater obtaining of indulgence for sins as thus the bridegroom Christ converts water into wine […]52”.

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1 / A pilgrim badge: pewter badge of the Veronica, found in the Seine in Paris, measurements unknown, 16th century

In other words, those who participated in the procession of the Veronica with true devotion and concomitant alms-giving, were to be endowed with an indulgence for the remission of their sins. By contrast to Innocent iii’s wish to encourage penance through such pilgrimage, or to increase papal-public relations and the glories of his own pontificate, another important aspect of his cultivation of devotion to the Veronica was as part of a wider religious programme of reform and renewal which emphasized the Eucharist as the center of Catholic life. We have seen how Innocent employed a monstrance in the procession of the Veronica with “a case of gold and silver with precious gems, made especially to carry it reverently” from St Peter’s to the Hospital of Santo Spirito53. This reverence towards the Veronica is in line with Innocent’s own personal devotion to relics and icons. We know, for example, that he commissioned a silver-gilt case to hold an icon of the Christ Emmanuel in the Sancta Sanctorum chapel of St John Lateran54.

Innocent was especially devoted to reverencing the Eucharist. Given that before he became pope, as Lothar dei Segni, he had in the 1190s composed the theological tract De missarum mysteriis (On the Mysteries of the Mass), his continuing interest in Eucharistic devotion when he became pope is not surprising55. It was manifested publicly in the Church in the first of the constitutions issued at the Fourth Lateran Council: a Council presided over by Innocent himself, which in 1215 proclaimed the theory of transubstantiation to explain the doctrine of the Real Presence56. Lateran iv formally decreed that: “His body and blood are truly contained in the sacrament of the altar under the forms of bread and wine, the bread and wine having been changed in substance, by God’s power, into his body and blood, so that in order to achieve this mystery of unity we receive from God what he received from us. Nobody can effect this sacrament except a priest who has been properly ordained according to the church’s keys, which Jesus Christ himself gave to the apostles and their successors57”.

By the time of the institution of the feast of Corpus Christi in 1264, during the pontificate of Pope Urban iv (1261–1264) and forty-eight years after Innocent iii’s death, the veneration of the Eucharist had become a dominant theme in lay and civic devotion58. This desire to emphasize the Eucharist as the devotional center of Catholicism is seen in Innocent’s association of the Veronica with Christian Charity by an interpretation of the Marriage Feast at Cana as described in St John’s Gospel (Jn 2, 1–11) at which Jesus miraculously changed water into wine. In Ad commemorandas nuptias Innocent wrote: “Jesus and his disciples went as guests to the wedding at Cana in Galilee […] and for that reason, most sensibly, we institute that the image of Jesus Christ be carried down from the basilica of blessed Peter by the canons to the said hospital59”.

Hence Innocent deliberately linked the Veronica with the story of the Wedding Feast of Cana, the first Gospel intimation of the sacrament of the Eucharist and hence of the mystery of the Mass. Innocent’s reading of the Wedding Feast at Cana is unsurprising, given his interest in developing the theology of the sacrament of marriage. Before becoming pope, he had written a treatise on marriage, the Liber de quadripartita specie nuptiarum

(On the Four Kinds of Marriage), which, never as popular as his De miseria humanae conditionis (On the Misery of the Human Condition), was nevertheless influential in its emphasis not only on the historical, allegorical, tropological and anagogical nature of marriage, but also on its sacramental nature. And as pope, in his letters and sermons, he allegorized the story of the Marriage Feast at Cana in terms of the transformation of Mercy into Charity. So, for example, in his sermon Dominica Prima Post Epiphaniam he wrote: “Water becomes wine, just as the result of Mercy is given shape by the disposition of Charity”60. It is therefore hardly surprising to see Innocent emphasizing the Veronica’s ostentation as an occasion for the performance of Charity61. In Ad commemorandas nuptias he insisted that the annual 50 Wolf, “From Mandylion to Veronica” (n. 1), p. 176. 51 Innocent iii,“Gesta Innocentii iii”,pl 214, col. 203A: “…ad audiendum et intelligendum sermonem exhortatorium, quem ibi facere debet Romanus pontifex de operibus pietatis, et ad promerendam et obtinendam indulgentiam peccatorum quam exercentibus se ad opera misericordiae pollicetur: ad quae ut alios non solum verbis provocet, sed exemplis, egenibus omnibus, ad illas spirituales nuptias concurrentibus, panes, carnes, et denarios constituit elargiri: quorum omnium rationem idem prudentissisimus praesul exposuit in homilia quam super illius diei evangelium exaravit”. See Egger, “Papst Innocenz iii. und die Veronica” (n. 1), p. 190. 52 See Innocent iii, “Dominica Prima Post Epiphaniam”, Sermones de Tempore (n. 26), col. 350: “qui hac in tentatione conveniunt, ut de caetero liberalius et hilarius se exhibuerint salubriter celebrare, de injunctis poenitentiis unus remittitur annus ad ampliorem obtinendam indulgentiam, peccatorum ut sic aquam convertat in vimum sponsus Christus”. See Egger, “Papst Innocenz iii. und die Veronica” (n. 1), pp. 190–191. 53 Innocent iii,“Ad commemorandas nuptias”(n. 27), col. 1270: “capsam ex auro et argento et lapidibus pretiosis ad hoc specialiter fabrefactam venerabiliter deportetur”. See Sand, Vision, Devotion (n. 2), p. 32. 54 Ibidem. 55 Lothar dei Segni, “De missarum mysteriis”, pl 217, cols 773–916. 56 Constitution 1 of Lateran iv in Decrees of the Ecumenical Councils, Vol. 1: Nicaea i to Lateran v, Norman P. Tanner ed., London 1990, pp. 230–231. For discussion of the verb transsubstantiare and the fact that its meaning remained uncertain for centuries see Gary Macy,“The Dogma of Transubstantiation in the Middle Ages”, Journal of Ecclesiastical History, xliv (1994), pp. 11–41. 57 Decrees of the Ecumenical Councils (n. 56), p. 230: “cuius corpus et sanguis in sacramento altaris sub speciebus panis et vini veraciter continentur, transsubstantiatis pane in corpus et vino in sanguinem potestate divina, ut ad perficiendum mysterium unitatis accipiamus ipsi de suo, quod accepit ipse de nostro. Et hoc utique sacramentum nemo potest conficere, nisi sacerdos, qui fuerit rite ordinatus secundum claves ecclesiae, quas ipse concessit apostolis et eorum successoribus Iesus Christus”. 58 Rubin, Corpus Christi (n. 3), p. 272. 59 Innocent iii, “Ad commemorandas nuptias” (n. 27), col. 1270: “Quia vero Jesus cum dicipulis suis ad has nuptias in Cana Galileae, ubi mater ejus erat, legitur invitatus, idcirco rationabiliter instituimus ut effigies Jesu Christi a beati Petri basilica per ejusdem canonicos ad dictum hospitale, […] deportetur […]”. See Sand, Vision, Devotion (n. 2), p. 31. 60 Innocent iii, “Dominica Prima Post Epiphaniam”, Sermones de Tempore (n. 26), col. 350: “Aqua fit vinum, cum effectus misericordiae charitatis informatur affectu”. 61 Ibidem. See also the discussion of charity in “Dominica Laetare, Sive de Rosa”, Sermones de Tempore (n. 26), col. 396. See Sand, Vision, Devotion (n. 2), p. 31.

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procession and ostentation of the Veronica must coincide with a donation from papal alms in which one thousand of the poor of Rome and three hundred inmates of the hospital would be given “three denari, one for bread, another for wine, and another for meat”62. In so doing, he reminded the faithful of biblical texts associated with the Eucharist: the Feeding of the Five Thousand (Mt 14, 13–21; Mk 6, 30–44; Lk 9, 10–17; Jn 6, 1–15) and the Marriage Feast itself (Jn 2, 1–11)63. So, through feeding the poor and disenfranchised of Rome – a metaphor for the Feeding of the Five Thousand and the Marriage Feast of Cana – Innocent highlighted the relationship between Christ and his vicar, the pope: certainly a public relations exercise. Yet Innocent also had a devotional goal: to emphasize the relationship between the Veronica and Christ. In his role as spiritual leader of western Europe, he was affirming, through devotion to the Veronica, that the Church alone could offer divine food through the Eucharistic sacrifice64. The Veronica had become a Eucharistic icon. Thus, Innocent’s efforts to popularize devotion to the Veronica should be seen in tandem with the Church’s deliberate and expanding visual “activation” of the infinitely “reproducible” body of Christ, truly present – if hidden from sight – in the “veil” of the Host65. In this context Sand has interpreted the Eucharistic nature of the image of the Veronica, and in particular the cruciform halo imprinted with Christ’s head, as referring visually to the Host, especially as contained in a reliquary, the metaphorical equivalent of a tabernacle66. As we shall see, later English and other images of the Veronica concentrated not on the uniqueness and materiality of the Veronica in Rome, but rather on the image itself now freed from the control of the papacy – but they too employed the metaphor of the Eucharist67. So, for example, in one early fourteenth-century English manuscript, Matthew Paris’s Office of Innocent iii, is represented by an illustration of the elevation of the Host rather than of Christ’s Holy Face68. We must always remember that the laity had restricted access to the Host in the later thirteenth century, so that substitute experiences such as that of the Veronica were highly sought after. The idea of “spiritual communion”, first proposed by

St Anselm of Canterbury (ca 1033–1109) in the early twelfth century, arose from fervent visual attention to the elevated Host, and we know that by the late thirteenth century, some clergy were worried that congregants often attended only the elevation and not the other parts of the liturgy69. Sand has pointed to the fact that the specifically Eucharistic connotations of the Holy Face were developed at a time when lay people were especially desirous for the sight of the Host’s elevation, so much so that they were avid to include Eucharistic elements in their own private devotions70. Innocent did not encourage the cult of Veronica in Rome merely to provide a “contact relic”of Christ to bring about the healing of patients at the Hospital of Santo Spirito, although this was important to him. His agenda was much more complex. Before we conclude our history of an important Roman stage in the history of the Veronica, it will not be irrelevant to our understanding of its significance in its time and place if we glance (however briefly) at its somewhat later non-Roman history. Innocent iii’s actions to encourage devotion to the Veronica in Rome were to have wide-ranging, long-term implications which he could not have foreseen. Not long after his death in 1216 there appeared the Ave facies praeclara – the Office of the Holy Face: part of a sequence of prayers attached to papal indulgences, which became known as the Office of Innocent iii71. We know that the Office involved twice repeating the words “Pray for us, Blessed Veronica, that we may be deemed worthy of the promises of Christ”72. This Office of Innocent iii, attributed to Innocent iii by Matthew Paris, appears in several manuscripts from the thirteenth century73. It includes a ten-day indulgence granted to those who devoutly repeat a prayer in honor of the Holy Face, and, according to Matthew, was said to have been written by Innocent himself: hence the indulgence became directly associated with him74. Yet many indulgences were associated with popes who did not grant them, and there is no evidence that Innocent himself instigated this particular one; although Matthew Paris attributes the prayer to Innocent, it is found nowhere in his known writings75. Thus, whereas Innocent intended to tie the indulgence specifically to Rome, here we have

an indulgence which soon slipped out of papal control. Ironically, Innocent’s idea of encouraging public profession of faith through devotion to the Veronica specifically in Rome, soon became a catalyst for much wider, non-Roman, private devotion. So a private devotion, associated with, but not initiated by, Innocent, developed out of the pope’s very public propagation of devotion to the Veronica in Rome. We have both the autograph manuscript of Matthew Paris’s Chronica Majora dated to around 1250, and an addition from circa 1240 to an illustrated Psalter of the 1220s, also attributed to Matthew Paris, which scholars refer to respectively as the Chronica Majora Veronica and the Arundel Veronica76. In the Arundel Veronica, the Office of Innocent iii is to be found under a miniature picture of the Veronica, and includes the prayer Matthew Paris later in his Chronica Majora attributed to Innocent iii77. Hence the Arundel Veronica is the earliest testimony we have to the prayer and the Office. The prayer from the Arundel Veronica reads: “Lord, you have left behind for us, who are marked by the light of your face, the image imprinted on the cloth of Veronica as your memento. Grant, for the sake of your Passion and the cross, that we who now adore on this earth in a mirror and a parable, shall one day see you face to face as judge, on the good side. Who lives and rules with God the Father in unity with the Holy Spirit, forever and ever. Amen78”.

Hence, to gain the indulgence of ten days one needed to recite the formal prayer and to repeat a verse from the Psalms79. What is so striking is not only that this prayer and the Office become so important but also the interpretation of the image of the Veronica itself. We see here the beginnings of what would go on to develop as the quasi-sacramental nature of copies of the image of the Veronica to be used in private self-reflective devotions. Certainly, we know that these “copies” which are first found in English manuscripts were supposed to be “vessels of contemplation”, concomitant to the prayer which would gain the indulgence 80. We do not know why Matthew Paris referred to the Veronica, but he may have connected it with the association of papal indulgences to devotion to the object and the reciting of the Ave facies praeclara in 1243 by one of Innocent iii’s successors, Pope Innocent iv (1243–1254). This,

however, is problematic since there is no evidence beyond an anecdote to connect Innocent iv with Ave facies praeclara, which appears from its metrical arrangement – which scholars have pointed out was never used by Innocent iv – to date from the fourteenth century. Between the beginning and the middle of the thirteenth century, practices of granting indulgences changed considerably, and Innocent iii – to whom Matthew Paris attributed the indulgence – generally tried to limit rather than expand the practice – except in the case of crusading where, for example, he encouraged the commutation and redemption of crusader vows. Alexa Sand has argued that Matthew Paris’s association of indulgence with the prayer and image of the Veronica may have been an attempt to give a more liberal and bountiful interpretation to Innocent iii’s letter Ad commemorandas nuptias which, as we have seen, helped to encourage devotion to the Veronica through the establishment of a procession through the streets of Rome81. Certainly the anonymous Deeds of Pope Innocent iii stated rather generally that the pope established the procession of the Veronica “in order to promote and obtain indulgence for sinners”82. It seems that 62 Innocent iii, “Ad commemorandas nuptias” (n. 27), col. 1270: “tres denarios, unum pro pane alterum pro vino, aliumque pro carne”. See Sand, Vision, Devotion (n. 2), p. 31. 63 Mt 14, 13–21; Mk 6, 30–44; Lk 9, 10–17; Jn 6, 1–15; Jn 2, 1–11; see Biblia sacra iuxta Vulgatam versionem, 2 vols, R. Weber ed., Stuttgart 1975. 64 Sand, Vision, Devotion (n. 2), p. 31. 65 Wolf, “From Mandylion to Veronica” (n. 1), p. 168: “manducatio per visum”. 66 Sand, Vision, Devotion (n. 2), p. 55. 67 Ibidem. 68 Ibidem, p. 57. 69 Ibidem, pp. 55–56. 70 Ibidem, p. 28. 71 Wolf, “From Mandylion to Veronica” (n. 1), p. 165; Sand, Vision, Devotion (n. 2), p. 201. 72 Matthew Paris, Chronica Majora (n. 34), ol. 3, p. 8: “Ora pro nobis, beata Veronica. U[t] d[igni] ef[ficiamur] pro[missionibus] Ch[risti]”. See Egger, “Papst Innocenz iii. und die Veronica” (n. 1), p. 201. 73 Sand, Vision, Devotion (n. 2), pp. 81–83. 74 Wolf, “From Mandylion to Veronica” (n. 1), p. 168. See Dobschütz, Christusbilder (n. 14), p. 294. 75 Sand, Vision, Devotion (n. 2), pp. 45–46. 76 Ibidem, p. 38. 77 Ibidem. 78 Ibidem, pp. 38–39. 80 Wolf, “From Mandylion to Veronica” (n. 1), p. 170. 81 For the full text of the letter of Innocent iii, see Innocent iii, “Ad commemorandas nuptias” (n. 27), cols 1270–1271; Sand, Vision, Devotion (n. 2), p. 42. 82 Innocent iii,“Gesta Innocentii iii”,pl 214, col. 203a: “Ad promerendam et obtinendam indulgentiam peccatorum”. Sand mistakenly attributes this statement to “Ad commemorandas nuptias” when it is in fact from the “Gesta Innocentii iii”. See Sand, Vision, Devotion (n. 2), pp. 42, 308, n. 71.

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2 / A pilgrim badge: pewter badge of the Veronica, found in Gdansk (Poland), 8,7 g, 42 x 34 mm, 14th century

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Matthew Paris’s point was that one didn’t need to make a pilgrimage to Rome to see the Veronica to gain spiritually, since a “homemade” image would do equally well83. Indeed, Sand has argued that through his depiction of the Veronica in the Chronica Majora, Matthew may have deliberately undermined the idea that the papacy in Rome alone had the monopoly on controlling and regularizing access to Christ’s Face – that is possible given his general hostility to Innocent iii’s pontificate84. Hence from the late thirteenth century it seems that the pious could gain the spiritual benefits of contemplating the Veronica whether or not they went to Rome to do so. Indeed, the private devotee might get a better experience through a private devotional picture rather than making a pilgrimage to the Eternal City. As we have seen, according to Matthew Paris’s account of the Roman procession of 1216, the Veronica had on that occasion turned upside down; by contrast, the reader of Matthew Paris’s text could contemplate the image the right way up85. So the indulgence of ten days granted for viewing the Veronica in the comfort of one’s own home was not bound to a pilgrimage to Rome

but was rather a “mediatisation” of the image86. Of course, given Matthew’s concerns about Innocent iii’s pontificate and in particular his desire at all times to assert Benedictine autonomy from Rome, it is not surprising to see his “revisionist” account of the Veronica in his chronicle and find him claiming this was more than sufficient for devotion87. Yet it is an important change of emphasis, since Innocent’s vision for the Veronica as a vehicle for pilgrimage and a symbol of universal papal power, has become so universal a symbol as to negate the very reason Innocent had propagated the cult in the first place, namely to encourage pilgrimage to Rome [Fig. 2]. To conclude, the cultivation of the cult of the Veronica in Rome was not just an exercise in public relations to foster the growth of papal power, nor was the Veronica itself merely a soothing relic for the sick, nor just a suitable devotional object for pilgrims to Rome, exploited to highlight the importance of establishing a Station, nor was it even simply a symbol of the religious climate of an age. It was all those things, and more. It must also be understood in the light of Innocent iii’s particular and personal devotion to the Eucharist as manifested through his letters and sermons. That before he became pope, Lothar dei Segni had composed the theological tract De missarum mysteriis, reveals Innocent’s life-long devotion to propagating the idea of the Real Presence which was finally given formal expression through the theory of transubstantiation at the Fourth Lateran Council of 1215. Furthermore, Innocent’s devotion to the Veronica should be viewed in terms of his own dynamic and complex character which saw no necessary dichotomy between the political and the devotional. The phenomenon of the Roman Veronica tells us not only much about the nature of medieval piety but gives us a (literally) iconic insight into the Eucharistic devotional priorities of one of the most pastoral as well as political popes of the High Middle Ages. 83 84 85 86 87

Sand, Vision, Devotion (n. 2), p. 45. Ibidem, p. 42; Clayton, Pope Innocent iii (n. 40), p. 40. Sand, Vision, Devotion (n. 2), p. 46. Wolf, “From Mandylion to Veronica” (n. 1), pp. 168–169. Sand, Vision, Devotion (n. 2), p. 47.

summary

Inocenc iii. a Veroničina rouška Prostředek papežské reprezentace či eucharistická ikona?

Článek Rebeccy Rist se věnuje propagaci kultu tzv. římského Veraikonu papežem Inocencem iii. (1198–1216). Veraikon, jehož uctívání Inocenc podpořil v roce 1208, se ve třináctém století stal jedním z ústředních cílů římských poutí a nadále v průběhu čtrnáctého a patnáctého století představoval důležitý zdroj laické zbožnosti. V dlouhodobém horizontu Inocencovy snahy nevedly pouze k prosazování myšlenky pravého obrazu Svaté Tváře – a to v období obzvláště vnímavém k posvátným obrazům – ale také k rozšíření kultu Corpus Christi. Autorka zkoumá, zda bylo Inocencovo prosazování kultu bravurním kouskem, který měl posílit jak pozici Říma, tak také papežského stolce i Inocencova pontifikátu, nebo jestli se jednalo spíše o součást náboženského programu reformy, která stavěla do středu katolického života eucharistii. Rist se zabývá důvody, které papeže k podpoře kultu Veraikonu vedly. Za prvé, Veraikon nacházel uplatnění ve veřejném prostoru, kde zajišťoval posílení a růst papežské moci. Za druhé se jednalo o relikvii tišící utrpení nemocných. Za třetí, na Veraikon se soustředil zájem mnoha

poutníků, kteří houfně přicházeli navštívit římská posvátná místa a pro něž Inocenc ustanovil liturgické statio v Ospedale Santo Spirito spojené s procesím. Za čtvrté se jednalo o důležitý symbol tehdejší náboženské atmosféry. Avšak kromě těchto důvodů je třeba Inocencův zájem o kult Vera­ ikonu chápat také ve světle jeho vlastního uctívání eucharistie, jež dokládají jeho dopisy a kázání. Lothar ze Segni, ještě než se stal papežem, sepsal teologický traktát De missarum mysteriis (O tajemství mše), jenž odhaluje jeho celoživotní zanícení pro prosazování myšlenky „skutečné přítomnosti“, která byla nakonec oficiálně vyjádřena teorií transsubstanciace na Čtvrtém lateránském koncilu v roce 1215. Inocencovo uctívání Veroničiny roušky souviselo také s jeho svéráznou a dynamickou povahou nevnímající rozdíl mezi věcmi světskými a náboženskými. Fenomén římského Veraikonu nám tedy nejen odhaluje mnohé o povaze středověké zbožnosti, ale nabízí nám doslova ikonický vhled do způsobů eucharistické úcty Inocence iii. – jednoho z největších církevních vůdců a zároveň z nejpolitičtějších papežů pozdního středověku.

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Abstract — Quaesivi vultum tuum. Liturgy, figura, and Christ’s Presence­  —  For medieval Christians, the figural, typological meaning is of the greatest importance in trying to make sense of historical events. There are not only figural meanings in the events of the past – i.e., those recounted in the Old Testament – that are fulfilled in the New Testament, but also in the events taking place after the life of Christ. Within this framework, the topic of God’s Face finds its meaning: the Holy Face is not only a relic, but also – or even primarily – a real figura. Keywords Comparative literature, classical tradition, history of liturgy, Late Antiquity, Latin, Christian Latin, medieval Latin Guido Milanese Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Milano Università della Svizzera Italiana, Lugano [email protected]

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Quaesivi vultum tuum Liturgy, figura, and Christ’s Presence1 Guido Milanese

The Introit Tibi dixit, unobtrusively placed by the traditional Catholic calendar during the second week of Lent2, has been treated with much more consideration in the new liturgical calendars, where it has been moved to the preceding Sunday, and also to the Feast of the Transfiguration on August 63. The text deals with man’s desire to see God’s face: Tibi dixit cor meum: quaesivi vultum tuum, My heart has said to Thee, I have sought Thy Face, vultum tuum, Domine, requiram: Thy Face, O Lord, will I seek, ne avertas faciem tuam a me. Turn not Thy Face from me. Dominus illuminatio mea et salus mea: The Lord is my light and my salvation: quem timebo? whom shall I fear? tibi dixit cor meum exquisivit facies mea faciem tuam Domine requiram ne avertas faciem tuam a me

As is visible on the notation [Fig. 1], the melodic setting is very interesting, and the main words are clearly emphasized: see the melodic development above dixit and the first vultum, and the “large” notes on quæsivi and requiram. The image shows the melody as edited by the 1908 edition of the Vatican Gradual, with some necessary adjustments (wrong pitches in the 1908 edition and improved rendering of the ancient neumes)4. The neumes featured by medieval manuscripts are very consistent indeed: see for example 1

My warmest thanks to Alberto Cavalleri, Marco Gozzi, and Fr. Marco Rainini o. p. for their kind help and suggestions. At the time of writing, I could not yet see Claudia Bino, Il dramma e l'immagine. Teorie cristiane della rappresentazione (ii–xi sec.), Firenze 2015, a very interesting work that I would like to discuss elsewhere. 2 Cf. René-Jean Hesbert, Antiphonale Missarum Sextuplex, Rome 1935, n. 48a. 3 See Graduale Triplex: seu, Graduale Romanum Pauli pp.vi cura recognitum & rhythmicis signis a Solesmensibus monachis ornatum, neumis Laudunensibus (cod. 239) et Sangallensibus (Codicum Sangallensis 359 et Einsidlensis 121) nunc auctum, Solesmis 1979, p. 88. 4 See Graduale novum editio magis critica iuxta sc 117: seu Graduale Sanctae Romanae Ecclesiae Pauli pp.vi cura recognitum, ad exemplar ordinis cantus missae dispositum, luce codicum antiquiorum restitutum nutu sancti Oecumenici Concilii Vaticani ii, neumis Laudunensibus et Sangallensibus ornatum, i: De Dominicis et Festis, Johannes Berchmans Göschl ed., Regensburg 2011, vol. i, p. 69. I have transcribed the melody myself, while making use of this edition and of the extensive bibliography on the subject (for a useful list see [http://gregorien.info/chant/id/8111/0/de]).

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1 / Notation of the Introit Tibi dixit, as edited by the 1908 edition of the Vatican Gradual

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manuscript from Einsiedeln, Stiftsbibliothek 121 [Fig. 2]; the neumes show that the keywords (quae-

sivi, vultum, requiram, faciem) must be performed clearly, without hurrying. It is impressive to note that, although a very short composition, so many words are “underlined” by the composer5. The desire to see God facie ad faciem is a cornerstone of Hebrew and Christian spiritual life. From the book of Exodus onwards, seeing God’s face has always been the deepest desire of man, as well as his greatest fear. God talks to Moses facie ad faciem, sicut loqui solet homo ad amicum suum (Ex 33, 11: “and the Lord spake unto Moses face to face, as a man speaketh unto his friend”), but a few lines later, God says that seeing His face is impossible for human beings, who will die as a consequence of seeing Him (non poteris videre faciem meam; non enim videbit me homo et vivet). This dialectic tension between desire and prohibition, between attraction and horror, makes up the cultural and anthropological environment of the devotion to Veronica and the various Holy Faces: if no man has ever seen God directly (θεὸν οὐδεὶς ἑώρακεν πώποτε; John 1, 18), it is nevertheless

possible to see Jesus’ face: in the Incarnation God accepts being seen. This is just an example – other liturgical texts develop the same theme, such as e.g. the Introit of Thursday on the fourth Sunday of Lent (Ps 105, 3–4): Lætetur cor quærentium Dóminum: quærite Dominum, et confirmamini: quærite faciem ejus semper. Let the heart of them rejoice that seek the Lord: seek the Lord, and be strengthened; seek His face evermore.

The liturgical text is comprehensible only within the framework of the exegetic tradition of the Bible: from Late Antiquity to the medieval schools, one of the most powerful analytical weapons was the relationship between ancient events and contemporary life, or between the Old and the New Testament. This relationship – for example, Abraham’s sacrifice and Christ’s sacrifice – was frequently called figura, translating the Greek word τύπος. The importance of figura–τύπος was studied in a seminal article by the German philologist and comparative scholar Erich Auerbach6. Trying to deepen his understanding of Dante’s realism, a topic he had already dealt with in his

dissertation Dante als Dichter der irdischen Welt, Auerbach noticed that scholars interpreted characters in the Comedy either as allegories, or as real people. For example, Pierre Mandonnet, the great theologian and philologist, could make sense of Dante’s Beatrice either as a pure allegory, or as “la petite Bice Portinari”, as he ironically wrote – the two interpretations were intended as mutually exclusive. The patristic and medieval notion of figura makes it possible to understand the meaning of Beatrice as well as of many other characters in Dante’s world, and, moreover, is necessary to make sense of the medieval way of looking at history and at human experience. Using the title of C. S. Lewis’s book, figura is a component of the Discarded Image of the medieval mind7. Quoting Auerbach’s words: “Figural interpretation establishes a connection between two events or persons, the first of which signifies not only itself but also the second, while the second encompasses or fulfils the first. The two poles of the figure are separate in time, but both, being real events or figures, are within time, within the stream of historical life 8 ”.

5

6

7 8

“By the composer” because all the other ancient manuscripts agree almost completely with Einsiedeln 121, testifying to a common European tradition, i.e. one musical composition and not a galaxy of oral traditions. The manuscript I referred to is Einsiedeln, Stiftsbibliothek 121, p. 122 ([http://www.e-codices.unifr.ch]). This manuscript, a Graduale–Sequentiarium written in Einsiedeln around 960–970, is of the greatest importance for the study of Gregorian Chant. A description (in German) of the manuscript and bibliography is provided online by P. Dr. Odo Lang osb: see [http:// www.e-codices.unifr.ch/en/description/sbe/0121]. The photograph of the manuscript is used according to the terms of [http://www.ecodices.unifr.ch/en/about/terms]. Erich Auerbach, “Figura”, Archivum Romanicum, xxii (1938), pp. 436–489, reprinted later in Neue Dantestudien, Istanbul 1944, pp. 11–71. English translation: “Figura”, in Erich Auerbach, Scenes from the Drama of European Literature, Minneapolis 1984, pp. 11–76; Italian translation: “Figura”, in Studi su Dante, Dante Della Terza ed., Milan 1966, pp. 174–220. Auerbach acknowledges his debts, for example to Étienne Gilson, but his essay is undoubtedly the “Epochenmacher” in this field. Auerbach quotes Gilson’s Les idées et les lettres, Paris 1955 and the essay “Le Moyen âge et l’histoire” in Étienne Gilson, L’esprit de la philosophie medievale, Paris 1948, pp. 365–382. Later Gilson published his own book on Dante: Dante et la philosophie, Paris 1953 (English translation Dante the philosopher, David Moore trans., London 1948), but he does not refer to Auerbach. The literature published on Auerbach and “Figura” is very extensive: let me refer only to the fascinating pages of Piero Boitani, Letteratura europea e Medioevo volgare, Bologna 2007, pp. 470–483 and to the collection of essays edited by Seth Lerer, Literary History and the Challenge of Philology: the Legacy of Erich Auerbach, Stanford, ca 1996. Two essays are worth mentioning: John David Dawson, “The Figure in the Fulfillment: Erich Auerbach”, in John David Dawson, Christian Figural Reading and the Fashioning of Identity, Berkeley, ca / London 2002, pp. 83–113 and “The Preservation of Historical Reality: Auerbach and Origen”, in Ibidem, pp. 114–126. Clive Staples Lewis, The Discarded Image: an Introduction to Medieval and Renaissance Literature, Cambridge 1964. Auerbach, “Figura” (n. 6), p. 53.

2 / Introit Tibi dixit in a Graduale–Sequentiarium, Einsielden, c. 960–970 / Einsiedeln, Stiftsbibliothek, ms 121

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Therefore, Virgil is both the historical Virgil and Dante’s guide, just as the Jewish Passover is both a historical reality of the Old Covenant and a reality of the New Testament, where the events of the Old Covenant find their fulfilment; in this case, the resurrection of the Lord fulfils the Jewish Pesach: “Virgil is not an allegory of an attribute, virtue, capacity, power, or historical institution. He is neither reason nor poetry nor the Empire. He is Virgil himself. Virgil in the Divine Comedy is the historical Virgil himself, but then again he is not; for the historical Virgil is only a figura of the fulfilled truth that the poem reveals, and this fulfillment is more real, more significant than the figura9”.

Auerbach was not the only scholar to develop an interest in this topic. The most compelling alternative is undoubtedly Friedrich Ohly’s impressive work on typology. Ohly’s academic career was completely different from the careers of older scholars, particularly Auerbach and Spitzer: a typical example of the German innere Migration – with Curtius’ self-exile possibly having been an example – he spent nine years as a prisoner of war in Russia, only resuming his teaching career in 1954, at the age of forty10. From his earliest works, Ohly’s research concentrated on the problem of meaning in medieval culture – not only in literature, but also in the wider history of arts, particularly architecture, philosophy, theology and Bible studies, even if he called himself a “philologist”. He published his works: “in scattered places over the course of half a century […] by avoiding the ‘magnum opus’, I favored things that were smaller in scope; I preferred to cut a path into the distance, engage in the pursuit across open country and bring the more general into sight on the basis of the particular11”.

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His two “magna opera” are in fact collected papers, published in 1977 and in 1995, one year before his death12. Ohly’s influence beyond the Germanspeaking world was also limited because most of his works were translated either when he was old or after his death13. Ohly refused to recognize too much originality in Auerbach’s essay on figura: for him, the forerunners of his own research on typology were other scholars, particularly Julius Schwietering, one of Ohly’s teachers14. Despite

Ohly’s deep and painstaking research, however, Auerbach’s work was the Epochenmacher in this area15. But a challenging problem immediately arises. The New Testament fulfils the Old Covenant: but what is the “figural status” of all the time since Jesus lived? Is the time between the Incarnation and Doomsday “deprived” of any figural–typological sense16? Let us begin with Auerbach. In his Neue Dantestudien, where “Figura” was reprinted in 1944, the chapter immediately following “Figura” is “St. Francis of Assisi in Dante’s ‘Commedia’”: Francis of Assisi offers an example of imitatio, a sort of “reverse” figura17: “Now the integral imitation with which we are dealing here in the mystical marriage of Francis with Poverty is as it were a recurring figure; it repeats certain characteristic themes of Christ’s life, renews them and revivifies them for all to see, and at the same time renews the office of Christ as the good shepherd whom the herd must follow […]. The figure and the imitation together make an image of the completed ideological view of history whose center is the incarnation of Christ”.

Auerbach’s scheme could be aptly represented as on the diagram on the next page [Fig. 3]. Is this explanation satisfactory? I am afraid it is not as simple as Auerbach suggests. An essential problem was raised by Ohly18: “The ecclesiological exegesis of the New Testament – i.e. of the Biblical antitype – does not feature a typological nature, since Christ continues to live in his Church, but he does not return enhanced. The Eucharist renews Christ’s Last Supper, it does not increase it”.

Therefore, present events (what happens within the Church: after the Resurrection but before the End of Time: call it “Our Life”) cannot have a typological relationship to what happened during the life of Christ – which makes perfect sense, given that the antitypus adimplet (erfüllt, fulfils) the typus. In Ohly’s words: “Bei der Typologie kehrt ein Geschehen der alten Zeit in einem Geschehen der Neuen Zeit wieder, und zwar in gesteigerter Spiegelung”19. Auerbach called this relationship imago and not figura – an appealing means of escape20:

however, the Fathers of the Church use figura not only when referring to the Old Testament – New Testament relationship, but also when referring to the New Testament – Our Life relationship. Therefore, it is true that the figura of the resurrection of Jesus is the ancient Passover; but we know from the Fathers that a sacrament, particularly the Eucharist, is also figura: “Dicit sacerdos: Fac nobis, inquit, hanc oblationem scriptam, rationabilem, acceptabilem, quod est figura corporis et sanguinis domini nostri Iesu Christi. Qui pridie quam pateretur, in sanctis manibus suis accepit panem, respexit ad caelum, ad te, sancte pater omnipotens aeterne deus, gratias agens benedixit, fregit, fractumque apostolis et discipulis suis tradidit dicens: accipite et edite ex hoc omnes; hoc est enim corpus meum, quod pro multis confringetur. – Adverte! [22.] Similiter etiam calicem, postquam cenatum est, pridie quam pateretur, accepit, respexit ad caelum, ad te, sancte pater omnipotens aeterne deus, gratias agens benedixit, apostolis et discipulis suis tradidit dicens: accipite et bibite ex hoc omnes; hic est enim sanguis meus21.”

Unfortunately, scholars in the field of liturgy and liturgical history have made little or no use of Ohly’s and Auerbach’s research, as most scholars in the field of Classical and medieval philology have 9 Auerbach, “Figura” (n. 6), p. 71. 10 On Ohly’s life and works see Samuel P. Jaffe, “Philology as ‘Aesthetic Science’ (Kunstwissenshaft) and ‘Human Science’ (Humanwissenschaft): In Memoriam Friedrich Ohly (1914–1996)”, in Friedrich Ohly, Sensus Spiritualis: Studies in Medieval Significs and the Philology of Culture, Samuel P. Jaffe ed., Chicago, il / London 2005, pp. 370–393. About Ohly, the best account is again Boitani, Letteratura europea (n. 6), pp. 499–511. 11 Ohly’s “Preface” to Sensus Spiritualis (n. 10), pp. xiii–xv. One cannot but recall the words of Sebastiano Timpanaro, the great Italian classicist, who labelled a volume of his collected papers “gli ‘scritti minori’ di un filologo che non ha al suo attivo ‘scritti maggiori’” (Sebastiano Timpanaro, Contributi di filologia e di storia della lingua latina, Rome 1978, p. 7.) 12 Friedrich Ohly, Schriften zur mittelalterlichen Bedeutungsforschung, Darmstadt 1977; Idem, Ausgewählte und neue Schriften zur Literaturgeschichte und zur Bedeutungsforschung, Uwe Ruberg, Dietmar Peil eds, Stuttgart 1995. 13 Two collections of Ohly’s papers were published in Italian during Ohly’s life: Geometria e memoria. Lettera e allegoria nel Medioevo, Lea Ritter Santini ed., Bruno Argenton, Maria Augusta Coppola trans., Bologna 1985; Tipologia: forma di pensiero della storia, with a foreword by Maria Augusta Coppola, Messina 1994). In English, a similar volume was prepared under Ohly’s supervision but published after his death (Sensus spiritualis [n. 10]). All these books feature collections of essays selected by Italian and American editors, thus not being complete translations of the two German books. The catalogue of the Bibliothèque Nationale de France does not list any edition of collected essays in French. For the sake of completeness, a virtue much praised by Ohly, I shall mention the early Italian translation, as a separate book, of the essay about the Duomo of Siena, more recently published as a chapter in the American collection, and, again in English and Italian, “Der Verfluchte und der Erwählte”. See Die Kathedrale als Zeitraum: zum Dom von Siena, Berlin 1972 (= La cattedrale come spazio dei tempi: il Duomo di Siena, Siena 1979; “The Cathedral as Temporal Space:

on the Duomo of Siena”, in Ohly, Sensus spiritualis [n. 10], pp. 136–233); Der Verfluchte und der Erwählte: vom Leben mit der Schuld, Opladen 1976 (= The Damned and the Elect: Guilt in Western Culture, Linda Archibald trans., Cambridge 1992; Il dannato e l’eletto: vivere con la colpa, Bologna 2001). Whenever possible, I cite the English translation of Ohly’s essay, otherwise the German original text and the Italian translation if available. 14 Ohly refers to an essay originally published in 1925: Julius Schwietering,“Typologisches in mittelalterlichen Dichtungen”, in Philologische Schriften, Friedrich Ohly, Max Wehrli eds, Munich 1969, pp. 269–281. In his early essay (1958) “Vom geistigen Sinn des Wortes im Mittelalter”, in Friedrich Ohly, Schriften zur mittelalterlichen Bedeutungsforschung (n. 12), pp. 1–31, sp. p. 332 (= “On the Spiritual Sense of the Word in the Middle Ages”, in Ohly, Sensus spiritualis (n. 10), pp. 1–30, sp. p. 16; “Sul significato spirituale della parola nel Medioevo”, in Ohly, Geometria e memoria (n. 13), pp. 249–275, sp. p. 297), Ohly writes that “Auerbach and Glunz developed and substantiated” Schwietering’s original ideas. He frankly believed that the importance of Auerbach’s essay had been overstated (“whose status as an emigrant strengthened the well-deserved effect of his work because it came from America”: “Typology as a form of historical thought”, in Friedrich Ohly, Sensus spiritualis (n. 10), pp. 31–67, sp. p. 54), but in later works he did recognize originality in Auerbach’s work insofar as the typological research widens its perspective to the non-Biblical (“Außerbiblisch Typologisches”) field: Friedrich Ohly, “Typologische Figuren aus Natur und Mythus”, in Ohly, Ausgewählte und neue Schriften (n. 12), pp. 473–508, sp. p. 473 (= Friedrich Ohly, “Figure tipologiche dalla natura e dal mito”, in Ohly, Tipologia [n. 13], pp. 37–96, sp. p. 37). In a later essay he criticizes Curtius, who was blind towards typology (“der dem Phänomen des Typologischen sich verschloß”), defending the insight of Glunz, whose book was overshadowed by the work of Curtius (“das von E. R. Curtius in den Schatten gerückte Buch von Glunz”: “Halbbiblische und außerbiblische Typologie”, in Ohly, Schriften zur mittelalterlichen Bedeutungsforschung (n. 12), pp. 361–400, sp. p. 382, obviously apropos of Ernst Robert Curtius, Europäische Literatur und lateinisches Mittelalter, Bern 1948): see Hans Hermann Glunz, Die Literarästhetik des europäischen Mittelalters: Wolfram, Rosenroman, Chaucer, Dante, Bochum 1937. 15 By way of example, it is interesting to note that in Seth Lerer, Literary history (n. 6), Ohly is never mentioned. 16 I am using figura (preferred by Auerbach) and “typology” (preferred by Ohly) as synonymous, even if the different choice of word is clearly interesting. For example, Ambrose (De sacramentis i, 22–23) interchanges figura and typus. I refer to Botte’s edition: Ambrosius, Des sacrements, Des mystères, Explication du symbole, Bernard Botte ed., Paris 1942. 17 Citation from the English translation: Erich Auerbach, “St. Francis of Assisi in Dante’s ‘Commedia’”, in Idem, Scenes from the Drama (n. 6), pp. 79–98, sp. p. 97. The original German text was published in Neue Dantestudien (n. 6), pp. 72–90. 18 My translation from Friedrich Ohly, “Halbbiblische und außerbiblische Typologie” (n. 14), p. 367 (“Die ekklesiologische Exegese des Neuen Testaments — des biblischen Antitypus — ist nicht typologischer Natur, da Christus in der Kirche fortlebt, nicht gesteigert wiederkehrt. Die Eucharistie erneuert, steigert nicht Christi Abendmahl”); for an Italian translation see Friedrich Ohly, “Tipologia biblica ed extrabiblica”, in Ohly, Geometria e memoria (n. 13), pp. 303–337, sp. p. 308. 19 Ohly, “Halbbiblische und außerbiblische Typologie” (n. 14), p. 364. 20 His uncertainty is evident, as he writes “as it were a recurring figure”. 21 Ambrosius, De sacramentis (cpl 0154), iv: 21–22, (Ambrosius, De sacramentis [n. 16], p. 114). The priest says: “Make this offering approved, reasonable, and acceptable for us, because it is the figure of the body and blood of our Lord Jesus Christ. Who on the night before he suffered took bread into his holy hands, looked up to heaven, to you holy Father, almighty eternal God, giving thanks, blessed, broke, and handed the broken [bread] to his apostles and disciples saying: Take and eat of this all of you: For this is my body which will be broken for many [Be attentive!]. Similarly, after supper, on the night before he suffered, he took the cup, looked up to heaven, to you holy Father almighty eternal God, giving thanks, blessed and handed it to his apostles and disciples saying: Take and drink from this all of you, for this is my blood”. I quote this translation from John Baldovin, “History of the Latin Text and Rite”, in A commentary on the order of Mass of the Roman missal, Edward Foley ed., Collegeville, mn 2011, pp. 247–254, sp. p. 247.

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3 / Scheme i

Old Testament



points ⇒

New Testament

figura

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points ⇒

Christian Life

imitatio

no idea that such a thing as “history of liturgy” exists22. Auerbach, himself Jewish, realized that Christian liturgical texts could have offered a rich contribution to the history of figura, as some footnotes of his essay show23. Images belong to the realm of imitation: but we learnt from Auerbach that figura implies time and reality: both sides of the relationship must be real, and not symbols or figments of imagination24. Auerbach understood that the particular relationship of Francis with Christ in Dante’s Comedy is “somehow” an instance of figura, but he failed to make sense of it. The point is not imitation as such – otherwise any decent Christian would be a figura: and indeed a few decades later The Imitation of Christ was to become the most popular book of the Late Middle Ages. Imitatio Christi is an end for any Christian. The special point is that Francis of Assisi, in his human life, was not simply imitating Christ: he was making Christ present again, as the medieval texts emphasize. He was a real man “pointing” to a real man, not an allegory pointing to reality or reality pointing to an abstraction: he made Christ present. He was himself a figura Christi – where the temporal relationship of typus and antitypus is apparently reversed. While the figura of the Old Covenant is temporally antecedent to the event of the New Testament it points to, here St Francis lives after Christ: but looking at him one can figurare Christ, as looking at Abraham’s sacrifice one can figurare the sacrifice of the Cross. Christ is the center of history, and any event may point to him. As the text of the Italian lauda says25:

1

Sia laudato San Francesco quel c’aparve en croce fixo come redemptore. A Cristo fo configurato de le piaghe fo signato emperciò k’avea portato scripto in core lu suo amore

The Italian text refers to the Latin technical word figura (“A Cristo fo configurator”, he was “configured” to Christ): St Francis indeed displays the distinctive features of Christ (the cross and the stigmata). But the text says configurato, not simply figurato. It is clearly a reference to Paul’s Philippians iii: ad agnoscendum illum et virtutem resurrectionis eius et societatem passionum illius configuratus morti eius si quo modo occurram ad resurrectionem quae est ex mortuis

Ambrose comments: ideo que nos apostolus configurari dicit oportere Christo, opening a continuous stream of interpretation26. And the same applies to the Eucharist as explained by Ambrose: the Eucharist is a figura because it is real, not an allegory or a symbol. It is a real object (bread, wine), and the priest, pronouncing the same words as Christ (as Ambrose repeats), “points” to an historical event, which happened during the life of Christ. Thus, the sacrament is this time figurans, typus and the event in Christ’s life is figuratum, antitypus. The events of the Old Covenant find the fullness of their meaning in the event they point to – figurans may be fully understood only by those who are able to know the event it points to, the figuratum:

4 / Scheme ii

Old Testament



points ⇒

New Testament

figura



⇐ points

Christian Life

figura

to use again the same example, the ancient Passover points to Christian Easter. So the sacrament is meaningful, and effective, because it points to an event in Christ’s life: it is not imitation, but figura. The relationship, insofar as time is concerned, is reversed, as Auerbach understood: but the center of time and of meaning is in any case Christ, and it does not matter if something happens before or after in human terms. Ambrose explains that the temporal relation must be reversed: the Sacraments of the Church are antiquiores rather than the figurae of the Old Covenant27: Accipe quae dico, anteriora esse mysteria Christianorum quam Iudaeorum […] antiquiora sunt sacramenta Ecclesiae quam Synagogae. Of course, a difference does exist between the ancient figura and the Christian one. The ancients did not know that the event they were witnessing was a figura, but the Christian knows the meaning of a figura – in medieval iconography, the Synagogue is blind and the Church sees 28. As clearly understood by Mircea Eliade 29:

representation cannot be the one proposed in the previous scheme [Fig. 3], but the one represented directly above [Fig. 4]. 22 Ohly acknowledges his debt to the works of Jean Daniélou and Henri de Lubac, without citing titles of publications: see Ohly, Sensus spiritualis (n. 10), pp. 4, 55. For any research on figura, Daniélou’s book should be cited almost everywhere: see Jean Daniélou, The Bible and the Liturgy, London 1960 (the French edition was published in 1951). 23 Auerbach, “Figura” (n. 6), pp. 234–235. Auerbach refers to the De sacramentis but not to Ambrose as the author of the work, a choice followed by most scholars of that time. 24 The central issue is of course the relationship between figura/typus and allegory. Auerbach opposed allegory and figura, while recognizing that the ancient terminology is often quite nuanced; Ohly was more keen on theoretical distinctions, and denounced the risk of confusion. See e.g. Ohly, “On the spiritual sense of the word” (n. 14), p. 15: “What literary history, particularly of the late Middle Ages, calls allegorical literature, like the Roman de la Rose or the minne allegories, has nothing to do with what we understand by allegory here. Each excludes the other”. He praises C. S. Lewis because he “clearly avoids” the danger of conceptual confusion. (Ohly refers to The allegory of love: a study in medieval tradition, Oxford 1936). Ohly’s polemical nature is manifest in his frequent criticism on this point. On the meaning of allegory in ancient criticism see e.g. Guido Milanese, Lucida carmina: comunicazione e scrittura da Epicuro a Lucrezio, Milano 1989, pp. 145–148. 25 Number 37 of the Cortona collection (Biblioteca Comunale, ms 91): see Martin Dürrer, Altitalienische Laudenmelodien: das einstimmige Repertoire der Handschriften Cortona und Florenz, Kassel/London 1996. 26 Ambrosius, De paradiso (cpl 0124), 15, 74, p. 333, 14; Augustin, Enchiridion de fide, spe et caritate (cpl 0295), 14, 97 (quicquid igitur gestum est in cruce christi […] configuraretur uita christiana quae in his geritur; Hieron, Commentarii in iv epistulas Paulinas (cpl 0591), Ad Galatas, 1, 370, 40: si quis mortificatis membris super terram, et mundo mortuus, configuratus fuerit morti iesu christi, crucifigitur cum iesu, et tropaeum mortificationis suae in ligno dominicae passionis affigit, and many others. 27 De sacramentis, iv: 3, 10; De mysteriis, viii: 44. 28 Ohly’s essay “Synagoge und Ecclesia” is one of his best works. 29 Mircea Eliade, Images and symbols: studies in religious symbolism, New York 1961 (translation of Images et symboles: essais sur le symbolisme magico-religieux, Paris 1952), p. 75. 30 The present research cannot deal with the problem of typology/ figura within the medieval theology of history. Ohly aptly refers to key figures such as Bonaventure and Joachim of Fiore: see Joseph Ratzinger, The Theology of History in St. Bonaventure, Chicago 1971 (original German edition Die Geschichtstheologie des heiligen Bonaventura, Munich/Zürich 1959). On Joachim of Fiore and figura see Marco Rainini, Disegni dei tempi: il “Liber figurarum” e la teologia figurativa di Gioacchino da Fiore, Rome 2006.

“a ‘Centre’ is the paradoxical ‘place’ where the planes intersect, the point at which the sensuous world can be transcended. But by transcending the Universe, the created world, one also transcends time and achieves stasis – the eternal nontemporal present”.

Within a Christian view of time and history, a sort of absolute atemporality as represented by Eliade is not acceptable – time is created by God himself – but, this notwithstanding, a figura can be figura if and only if all the events divided by time can be seen as united by time30. Therefore, a possible

1

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We could repeat all of this about a very particular image, the Holy Face. It is not an image, a human work of imitation. It is ἀχειροποίητα, an object “not made by human hand”, but it is a real object: just as when the priest consecrates, he does not merely pronounce human words, but he operates (to use the word operari so often used by Ambrose) on real things. Does it belong to the same realm of the figurae studied in the present essay? Of course, it is a relic: but the ostension of the Holy Face on the occasion of Passion Sunday, when the relic is displayed from a balcony in the Roman Basilica, is clearly a figura of Christ’s passion. The Holy Face is a figura, and, in a wider, non-technical meaning, it is a sacrament. God is always present not only spiritually, but also figuratim, thus in a very tangible way, as the presence of Christ in the Eucharist is physical and for this reason is figural, not allegorical. And the anxiety of the ancient Jewish prayer (Vultum tuum Domine requiram) finds its serene Christian answer in a tangible object, a figura that points to a God who has accepted matter and human temporality, and who not only “dwelt among us”, but who dwells among us now, not through symbols, but through the “figures” of the sacraments, human but not human, temporal and eternal.

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summary

Quaesivi vultum tuum Liturgie, figura a Kristova přítomnost

Pro středověkého člověka byl figurální a typologický význam stěžejní v chápání smyslu historických událostí. Figura a typologie představovaly základní nástroje pro výklad Písma svatého již od dob pozdní antiky. Zásluhou badatelů jako byli Erich Auerbach a především Friedrich Ohly došlo k odhalení dlouhé tradice typologické interpretace důležité nejen pro pochopení teologických a literárních děl, ale i figurativního umění, hudby a samozřejmě liturgie. Události z dob minulých přesahující rámec Starého zákona a dotýkající se i „pohanské“ historie docházejí naplnění v tzv. nové úmluvě: nejznámějším příkladem jsou Velikonoce, které naplňují význam Paschy. V tomto případě dávná událost poukazuje k ústřednímu aktu Stvoření – životu, smrti a vzkříšení Krista. Tento proces naplňování však přetrvává i po příchodu Krista na zem. V liturgii figurální význam odkazuje na základní události Stvoření v opačném směru. Nabízí se tak použití konceptu Mircea Eliadeho, avšak v pozměněném významu: v tomto případě figura nepředjímá něco, co bude naplněno v budoucnosti, ale zpřítomňuje to, co

se již událo v minulosti. Toto je velice zřetelné v pre-luteránské liturgické tradici, jejíž je zpřítomňování samotnou podstatou. Již v pozdní antice sv. Ambrož vysvětloval tento fenomén ve svém spisu De sacramentis. I historické události, které se odehrály po Kristově životě na zemi musí být chápany v tomto rámci: dobrým příkladem je život sv. Františka z Assisi, který je podle středověké lauda zpodobněním (configurato) Krista samotného. Františkův život je figurou Kristova života, který se odehrál před dobou Františkovou, ale skrze světce se opět zpřítomňuje. František je tak chápán jako Kristova figura. Jak ukazuje Ohly v mnohých ze svých prací, figurativní umění musí být chápáno v tomto exegetickém rámci. Umělecké dílo nemá být jen hezkým předmětem, ale také způsobem nahlížení do dějin spásy. Svatá Tvář je pak velice příhodným příkladem, neboť se nejedná o umělecké dílo, ale o relikvii, skutečný fragment Kristova života, který je možné vidět a dotýkat se ho. Vystavování Svaté Tváře tak představuje figuru Kristova utrpení – v širším smyslu se tedy jedná o svátost.

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Abstract – Face to Face with Christ in Late Medieval Rome. The Veil of Veronica in Papal Liturgy and Ceremony – Whereas the other most important contact relics contained no image, the Veronica, with Christ’s face held to be directly imprinted on it, thus showed the face of God Himself. As a result, the faithful could receive indulgences by viewing the venerated veil, which, in turn, drew crowds of pilgrims from across Europe, especially during Holy Years. According to originally rather arcane sources (i.e., diaries and treatises of the papal masters of ceremony), the veil was used not only during high holy days such as Christmas, Easter, Ascension Day, and during Lent, but it also had a special significance in relation to Saint Peter and the Pope. So, on some occasions, it was more a part of the papal ceremonial than part of the Roman liturgy. Sometimes it was even used to keep people safe when a large crowd needed to be prevented from walking the wrong way. Therefore, the Veronica in late medieval Rome requires new consideration with regard to both liturgy and ceremony. Keywords liturgy, ceremony, pope, Old Saint Peter’s Basilica

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Jörg Bölling Georg-August-Universität Göttingen [email protected]

Face to Face with Christ in Late Medieval Rome The Veil of Veronica in Papal Liturgy and Ceremony Jörg Bölling

“I heard the ringing of bells on the balcony above us and saw the white radiance of priestly habits there; a mysterious object was lifted: I didn’t know what it was, but I felt the same inexpressible emotion I had experienced on seeing the monstrance; indeed I believed I was seeing it not with my eyes, but with my love”1.

With these words Gertrud von le Fort describes the central experience of the first-person narrator in her 1928 novel Das Schweißtuch der Veronika [The Veil of Veronica]. In this quotation, the presentation of the sudarium is described taking place on the balcony of St Peter’s Basilica, which had been specially built for this purpose in the sixteenth century, close to the main altar above the tomb of St Peter. The reference to a similar experience when looking at the monstrance points to the analogy between viewing Christ’s material relic and

His sacramental testament, the face and body of Christ2. Here the relationship between Christ’s Eucharistic real presence and his representation in the Holy Face is embodied in literature3. At the end of this episode, the first-person narrator alludes to the acoustic embedding of the visual presentation: as the service concluded, a musical version of Psalm 50(51) Miserere mei was sung in the Renaissance “a cappella” style: 1

2 3

Gertrud von le Fort, Das Schweißtuch der Veronika: Roman, Freiburg i. B. 1961 [Munich 1928], p. 150: “Ich hörte von dem Balkon über uns Geläut und sah dort oben das weiße Leuchten priesterlicher Gewänder; ein geheimnisvoller Gegenstand wurde erhoben: ich erkannte nichts, aber ich fühlte dieselbe unaussprechliche Ergriffenheit wie damals beim Anblick der Monstranz, ja ich glaubte sie zu sehen, nicht mit meinen Augen, sondern mit meiner Liebe”. Cf. von le Fort, Das Schweißtuch (n. 1), pp. 128, 147. For the Eucharist cf. Miri Rubin, Corpus Christi: The Eucarist in Late Medieval Culture, Cambridge 1991; for the Veronica, The Holy Face and the Paradox of Representation: Herbert L. Kessler, Gerhard Wolf eds, Bologna 1998

1 / Ordo missae by Paris de Grassis, Rome, 1512–1519 / Universitäts­ bibliothek Salzburg, m i 140, fol. 1r

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“Afterwards, as we moved slowly through the dimly lit aisle of the gigantic church towards the exit, my grandmother explained the meaning of the ceremony. She also talked about the relic of the holy Veronica and, most beautifully, about its immense importance at the end of the Miserere: [...] little did she know that I was aware for the first time that I was greeting the image of the man crowned with thorns with love”4.

The allusion to the ending of the Miserere is obviously intended to show that the presentation of the sudarium visually exceeded the already impressive acoustic ending: the image rather than the music provided the culmination, with the presentation of the likeness of Christ himself following on from the biblical and liturgical texts referred to in the ceremony5. In this encounter, two distinct groups are involved: on the one hand the clergy on the balcony, on the other hand the first-person narrator herself who, as she says, comes face to face with Christ, “greeting the image of the man crowned with thorns with love”. To this day, the Veil of Veronica is described being displayed on specific occasions, in a manner similiar to that described by Gertrud von le Fort in the early twentieth century. But what happened in the Late Middle Ages – before today’s St Peter’s Basilica, whose construction was only begun in 1506, even existed? When and where was it shown, for whom and for what purpose? I will examine these questions in three parts: firstly, I will give a brief overview of the relevant sources (i). I will then examine these sources in the light of the aforementioned questions (ii). Finally, I will summarise the results in a short conclusion (iii).

i. Sources

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A number of studies have already been published examining the architecture and liturgy of “Old St Peter’s”6. The place where the Veronica was preserved can be easily identified on the plan of Alpharano: a “ciborium” in the oratory of John vii by the Holy Door of the old St Peter’s basilica7. However, the three questions of occasion, recipients and purpose need more detailed description. The main sources on these aspects in the fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries are the ceremonial writings of the papal masters of ceremonies. These

can be subdivided into three groups. The first source is the Caeremoniale Romanae Curiae which was completed by Agostino Patrizi Piccolomini, assisted by his colleague Johannes Burckard, in 14888. It is a writing with normative information about procedures. In it Patrizi summarizes according to scholastic-canonic principles the whole medieval tradition, based on the papal Pontificale Romanum which he and Burckard had published in 14859. With this, he created a reference text for the modern period which basically remained valid until the 1960s10. The documentary diaries of the masters of ceremonies, which remain in the Vatican today, constitute the second group, in particular the diary of Johannes Burckard11. These diaries describe real events, rather than their idealized versions. They present extremely detailed accounts of events, which were highly confidential and only circulated within the Curia, including all mistakes and mishaps which should be avoided in the future. Finally, the third group is made up of special writings about particular problems, among them treatises with profound reflections and expertise for foreign enquirers, written by Burckard’s successor Paris de Grassis12. While Patrizi and Burckard have been edited – albeit with singular deficiencies and gaps – most of the accounts of this third group are still to be edited and examined. One of the items in this third group is also recorded in the library at Trinity College, Cambridge under the shelfmark ms o.4.18. It is an ordo missae of the late fifteenth century for an officiating bishop, obviously produced in Rome13. However, it is anything but a simple episcopal ordo, because it contains various texts14. Ordines were widespread. The best-known ordo is the ordo missae of Johannes Burckard, printed initially in 1496, and reprinted in 150215. This ordo constituted the definitive basis for the Missale Romanum of 1570 which was valid worldwide and was to remain unchanged for exactly 400 years16. The editio princeps is stored in the state and university library of Göttingen – an incunabulum from the year 1496, whose margin notes deserve a complete analysis of their own17. The ordo which is preserved in Cambridge corresponds less to this valid order of mass for every celebrant but rather offers a cardinal bishop

an insight into the ceremonies of the papal liturgy, in the way that a Supreme Pontiff, but also an officiating cardinal should know – with or without the presence of the Pope. For this reason, this ordo can be compared with that of Domenico della Rovere from about 1495 or the only slightly later one for Guillaume Briçonnet, Archbishop of Narbonne and Cardinal-Bishop of Albano, which were edited in the eighteenth and twentieth centuries18. In this context, we should also mention the ordo of the Archbishop of Salzburg, Matthäus Cardinal Lang von Wellenburg19. These aforementioned ordines are different to Burckard’s ordo not only in that they were intended for cardinal-bishops instead of ordinary priests. These are special writings for very particular persons of quite different origins: for the Italian Domenico della Rovere, the French Guillaume Briçonnet and the German-Austrian Matthäus Lang. The original addressee and owner of the Cambridge manuscript has still to be traced. On fol. 15v there is a magnificently decorated heading with a cardinal’s coat of arms in the lower margin; on the cover (flyleaf) a sixteenth-century hand offers the hint “Hisspani (Cardinalis)”20. The coat of arms and the designation of origin have not yet been identified. It could be assigned to the Spanish Cardinal-Archbishop Roderic Borgia, who went on to become Pope Alexander vi. His pontifical coat of arms can be also recognised in another liturgical book: his Christmas Missal 21. In both manuscripts, 4 5

6

Cf. von le Fort, Das Schweißtuch (n. 1), p. 151, concerning the liturgical music cf. 147–150. For liturgical aspects, including music and art, cf. Jörg Bölling, Das Papstzeremoniell der Renaissance: Texte – Musik – Performanz, Frankfurt am Main 2006, pp. 237–254, 259–270; Idem, “Liturgia di cappella e cerimonie di corte”, in Pompa sacra. Lusso e cultura materiale alla corte papale nel basso medioevo (1420–1527), Thomas Ertl ed., Rome 2010, pp. 37–53; Idem, “Den Papst sehen. Eine Privataudienz im Medium des Bildes / Seeing the Pope: a Private Audience in the Medium of the Picture”, in Raffael und das Porträt Julius’ ii. Das Bild eines Renaissancepapstes / Raphael and the Portrait of Julius ii. Image of a Renaissance Pope, Ausstellungskatalog / exhibition catalogue (Frankfurt, Städel Museum, 7. 11. 2013 – 2. 2. 2014), Jochen Sander ed., Petersberg 2013, pp. 39–49, sp. pp. 40–44; Jennifer Mara DeSilva, “Pluralism, Liturgy and the Paradoxes of Reform: A Reforming Pluralist in Early Sixteenth-Century Rome”, Sixteenth Century Journal, xliii (2012), pp. 1061–1078; Eadem, “Preventing Sloth and Preserving the Liturgy: Organizing Sacred Space in Sixteenth-Century Rome”, in The Sacralization of Space and Behaviour in the Early Modern World, Jennifer M. DeSilva ed., Aldershot 2015, pp. 33–80. Achim Arbeiter, Alt-St. Peter in Geschichte und Wissenschaft: Abfolge der Bauten, Rekonstruktion, Architekturprogramm, Berlin 1988; Sible de Blaauw, Cultus et decor. Liturgie e architettura nella Roma tardoantica e medievale; Basilica Salvatoris, Sanctae Mariae, Sancti Petri, 2 vols, Rome 1994;

see recently Rosamond McKitterick et al. eds, Old Saint Peter’s, Rome, Cambridge 2013, esp. Ann van Dijk, “The Veronica, the Vultus Christi and the Veneration of Icons in Medieval Rome”, in: Ibidem, pp. 229–256. 7 Cf. van Dijk, “The Veronica” (n. 6), p. 229, fig. 12.1, p. 238, fig. 12.6. 8 L’œuvre de Patrizi Piccolomini ou le cérémonial papal de la première Renaissance, Marc Dykmans ed., 2 vols, Vatican City 1980–1982. Cristoforo Marcello published an unauthorized edition of his own, slightly revised version in 1516, which was often adopted afterwards: Augustinus Patricius Piccolomineus, Caeremoniale Romanum. The first edition, Venice 1516, to which is appended Patrizi’s original preface, rediscovered by Jean Mabillon and published by him in the second volume of his Museum Italicum, Lutetiae Parisorum 1689, Reprint Ridgewood, nj 1965. 9 Pontificale Romanum: Pontificalis liber [...] diligentia [...] Augustini Patricii de Piccolominibus episcopi Pientini et Ilnicensis ac Iohannis Burckardi [...] correctus et emendatus, Rome 1485. 10 Bölling, Papstzeremoniell (n. 5), pp. 25–47. 11 Johannis Burckardi Liber Notarum, Enrico Celani ed., 2 vols, Città di Castello 1906–1942. See also the often quoted, but less reliable edition Johannis Burchardi Diarium sive rerum urbanarum commentarii (1483–1506), Louis Thuasne ed., 3 vols, Paris 1883–1885. Cf. Bölling, Papstzeremoniell (n. 5), pp. 30–33. 12 Cf. Bölling, Papstzeremoniell (n. 5), pp. 62–68. See also the distinguished edition of one of these treatises: Philipp Stenzig, Botschafterzeremoniell am Papsthof der Renaissance: Der “Tractatus de oratoribus” des Paris de Grassi – Edition und Kommentar, 2 vols, Frankfurt am Main 2013. 13 A newer digital copy can be inspected online under the address [http://trin-sites-pub.trin.cam.ac.uk/james/viewpage.php?index=770]. A useful tabular comparison of the regular pontifical masses during the liturgical year mentioned by Patrizi (1488), Burckard (1483–1488) and the author of this ordo is given by Bernhard Schimmelpfennig, “Die Funktion der Cappella Sistina im Zeremoniell der Renaissancepäpste”, in Collectanea ii. Studien zur Geschichte der päpstlichen Kapelle. Tagungsbericht Heidelberg 1989, Bernhard Janz ed., Vatican City 1994, pp. 123–174, sp. pp. 150–170. 14 The prayers of the celebrant while putting on his vestments before the papal mass, suggestions for the funerals of popes and cardinals, details about the consistories of the pope with his cardinals, and finally the papal masses over the course of the liturgical year are all presented; cf. Bölling, Papstzeremoniell (n. 5), pp. 47–54. 15 It is mostly quoted following the publication of the second edition of 1502 by John Wickham Legg, “Ordo missae Ioannis Burckardi”, in Tracts on the Mass, John Wickham Legg ed., London 1904, pp. 119–178. The original, however, had already been printed in 1496; cf., for instance, Staats- und Universitätsbibliothek Göttingen, 8 h e rit i, 7860 inc [http://gesamtkatalogderwiegendrucke.de/docs/M28330 htm]. 16 Missale Romanum. Editio princeps (1570). Edizione anastatica, Introduzione e Appendice, Manlio Sodi, Achille Maria Triacca eds, Vatican City 1998. 17 Staats- und Universitätsbibliothek Göttingen, 8 h e rit i, 7860 inc; cf. n. 15. 18 For Guillaume Briçonnet, see Edmond Martène, Tractatus de antiqua ecclesiae disciplina in divinis celebrandis officiis, Lyon 1706, pp. 595–613; reprinted in Idem, De antiquis ecclesiae ritibus, 4 vols, Antwerp [Milan] 1736–1738, vol. 3, pp. 607–623 (reprinted Hildesheim 1967); see the original manuscript in Paris: Bibliothèque nationale de France, Lat. 1004 a; cf. Bölling, Papstzeremoniell (n. 5), pp. 47–54. With regard to Domenico della Rovere, cf. the edition of Dykmans (ed.), L’œuvre de Patrizi Piccolomini (n. 8), vol. 2, pp. 542–550 (“Appendice vi”); cf. Ibidem, pp. 523–529. 19 Salzburg, Universitätsbibliothek, ms m i 140 (olim Studienbibliothek, ms v. 1. J. 273), dedicated to Cardinal Lang, including his special office at the Curia; cf. fol. 24v–31v: “Officium diaconi cardinalis cantaturi evangelium in missa papali”. See also [http://www.ubs.sbg.ac.at/sosa/ handschriften/MI140.htm]. For a later copy of this manuscript, cf. Paris, bnf, ms lat. 1229. 20 Cf. [http://trin-sites-pub.trin.cam.ac.uk/james/viewpage.php?index=770] and Montague Rhodes James, The Western Manuscripts in the Library of Trinity College, Cambridge: a Descriptive Catalogue, vol. 3: An account of the Manuscripts Standing in Class o, Cambridge 1902, no. 1249, pp. 270–271. 21 Cf. Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, Borg. lat. 425, fol. 8v, described and partly edited by Adalbert Roth, Das Weihnachtsmissale der Päpste: Feierlicher Mittelpunkt der Christnacht im Petersdom, Stuttgart 1998. In the Cambridge manuscript there is only one sable bend. In the Vatican missal the coat of arms is divided into two parts: in one of them there are three sable fesses (bars) instead of one, in the other one you see

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you see the same characteristic golden shield form within a green wreath and sable bends or fesses. It is more likely, however, that this ordo belonged to Juan de Carvajal or to his nephew Bernardino Lopez Carvajal22. In an entry of the codex kept in Cambridge concerning the High Mass (“missa in die”, third mass) on Christmas Day it says: “Datur indulgentia plena[-]ria et ostenditur veroni[-] ca et ferru(m) d(omi)nice lancee: fi[-] nita missa cardinales exu[-] unt paramenta in capella et accipiunt capas rubeas cu(m) quibus asociant papa(m)”23.

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According to this, the presentation of the Veil of Veronica belonged to the regular rite within the framework of the Pope’s Christmas mass. This is an important additional piece of information, supplementary to Burckard’s ordo missae of 1496 and the Christmas Mass book of Pope Alexander vi. At Christmas, the vultus Domini was especially praised in the first Antiphon of Vespers: “Rex pacificus * magnificatus est, cuius vultum desiderat universa terra”. God is made flesh and can be seen in Jesus Christ. The presention of the veil at Christmas is validated by the Salzburg manuscript, even if it is considered that it was performed only as a matter of choice on this feast day (“si placet”), being usually reserved for Ascension: “item vultus sanctus ostenditur”24. Hence, the ordo preserved in Cambridge was much closer to Patrizi and Burckard than to Paris de Grassis 25. However, what was the Cambridge codex used for later on? In places, there are traces of usage, corrections and margin notes. Thus, a later user provided information about the pallium mentioned on fol. 31r. On fol. 55r the same hand also makes corrections. Based on the writing style and the distinctive yellow ink, this hand can be clearly identified as that of Paris de Grassis, the master of ceremonies of Popes Julius ii and Leo x, who were in office in the first quarter of the sixteenth century. Paris de Grassis was also the author of the previously mentioned, slightly later ordines for the cardinals Briçonnet and Lang. Obviously, this master of ceremonies took as his inspiration this earlier copy from Cambridge. This deserves

special attention. The other margin notes are much later. I do not know their author, but they are not of particular interest to our very specific subject. So, what does this source and indeed other sources say about the question asked at the beginning concerning the time and place of the presentation of the Veil of Veronica and its purpose? This leads me on to my second part.

ii. Performances In the previously mentioned ceremonial sources of the fifteenth century, numerous proofs of the Veil of Veronica can be found. The findings from these sources can be subdivided into five parts: 1. Presentation to the Pope – for his benediction (with subsequent papal blessing) 2. Presentation to believers and pilgrims – for their blessing (with subsequent papal blessing) 3. Presentation for pomp and pragmatism 4. Presentation based on the assessment of the canons of St Peter’s and individual cardinals 5. Presentation as a highlight for foreign guests and ambassadors

ii.1. Presentation to the Pope Patrizi refers to the personal presentation of the Veil of Veronica to the Pope immediately after the feast day mass in his Caeremoniale Romanum of 1488, which united different medieval traditions in a normative way and was still the literal basis for the last coronation of a Pope on June 30, 196326. All the believers could see the Veil of Veronica, but its contemplation by the Supreme Pontiff is a key moment in the ceremonial procedure. However, at this point, unlike in the Cambridge manuscript, it is Easter rather than Christmas which is stressed. I quote: “And the Pope walks in procession under his canopy, which – as previously – is carried by noblemen, while the officiants, dressed in albs, precede the train, with all the prelates in their order of precedence in the church. The Pope walks through the last nave, where he stops in order to see the Holy Face (‘vultum sanctum’), before moving on to the place where the public blessing takes place, and solemnly blesses the faithful and grants plenary indulgence”27.

Here, this private viewing of the sudarium obviously serves as a personal papal benediction before his papal blessing and the indulgence, as Étienne Doublier has explored28. The normative information provided by Patrizi is verified with the help of the Diarium of his temporary employee Johannes Burckard, but also completed with the addition of some interesting details. According to the Diarium, Pope Alexander vi looked at the Veil of Veronica regularly at Easter, on Ascension Day and at Christmas. For example, at Easter in 1498 and 1499 Burckard confirms the normative guidelines almost literally. At Easter on April 15, 1498, he also refers to the viewing of the Holy Lance and the persons who announce the indulgence: Cardinal Colonna in Latin, and Cardinal Cesarini in Italian. On Easter Sunday on March 31, 1499, Burckard again mentions that the Pope didn’t want to exhibit the Holy Lance during the Easter High Mass, in contrast to the Veil of Veronica. The indulgence was announced by Cardinals Sangiorgio in Latin and Colonna in Italian29. On Ascension Day 1499, the sudarium was exhibited in St Peter’s Church. The Pope paused before it, before issuing his blessing and indulgence. Finally, at Christmas 1497, to give a last example, the Pope looked at the sudarium after the High Mass, released his cardinals at the portico of St Peter and walked into his palace without giving his papal blessing.

ii.2. Presentation to Believers and Pilgrims The exhibition of the Veil of Veronica was definitely intended for all believers, even if the masters of ceremonies paid special attention to the Popes’ use of it as a source of meditation. On some days, its exhibition was even announced city-wide, so it was actively promoted to the faithful. Thus, on March 18, 1497, posters at the Campo dei Fiori and at other places across the city announced that at the Pope’s behest, the heads of the apostles Peter and Paul were to be shown in the Lateran basilica on the following Saturday, with the sudarium exhibited the following day, Palm Sunday, after which the Pope would give his solemn blessing. Announcements like these were not always reliable. For on this occasion, the heads of the apostles

were indeed shown, but the sudarium was not presented, nor was the papal blessing given – despite the fact, Burckard stresses, that this had already been announced on posters across the city. Jubilees also constituted a regular exception, as in the case of the great Jubilee of the year 1500. During the preparations, the chapel of the holy Veronica already played a decisive role, as it was located in close proximity to the “Golden Gate” which was to be opened for the Jubilee. During the Holy Year itself, the sudarium was not only to be seen at Christmas, but also on all Sundays and feast days. Here too, one could observe different variations, for example on the Feast of Saints Peter and Paul.

ii.3. Presentation for Pomp and Pragmatism The presentation of the Veil of Veronica did not always achieve its aim of augmenting the liturgy of worship with a devout ending. Thus, the master of ceremonies Johannes Burckard puts on record that the announcement of the exhibition of the Veronica and the indulgence for Christmas Day in 1498 was generally understood as a pr campaign – so completely in the sense of the paper by Rebecca Rist30. On the day before Christmas Eve, posters were put up on the Campo dei Fiori, on the doors of St Peter’s and all over the city with the announcement that a papal blessing was to be given after the Christmas Eve service, an indulgence would be granted and the sudarium exhibited. Gold and a bull Gules on a terrace Vert. The Vatican missal shows the coat of arms used by the Dukes of Gandía. Their title, however, was re-established only in 1483 – by Ferdinand ii of Aragon as a favour to Cardinal Rodrigo Borgia, later Pope Alexander vi, for his son Pedro Luis (Pier Luigi de Borgia). The bull obviously derived from the coat of arms used by Pope Alexander’s uncle Calixt iii. Rodrigo Borgia himself, however, before being elected Pope, only used the coat of arms we see in the Cambridge manuscript. On fol. 78r the ominously so-called “cardinalis hispanus” is mentioned as a cardinal of Pope Sixtus iv and Innocent viii. This is exactly the time when Alexander vi served as the Spanish cardinal. 22 I am indebted to Édouard Bouyé, Directeur des Archives départementales de la Côte-d’Or (Dijon) for this insight. 23 Cambridge, Trinity College, ms o.4.18, fol. 55r; cf. the identical words in the ordo of Domenico della Rovere, Dykmans ed., L’œuvre de Patrizi Piccolomini (n. 8), vol. 2, p. 545, l. 5–8. 24 Cf. Salzburg, Universitätsbibliothek, ms m i 140, fol. 10r and 19v. 25 Concerning Patrizi and Burckard, see the tabular list by Schimmelpfennig, “Die Funktion der Cappella Sistina” (n. 13), p. 153. 26 Bölling, Papstzeremoniell (n. 5), p. 69, n. 1. 27 Dykmans (ed.), L’œuvre de Patrizi Piccolomini (n. 8), vol. 2, p. 415, line 18, p. 416, line 1 (with n. 1). 28 Cf. the article of Étienne Doublier in this volume. 29 Cf. Johannis Burckardi Liber Notarum, Celani ed. (n. 11), vol. 2. 30 Cf. Rebecca Rist, in this volume.

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This announcement was interpreted as a way of ensuring that a large number of people would be able to observe the pomp of the ostentatious papal procession: “quod fieri interpretatum est ut vide[a] tur a majore multitudine ejus pompa”. At Christmas 1499, according to the Roman calendar Anno Domini, i.e. “post Christum natum”, with the Holy Year of 1500 already underway, the sudarium was not only exhibited in accordance with the ritual after the mass, but also before it. On this occasion, the reason was more to do with pragmatism than pomp. With the number of people too great in St Peter’s, they were asked to leave the church, and it was only due to this that the Pope permitted the sudarium to be presented for the first time before the mass: “After the mass the Pope didn’t want to leave the church through the ‘Golden Gate’, but went – as in the previously mentioned example of Christmas 1497 – directly to the palace”.

Apparently the crowd of people was too much for him. The reproach mentioned by Burckard that his contemporaries judged pomp to be important to Pope Alexander vi must be questioned in any case. The same is true of the other compromising passages, which can only be found in later interpolations, but not in the autograph.

ii.4. Presentation Based on the Assessment of the Canons of St Peter’s and Individual Cardinals Occasionally the Pope would allow the canons of St Peter’s to exhibit the Veil of Veronica. Here it obviously becomes important that these clergymen were the true guardians of the tomb of St Peter and in fact the inventors of the Holy Year, as Jochen Johrendt pointed out 31. Individual clergymen could also celebrate mass at the altar of the Veil of Veronica for reasons of personal devotion if they were accompanied by a cardinal. Uwe Michael Lang elucidates the Mass Proper used on these occasions32.

ii.5. Presentation as a Highlight for Foreign Guests and Ambassadors

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Finally, aside from all its liturgical and ritual-ceremonial functions, the sudarium could also be

used to show foreign visitors one of the most important attractions of Rome. This applied for example to an Ethiopian delegation who visited Rome between October 9 and 13, 1441 and were able to see the Veil of Veronica. Various sources independently give proof of this event33.

iii. Conclusion The Veil of Veronica (also sudarium, Veronica, vultus sanctus, vultus Domini) was one of the main relics preserved in the church housing the tomb of Saint Peter, “prince of the apostles”. Whereas the other most important contact relics (pieces of the Holy Cross and the Holy Lance of Longinus) had no image of their own, the Veil, in the eyes of the faithful, showed the face of Jesus Christ and thereby that of God himself. People were hence able to receive indulgences by viewing it. This, of course, drew crowds of pilgrims from throughout Europe, especially during the Holy Year. In light of its meaning in the context of the Saviour’s Passion, the Veil was used during Lent. As late as the early twentieth century, the German author Gertrud von le Fort describes its presentation in this way in her novel Das Schweißtuch der Veronika. The medieval forms of presentation, however, were considerably more complex. According to originally rather arcane sources, namely diaries and treatises of the papal masters of ceremony, the Veil also had a special significance with regard to Saint Peter and the Pope. So, for some occasions, it was more a part of the papal ceremonial rather than of the Roman liturgy. Sometimes it was even used to keep people in safety when a large crowd needed to be prevented from walking the wrong way. Therefore, the Veil of Veronica in late medieval Rome requires new consideration – with regard to both liturgy and ceremony. 31 Cf. Jochen Johrendt, Die Diener des Apostelfürsten: Das Kapitel von St. Peter im Vatikan (11.–13. Jahrhundert), Berlin / New York 2011, pp. 327–350. Cf. the Italian version: Idem, Il Capitolo die San Pietro, i Papi e Roma (secoli xi–xii), Anna Maria Voci trans., Vatican City 2012. 32 Cf. the article by Uwe Michael Lang in this volume. 33 Cf. Philipp Stenzig, Botschafterzeremoniell am Papsthof der Renaissance: Der Tractatus de oratoribus des Paris de Grassi – Edition und Kommentar, 2 vols, Frankfurt am Main 2013, vol. i, pp. 518–519.

summary Tváří v tvář Kristu v pozdně středověkém Římě. Veroničina rouška v papežské liturgii a ceremoniích

Veroničina rouška (nazývaná také sudarium, Veronica, vultus sanctus či vultus Domini) byla jednou z relikvií uchovávaných v chrámu, kde se nacházel hrob svatého Petra, „prvního z apoštolů“. Zatímco ostatní významné kontaktní relikvie – části svatého Kříže a Longinovo kopí – nenesly žádný obraz, rouška ukazovala věřícím tvář Ježíše Krista, tedy Boha samotného a lidé mohli skrze pohled na ni získat odpustky. Rouška tak pochopitelně přitahovala davy poutníků ze všech koutů Evropy, a to obzvláště během Svatých roků. Vzhledem ke svojí úloze v  příběhu Spasitelova umučení se rouška používala v období velikonočního postu. Na začátku dvacátého století popsala její vystavování německá autorka Gertrud von le Fort v románu Das Schweißtuch der  Vero­nika (česky pod názvem Rouška Veroniky).

Středověký způsob vystavování byl však mnohem složitější. Podle pramenů, které byly dříve dostupné jen zasvěceným, konkrétně deníků a pojednání papežských ceremoniářů, se rouška používala v průběhu velkých svátků – tedy na Vánoce, v postní době, o Velikonocích a na svátek Nanebevstoupení, avšak měla také zvláštní význam v souvislosti s katedrálou sv. Petra a postavou papeže. V  některých případech se tak stávala spíše součástí papežského ceremoniálu než římské liturgie. Mimo jiné byla rouška využívána i k ochraně lidí, například když bylo třeba zabránit velkému davu, aby se vydal špatnou cestou. Význam Veroničiny roušky v pozdně středověkém Římě si tedy podle autora článku žádá přehodnocení – a to s přihlédnutím jak k liturgii, tak k ceremoniím.

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Abstract – Origins of the Liturgical Veneration of the Roman Veronica – Pope Innocent iii’s efforts to promote devotion to the Roman Veronica also gave rise to a liturgical veneration of the Holy Face of Christ. The widespread devotional office includes several psalm verses and versicles that invoke the Old Testament search for the Lord’s countenance and present it as being fulfilled in the contemplation of the face of Christ. The concluding prayer is the stable, recurring feature in the later liturgical formularies in honor of the Holy Face, which otherwise show considerable diversity. A manuscript missal from the Capitular Archives of St Peter’s in the Vatican contains an added set of Mass orations, probably not earlier than the fifteenth century, with the heading Collecta ad faciem Christi. These orations are analyzed according to their literary

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forms, biblical motives, and theological contents. The paper also includes a brief overview of the complete Mass formularies of the Holy Face, including proper readings and chants, which are found in early printed diocesan missals from the late-fifteenth and earlysixteenth centuries. Keywords – Veronica, Holy Face, image of God, Passion of Christ, Second Coming, beatific vision, votive mass, missal Uwe Michael Lang Heythrop College, University of London [email protected]

Origins of the Liturgical Veneration of the Roman Veronica Uwe Michael Lang

Pope Innocent iii (1198–1216) is known for promoting devotion to the Roman Veronica, the relic treasured in the Vatican Basilica of St Peter’s, which was identified with the cloth a holy woman called Veronica offered to Christ as he was carrying his cross to Golgotha, so that he might wipe off the blood and sweat from his face. In return for the woman’s act of kindness, Christ was believed to have left an imprint of his sacred countenance on the cloth. The name Veronica was also given to the holy relic, which was explained as vera icon, the “true image” of the Saviour. Devotion to the Roman Veronica spread rapidly throughout Europe and gave rise to liturgical veneration of the Holy Face of Christ, which is first attested in a set of Mass orations that were added (probably no

earlier than the fifteenth century) to a manuscript missal from St Peter’s. I shall trace the origins of the Vatican Mass prayers and offer an analysis of their literary forms, biblical motives and theological contents. The paper will also include a brief overview of the complete Mass formularies of the Holy Face, including proper readings and chants, which are found in early printed diocesan missals from the late fifteenth and early sixteenth century.

Devotional Offices The liturgical texts associated with the Veronica are related to the earlier devotional offices, which were not intended for the Church’s official public worship, but belonged to a genre of pious

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exercises popular among both religious and laity the pope with dread; at the advice “of the brothers” at the time. As such, they would typically include (presumably the Cardinals), Innocent composed psalm verses, versicles, and invocations, to be an “elegant prayer in honour of the image”, to concluded by a formal prayer. An office composed which a psalm and versicles were added. Matthew specifically for the Roman Veronica was recorded also mentions an indulgence attached to the recc. 1210 by Bernard Itier, monk and librarian of itation of the prayer 7. The Cambridge manuscript the Benedictine abbey of St Martial in Limoges1. then incorporates the miniature of the Veronica, The office consists of the hymn O facies sancta, two followed by prayers to be recited. psalm verses (Ps 44, 3; 13) and a concluding prayer In his introduction, Matthew notes rather gemade on behalf the people assembled to honour nerically that the name “Veronica” is derived from the sacred cloth2. This office has a more popular “a woman so called, at whose request Christ made character and does not seem to have influenced an impression of himself”. The rubrical instruction the liturgical veneration of the Holy Face. to make the sign of the cross is followed by the The devotional office that would enjoy a wide text of the office (the editor’s presentation of the diffusion appears first as an addition to the illus- manuscript text has been retained): trated Arundel Psalter, most likely written in Oxford in the first quarter of the thirteenth century. “Signatum est super nos lu[men] On a single sheet pasted in the manuscript, a halfv[ultus] t[ui], D[omine]. Ded[isti]. page miniature of the Veronica is followed by the Ps. Deus misereatur nostri, etc. Gloria. text of the office3 (for the image, see the article by Kyrieleison, Christeleison, Kyrieleison. Nigel Morgan within this volume: Fig. 4). The Pater noster. Et ne. insertion has been dated c. 1240 and is sometimes Vers. Fac mecum signum in bo[num] ut vid[eant]. attributed to the English Benedictine chronicler Vers. Tibi dixit cor meum [exquisivit te] fa[cies] and artist Matthew Paris (c. 1200 –1259)4. A largely m[ea], fac[iem] t[uam] D[omine] r[equiram]. identical version of the office is included in the Vers. Quaerite Dominum et confirmamini, Cambridge manuscript of the second volume of q[uaerite] f[aciem] e[jus] s[emper]. Matthew’s Chronica Maiora, which has been dated Vers. Ora pro nobis, beata Veronica. U[t] d[igni]. c. 1240 –1253 (for the image, see again Morgan’s Vers. Domine exaudi orationem meam. Et. article: Fig. 2). Most of this volume is believed Vers. Domine Deus virtutum to be in chronicler’s own hand, and the pasted converte nos, et ostende. miniature of the Veronica, followed by the text Oremus. of the devotional office, can certainly be ascribed to Matthew5. Among the later sources with very Deus qui nobis signatis lumine vultus Tui memoriale tuum ad instantiam Veronicae sudario impressam imaginem similar texts of the office, there is the illuminated relinquere voluisti, per passionem et crucem tuam tribue Psalter made in the Rhineland c. 1260 for the Cisnobis quaesumus, ut, ita nunc in terris per speculum et in tercian Abbey of Bonmont near Geneva, and the enigmate ipsam adorare et venerari valeamus, ut facie ad Psalter-Hours of Yolande of Soissons, originating faciem venientem iudicem te securi videamus. Qui vivis et from Amiens c. 1280 –12906. regnas cum Deo Patre ”8 . In his chronicle for the year 1216, which is largely based on the work of Roger of Wendover, This composition includes several psalm verses Matthew Paris adds a description of Innocent iii’s that invoke the search for the Lord’s countenance. annual procession with the Veronica from St Pe- While the Hebrew Bible characteristically uses ter’s to the Hospital of the Holy Spirit. The pro- anthropomorphisms when speaking about God, cession was first instituted in 1208 and prescribed the expression “face” or “countenance” (panim) for the Second Sunday after the Epiphany. This is charged with particular meaning. In human time a strange incident happened: the image in terms, the face is understood not simply as a part its shrine turned by itself and stood upside down. of the body, but rather as the expression of a perThis was interpreted as an ominous sign and filled son’s identity. By virtue of being the seat of most

senses, the human face communicates thoughts, feelings and intentions, and so establishes a relationship with others. Hence it is a sign and means of God’s grace and blessing when he turns his face to the people of Israel or lets his face shine upon them (e.g., Num 6, 24–26; Ps 26, 8 – 9; 30, 17; 66, 2; 79, 4; 88, 15–16; Dan 9, 17)9. Seeking the face of God becomes almost synonymous with acts of worship, including visiting a sanctuary on pilgrimage10. The office of the Veronica opens with Ps 4, 7, “The light of your countenance, O Lord, is stamped upon us: you have given gladness in my heart”, which is also worked into the concluding prayer. In the Latin patristic tradition, this verse is read as a statement about man being created in the image and likeness of God and about the restoration of this image, disfigured by original sin, in the sacrament of baptism. According to Ambrose of Milan (337–397), it is through the Holy Spirit that we attain to the image and likeness of God. The same Spirit makes us partakers of the divine nature through the grace of adoption that is received in baptism. With reference to Eph 1, 13, Ambrose interprets this grace as a seal (signaculum) on our hearts and confirms this reading with a citation of Ps 4, 711. Augustine of Hippo (354–430) connects the psalm verse directly with Genesis 1, 26 in his Explanations of the Psalms, a work that was widely received in the later Latin tradition and shaped biblical interpretation in the Middle Ages12. The human soul is illumined and imprinted (signata) with the light of God’s countenance, as a coin is stamped with the image of the king. The image of God in the soul is defaced by sin, but is imprinted anew by rebirth in baptism13. Elsewhere Augustine reads the psalm verse together with the Christian’s being conformed to the image of the Son of God (Rom 8, 29). While this happens through the agency of the Holy Spirit, as in Ambrose’s earlier exposition, Augustine’s reading is specifically Christological: “light of your countenance” is taken to refer to the Son14. The Venerable Bede (672/3–735) employs Ps 4, 7 in a homily for the first Mass of Christmas Day, connecting it not only with the first man’s being created in the image of God, but also with the re-formation of this image, lost through sin, by

God himself assuming a human face in the Incarnation of his Son15. In his commentary on the beginning of Genesis, Bede equates the image of God in man with the use of reason and associates it with the enlightenment that is the theme of prologue to the Gospel of John 1, 9, “the true light, which enlightens everyone, was coming into the 1

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Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale de France, ms Lat. 3719, fol. 115v [http://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/btv1b52502489w]. The nine lessons for (non-monastic) Matins in the same manuscript belong to the Office of the Blessed Virgin Mary, not of the Holy Face, as claimed by Solange Corbin, “Les offices de la Sainte Face”, Bulletin des Etudes Portugaises, n.s. xi (1947), pp. 1– 62 (also published separately: Coimbra 1947), sp. p. 18. A very similar version of this office is found in a manuscript dating from the first half of the thirteenth century, Basel, Universitätsbibliothek, ms c.iv.4, fol. 27v. See Christoph Egger, “Papst Innocenz iii. und die Veronica. Geschichte, Theologie, Liturgie und Seelsorge”, in The Holy Face and the Paradox of Representation: Papers from a Colloquium held at the Bibliotheca Hertziana, Rome and the Villa Spelman, Florence, 1996, Herbert L. Kessler, Gerhard Wolf eds, (Villa Spelman Colloquia, 6), Bologna 1998, pp. 181–203, sp. pp. 195 –196. London, British Library, ms Arundel 157, fol. 2r, reproduced in Alexa Sand, Vision, Devotion, and Self-Representation in Late Medieval Art, New York 2014, p. 39. See esp. Suzanne Lewis, The Art of Matthew Paris in the Chronica Majora, (California Studies in the History of Art), Berkeley, ca 1987, pp. 127–129, followed by Sand, Vision, Devotion (n. 3), p. 38. However, Nigel J. Morgan, Early Gothic Manuscripts (i) 1190 –1250, (A Survey of Manuscripts Illuminated in the British Isles, vol. 4, part i), London 1982, pp. 72–73, n. 24, does not consider the miniature a work of Matthew Paris. Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, ms 16, fol. 53v (49v), reproduced by Sand, Vision, Devotion (n. 3), p. 43. For a description of the manuscript, see Morgan, Early Gothic Manuscripts (n. 4), pp. 136 –139. Besançon, Bibliothèque Municipale, ms 54, fol. 18, and New York, Pierpont Morgan Library, ms 729, fol. 14v; the texts are given by Sand, Vision, Devotion (n. 3), pp. 81– 83. Matthew Paris, Chronica Majora, Vol. iii: a.d. 1216 to a.d. 1239, H. R. Luard ed., (Rerum Britannicarum Medii Aevi Scriptores), London 1876, p. 7. See also Egger, “Papst Innocenz iii. und die Veronica” (n. 2), pp. 197– 198. Matthew Paris, Chronica Majora, Vol. iii (n. 7), pp. 7– 8. The numbering of the psalms follows the Latin Vulgate, and Scripture translations are taken from the Douay-Rheims 1899 American Edition, with some modifications. See the monograph of Joseph Reindl, Das Angesicht Gottes im Sprachgebrauch des Alten Testaments, (Erfurter theologische Studien, 25), Leipzig 1970. Ambrose of Milan, De Spiritu Sancto i.6.80, (csel 79, 48); see also i.17.149, (csel 79, 78). See Hildegund Müller, “Enarrationes in Psalmos”, in The Oxford Guide to the Historical Reception of Augustine, Karla Pollmann, Willemien Otten eds, 3 vols, Oxford 2013, vol. i, pp. 412 – 417. Augustine of Hippo, Enarrationes in Psalmos 4, 8 (ccl 38, 17–18); see also 66, 4 (ccl 39, 861); In Io. Tract. 40, 9 (ccl 36, 355 – 356); De spiritu et littera, xxviii, 48, (csel 60, 203). Augustine of Hippo, De moribus Ecclesiae Catholicae i, xvi, 29 (csel 90, 34). See Chad Tyler Gerber, The Spirit of Augustine’s Early Theology: Contextualizing Augustine’s Pneumatology, Farnham/Burlington, vt 2012, p. 133. Bede, Hom. Evang. i, 1, 6 (ccl 122, 39). While this homily was not included in the original version of the homiliary compiled by Paul the Deacon (c. 720 – 799), which was widely diffused and became part of the monastic Office of Matins, it was added in at least one later adaptation of Paul’s work. The homiliary was the primary way through which Bede’s homilies were known in the Middle Ages. I gratefully owe this information to Zachary Guiliano (Cambridge).

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1 / Missale secundum consuetudinem Romane ecclesiae, 13th century / Vatican Library, Arch. Cap. S. Pietro e.6, fol. 341r (addition from the 15th century)

world”, which is in turn identified with the light evoked in Ps 4, 7 16. The same psalm verse is cited in the proceedings of the Second Session of the Second Council of Nicaea in 787, with a bearing on the theology of images. The conciliar acts incorporate a letter of Pope Hadrian i (772–795) to Emperor Constantine  vi and Empress Irene concerning the veneration of sacred images. After setting out his general argument, Hadrian presents a florilegium of patristic texts. By way of transition, he invokes David’s prophetic anticipation of the Incarnation and cites several psalm verses expressing the quest for the Lord’s countenance, which is found in the human face of Christ. Hadrian concludes this section of his letter with the citation “Signatum est super nos lumen vultus tui, Domine” (Ps 4, 7) and a phrase attributed to “blessed Augustine, the eminent father and best teacher”: “What is the image of God but the face of God, with which the people of God have been stamped (signatus)”17? While the exact phrase has not been identified in the extant corpus of Augustine’s work, the phrase neatly summarises his interpretation of the psalm verse, which has been sketched above18. These strands of patristic exegesis are woven together in Peter Lombard’s (c. 1096–1160) Commentary on the Psalms19; hence a tradition of interpretation can be established that would have provided a hermeneutical context for reading the opening verse of the devotional office attributed to Innocent iii. In the Veronica office, the initial verse is followed by Ps 66, which is indicated only by its first three words, “Deus misereatur nostri”, but is presumably to be recited in its entirety. This psalm also evokes the light of God’s countenance and recognises it as an expression of his mercy, according to the parallelism that is a typical feature of Hebrew poetry: “May God have mercy on us, and bless us: may he cause the light of his countenance to shine upon us, and may he have mercy on us. / That we may know your way upon earth: your salvation in all nations” (Ps 66, 2–3). The psalm concludes with the customary doxology (“Gloria Patri…”), after which are placed the threefold acclamations “Kyrie eleison, Christe eleison, Kyrie eleison” and the Pater Noster.

Three more psalm verses articulate the search but to God the Son. The statement of fact recalls for the Lord’s face: Ps 85, 17, “Show me a token the miraculous imprint Christ left of his own imfor good: that they who hate me may see, and be age on a cloth at the instigation of the holy woman. confounded, because you, O Lord, have helped We find woven into this statement a paraphrase me and have comforted me”; Ps 26, 8, “My heart of Ps 4, 7, already used at the beginning of the dehas said to you: My face has sought you: your votional office: the image is left “for us, stamped face, O Lord, will I still seek”; Ps 104, 4, “Seek with the light of your countenance”. Given the Lord, and be strengthened: seek his face ev- the common medieval reading of this psalm ermore”. While the abbreviated manner in which verse, its integration into the collect serves to these psalms verses are indicated in the manu- establish a relationship between “us” (those who script may have been owing to the lack of space on make the prayer) fashioned in the image of God the page, it would certainly presuppose familiar- and the miraculous image of Christ’s face imprintity with the psalter among those praying the de- ed on the sacred cloth. The theme of the collect votional office. Matthew Paris in fact claims that is introduced with an invocation of Christ’s pasmany people committed the office to memory20. sion and cross, and hence alludes to the Veronica The subsequent invocation “Pray for us, bless- narrative. Thus, attention is focused on Christ’s ed Veronica” with the response “That we may be work of redemption, through which the image made worthy of the promises of Christ” stands of God in us, defaced through sin, is restored. out, because it would seem to suggest a veneration The actual petition introduces an eschatological of the holy woman who received the miraculous perspective: our present veneration of the image cloth; such veneration is known to have spread of Christ “in a mirror dimly” may prepare to be only in the later Middle Ages accompanying the “secure” when we see Christ “face to face” in his increasing devotion to the Passion of Christ21. Second Coming as judge. This is an elaboration The conventional versicle “O Lord, hear my on 1 Cor 13, 12, “For now we see in a mirror dimly, prayer” with its response “And let my cry come but then face to face” (rsv)22, which is often read before you”, and yet another psalm verse (Ps 79, 20, as referring to the visio beatifica, the contemplative “O Lord God of hosts, convert us: and show your vision of the God that is at the very heart of the face, and we shall be saved”) lead to the final in- eternal beatitude of the saints23. However, in the vitation “Let us pray” and the concluding prayer: Veronica prayer this reference is only implicit, as the petition relates to Christ’s coming in glory to “O God, who willed to leave for us, stamped with the light of your countenance, as your memorial at the urging of Veronica the image imprinted on a cloth, through your passion and cross grant us, we pray, that we may now on earth, in a mirror dimly, so adore and venerate the same [image], that we may see you secure face to face, when you come as judge. Who live and reign with God the Father”.

This prayer follows the classical style of the Roman collect and is carefully composed. The collect typically begins with an address to God, accompanied by a relative clause serving as a statement of fact that invokes a divine attribute or action, refers to a particular feast day, or the specific occasion for which the prayer is made. It should be noted that the prayer attributed to Innocent iii is not addressed to God the Father, as would have been normative in the Roman liturgical tradition,

16 Bede, In Principium Genesis, i, 842– 848 (ccl 118a, 28); see also ii, 341–346 (ccl 118a, 82). 17 Concilium Universale Nicaenum Secundum: Actiones i–iii, Erich Lamberz ed., (Acta Conciliorum Oecumenicorum. Series Secunda), Berlin 2008, Actio Secunda, p. 134 (Greek translation) and p. 135 (Latin original). See Ann Van Dijk, “The Veronica, the Vultus Christi and the Veneration of Icons in Medieval Rome”, in Old Saint Peter’s, Rome, Rosamond McKitterick, John Osborne, Carol M. Richardson, Joanna Story eds, (British School at Rome Studies), Cambridge, pp. 229 –256, sp. pp. 252–254, and Thomas F. X. Noble, Images, Iconoclasm, and the Carolingians, (The Middle Ages Series), Philadelphia 2012, pp. 152–153. 18 There is no direct bearing on the veneration of images in Augustine’s exegesis of the psalm verse, and this is effectively used by the author of the Opus Caroli Regis, most likely Bishop Theodulf of Orléans, in his critique of the Greek veneration of images. Opus Caroli ii.16; see Noble, Images, Iconoclasm, and the Carolingians (n. 17), p. 192. 19 Peter Lombard, Commentarium in Psalmos Davidicos, 4, 7: pl 191, 88. 20 Matthew Paris, Chronica Majora, Vol. iii (n. 7), p. 7. 21 See Egger, “Papst Innocenz iii. und die Veronica” (n. 2), p. 201 and already Ernst von Dobschütz, Christusbilder: Untersuchungen zur christlichen Legende, (Texte und Untersuchungen zur Geschichte der altchristlichen Literatur), n.f., 3, Leipzig 1899, pp. 249*–250*. 22 On the theme of the mirror image in later medieval piety, see Sand, Vision, Devotion (n. 3), pp. 4–5. 23 See Egger, “Papst Innocenz iii. und die Veronica”(n. 2), pp. 202–203.

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2 a,b / Missale Olomucense, Bamberg, Johannes Sensenschmidt, for Peter Drach in Speyer, 1488, fols 296r–297r

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judge the living and the dead, which in turn will mean the passage towards the beatific vision for those who are “secure”. The prayer has considerable theological depth and its literary composition includes the – albeit sparse – use of rhythmic clausulae (cursus velox: “relínquere voluísti”; cursus trispondiacus: “secúri videámus”)24. A search in the Corpus Orationum has not yielded any significant euchological parallels, except for the concluding phrase of the petition, which is similar in the ancient Roman collect for the Vigil of the Nativity of the Lord on December 2425. Can any conclusion be drawn about Matthew Paris’s association of the office with the annual procession of the Veronica and his attribution of the prayer to Pope Innocent iii? There is no trace of the office or the prayer in the Ordinal of the Papal Court26, or in the Gesta Innocentii27. Innocent is known to have composed prayers for liturgical and devotional purposes28,

but his authorship of the Veronica prayer must remain uncertain.

The Vatican Mass Orations A set of Mass orations in honour of the Holy Face is attested in a manuscript missal (Missale secundum consuetudinem Romane ecclesiae) from the Capitular Archives of St Peter’s in the Vatican29. As the missal contains an Order of Mass, with the prayers at the foot of the altar, including Ps 42 (Iudica me), and the offertory prayers in their definitive Roman form, its terminus post quem would be 124330. At the end of the Missal (fol. 341r), in a hand different from the main body of the manuscript, probably from the fifteenth century31, we find three orations: Collecta ad faciem Christi, Secreta and Complenda [Fig. 1]. The collect is identical with the prayer of the devotional office attributed to Innocent iii, except for some minor variations (underlined):

“Deus qui nobis signatis lumine uultus tui memoriale tuum ad instantiam beate ueronice ymaginem tuam sudario impressam relinquere uoluisti, per crucem et passionem tuam tribue ut ita nunc in terris per speculum et in enigmate uenerari honorare adorare ipsam ualeamus ut te tunc32 facie ad faciem venientem super nos iudicem securi uideamus. Qui uiuis et regnas deus…“ “O God, who willed to leave for us, stamped with the light of your countenance, as your memorial at the urging of blessed Veronica the image imprinted on a cloth, through your cross and passion grant us, we pray, that we may now on earth in a mirror dimly, so venerate, honour, adore the same [image], that we may then see you secure face to face, when you come as our judge. Who live and reign, God…”

The addition of the attribute “blessed” for Veronica would seem to imply a growing veneration of the holy woman who obtained the precious image from Christ himself. The most notable change is in the petition, where the devotion to the Holy Face is intensified by the asyndeton of

synonyms “venerate, honour, adore”. Moreover, the relationship between those who in the present time make the prayer before the holy image and 24 Pace Corbin, “Les offices de la Sainte Face” (n. 1), pp. 29 –30. 25 “…venientem quoque iudicem securi videamus”. Corpus Orationum, E. Moeller, J.-M. Clément, B. Coppieters‘t Wallant eds, (ccl 160), 14 vol., Turnhout 1992–2004, no. 1915. See also the collect for the feast of the Purification of the b.v.m. (February 2), no. 1133. 26 Stephen J. P. van Dijk, o.f.m., The Ordinal of the Papal Court from Innocent iii to Boniface viii and Related Documents, completed by Joan Hazelden Walker, Fribourg 1975, pp. 157–158. 27 Gesta Innocentii pp. iii, cxliv: pl 214, 200 –203. 28 As noted by van Dijk, The Ordinal of the Papal Court (n. 26), p. 157, n. 3. 29 Arch. Cap. S. Pietro e.6. The manuscript is digitalised and accessible on [http://digi.vatlib.it/view/MSS_Arch.Cap.S.Pietro.E.6/0001]. 30 This fully developed Order of Mass is contained in the ordinal known by its opening words Indutus Planeta, which was based on the observance of the Roman Curia. This ordinal was adopted by the Friars Minor at their chapter in Bologna in 1243 at the initiative of their Minister General, Haymo of Faversham, and became the standard for the Roman Rite. Thus van Dijk, The Ordinal of the Papal Court (n. 26), p. 157, n. 3, speaks of a “Haymonian missal from the Vatican”. 31 I gratefully owe this information to the expertise of Michelle Brown (London). Corbin, “Les offices de la Sainte Face” (n. 1), p. 19, notes that the manuscript contains material dating from the thirteenth to the fifteenth century. 32 Corbin, “Les offices de la Sainte Face” (n. 1), p. 19 mistakenly reads “nunc” here.

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their eschatological hope is highlighted by the addition of “then” and the emphasis on Christ as “our judge”33. The Secreta (prayer over the offerings) reads: “Deus, qui es splendor patris et figura substantie eius quique tuam gloriosam faciem coram discipulis solari claritate refulgere fecisti, presta quaesumus, ut qui nunc in speculo et enigmate te uidemus in reuelatione glorie tue facie ad faciem contemplatione speciei tue perfrui mereamur. Qui uiuis et…” “O God, who are the radiance of the Father and the figure of his substance and made your glorious face shine with brightness before the disciples, grant, we pray, that we who now see you in a mirror dimly, may in the revelation of your glory be worthy to enjoy face to face the contemplation of your sight. Who live and…”

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This oration also follows the classical pattern of Roman liturgical prayer. As in the collect, the simple form of address “Deus” refers to the Son. The following statement of fact is twofold: first, it paraphrases Hebrews 1, 3, where the Son is said to reflect the glory of God the Father and bear the very stamp of his essence or nature; secondly, it recalls

the Transfiguration of Christ witnessed by his chosen disciples Peter, James and John. There would seem to be a specific reference to the narrative in Matthew 17, which records that the face of Christ “shone like the sun” (“resplenduit facies eius sicut sol”, Mt 17, 2)34. The theme of the Secreta takes up 1 Cor 13, 12, as does the Collecta, but this time it is directly and explicitly related to the beatific vision: “species” is used in the Vulgate translation of 2 Cor 5, 7, “we walk by faith (per fidem) and not by sight (per speciem)”35. While there is no direct reference to the liturgical act of offering, the emphasis on seeing Christ now by faith has Eucharistic resonances, especially in the context of the flourishing visual devotion to the sacrament of the altar. The oration has scriptural and theological depth; its literary composition respects the Roman form, including rhythmic clausulae (cursus trispondiacus: “refúlgere fecísti”; cursus velox: “enígmate te vidémus”, “pérfrui mereámur”). Finally, the Complenda (prayer after communion) reads:

3 a, b / Missale Misnense, Mainz: Peter Schöffer, 1485, [pp. 305–307]

“Comple in nobis quesumus domine deus noster sumpti sacramenti uirtutem ut saluator mundi in cordibus nostris per fidei illuminationem et caritatis feruorem accendatur cuius claritatis solemnia deuota ueneratione celebramus. Qui uiuis et regnas... ” “Complete in us, we pray, Lord, our God, the strength of the sacrament received, so that the Saviour of the world may be kindled in our hearts through the illumination of faith and the fervour of charity, as we celebrate with loving veneration the feast of his glory. Who live and reign…”

The incipit “Comple” is rare in the earlier Roman tradition, but more common in later medieval compositions. The oration makes reference to the sacrament received and its divine efficacy36. The petition asking that the “Saviour of the world may be kindled in our hearts” through faith and charity is unusual, and I have not found any euchological parallel. In the Latin biblical tradition, “claritas” is one of several possible translations for the Hebrew kabod and the Greek doxa, describing the manifestation of glory of the Lord37. A close liturgical association would be the Roman Preface of the

Nativity38, which was used in the Mass for the feast of Corpus Christi, composed by St Thomas Aquinas between 1261 and 126439. 33 It may be worth noting that this version of the collect is virtually identical (except for the omission of “blessed”) with that of the Bonmont Psalter. The petition is the same in the version of the Psalter-Hours of Yolande of Soissons, though in this prayer the phrase “per passionem et crucem tuam et sanctum sudarium tuum” stands out; see Sand, Vision, Devotion (n. 3), pp. 82– 83. 34 The Matthaean narrative of the Transfiguration (Mt 17, 1– 9) was read on the Second Sunday of Lent in the Roman Rite. At the time, the feast of the Transfiguration on August 6 was celebrated only locally in the West and was spreading in the later Middle Ages, until it was inserted into the universal Roman calendar by Pope Callixtus iii in 1456. 35 Cf. the collect for the feast of the Epiphany in the Roman Rite: “… ut, qui iam te ex fide cognovimus, usque ad contemplandam speciem tuæ celsitudinis perducamur” (Corpus Orationum, no. 1673). 36 See M. P. Ellebracht, Remarks on the Vocabulary of the Ancient Orations in the Missale Romanum, (Latinitas Christianorum Primaeva, 18), 2nd ed., Nijmegen/Utrecht 1966, p. 129, on “virtus”. 37 For instance, in the sanctuary of the desert (Ex 40, 33–35) and in the Temple of Jerusalem (1 Kings 8, 11). See also the angel’s apparition to the shepherds in Lk 2, 9 (Vg.): “et claritas Dei circumfulsit illos”. 38 “Quia per incarnati Verbi mysterium nova mentis nostrae oculis lux tuae claritatis infulsit: ut dum visibiliter Deum cognoscimus per hunc in invisibilium amorem rapiamur”. Corpus Praefationum, E. Moeller ed., (ccl 161), 4 vol., Turnhout 1980–1981, no. 1322. 39 See Pierre-Marie Gy, “L’office du Corpus Christi et s. Thomas d’Aquin. État d’une recherche”, Revue des sciences philosophiques et théologiques, lxiv (1980), pp. 491–507; Jean-Pierre Torrell, Saint Thomas Aquinas, Vol. i: The Person and His Work, R. Royal trans., Washington, dc 1996, pp. 129–136. On the Eucharistic connotations of devotion to the Holy Face, see Sand, Vision, Devotion (n. 3), pp. 28–29; 54–58.

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The Votive Masses of the Holy Face in Late Medieval Missals Complete Mass formularies of the Holy Face, including proper readings and chants, are found early printed diocesan missals from the late fifteenth and early sixteenth century 40. The single element all these formularies have in common, with some minor variations, is the familiar prayer “Deus, qui nobis signatis lumine…” as the collect of the Mass. The Secreta and the Complenda from the Vatican missal do not seem to have left a trace in the later tradition. The Mass formularies fall into two groups: on the one hand, the missals from Olomouc (1488)41 [Figs 2a,b], Krakow (after 1493)42, Passau (1503)43, Mainz (1510)44, and Augsburg (1510)45 use as their template the votive Mass of the Holy Cross, from which the chant texts are taken. The Veronica is venerated as the visible, miraculous memorial of the Passion of Christ and hence of his saving work. There is a sobering emphasis on redemption from sin and the present vision of the Holy Face is seen above all as an anticipation of and preparation for the eschatological vision of Christ as judge at his Second Coming. On the other hand, a more festive tone is struck in the missals from Meissen (1485)46 [Figs 3a,b], Prague (1498)47, Merseburg (1502)48, and Wrocław (1505)49. This type of Mass formulary does not draw on a traditional model but is specifically composed for the object of veneration, with the use of poetic, non-scriptural texts for the chants. The Prague and Meissen missals also give a fixed date for the liturgical observance, January 15, which may have been

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chosen because it was the closest available day to the Second Sunday after the Epiphany, the date of the annual procession of the Roman Veronica instituted by Innocent iii. This type of formulary celebrates the present vision of the Saviour’s face as the source of grace and blessing for those who have come to worship him. The limits of this article do not allow for a detailed discussion of these texts, which I intend to offer in a separate publication. Art historians have observed that the Veronica can presented both as an image of the suffering Christ and as an image of Christ in his divine glory50. It may be rewarding for further inter-disciplinary research to relate these two images to the two different types of Mass formularies. 40 There is no votive Mass of the Holy Face in the printed editions of the Roman Missal considered in Missale Romanum Mediolani, 1474. Vol. ii. A Collation with Other Editions Printed before 1570, Robert Lippe ed., (Henry Bradshaw Society, 33), London 1907. The Mass formulary “de Iconia Domini Salvatoris”, with the Introit “Sanctus Deus, Sanctus fortis, sanctus et immortalis…” (Ibidem, pp. 329–330), is not related to the Roman Veronica. See Marica Tacconi, Cathedral and Civic Ritual in Late Medieval and Renaissance Florence: The Service Books of Santa Maria Del Fiore, (Cambridge Studies in Palaeography and Codicology, 12), Cambridge 2005, pp. 84–93, and Richard W. Pfaff, The Liturgy in Medieval England: A History, Cambridge 2009, pp. 541–542. 41 Missale Olomucense, Bamberg: Johannes Sensenschmidt, for Peter Drach in Speyer, 1488, fols 296r–297r. 42 Missale Cracoviense, Nuremberg: Georg Stuchs for Johannes Haller, after 1493, fols 302r–v. 43 Missale secundum chorum Pataviensem, Augsburg: s.n., 1503, fols 306v–308r. 44 Missale Moguntinum, Strassburg: Prüss, 1510, fols 200r–v. 45 Missale secundum ritum Augustensis ecclesie, Augsburg: Erhardus Ratdolt, 1510, fols 215v–216v. 46 Missale Misnense, Mainz: Peter Schöffer, 1485, [pp. 305–307]; the original print does not have page numbers. 47 Missale Pragense, Leipzig: Konrad Kachelofen, 1498, fols 149r–150r. 48 Ex quo missalium diversitas in diocesi Merszburgensi, Leipzig: Melchior Lotter sen., 1502, fols 146r–147r. 49 Missale Wratislaviense, Krakow: Kaspar Hochfeder, Johannes Haller and Sebastian Hyber, 1505, fols 284v–285r. 50 See the Introduction to this volume, written by Herbert L. Kessler.

summary

Původ liturgického uctívání římského Veraikonu

Snahy Inocence iii. o prohloubení úcty k římskému Veraikonu vedly mimo jiné k častějšímu uctívání Kristovy tváře během liturgie. Později všeobecně rozšířená bohoslužba uctívání Veraikonu je doložena poprvé v Arundelském žaltáři (kolem 1240) a následně v rukopisu z Cambridge – druhém vydání Chronica Maiora (kolem 1240–1253) od Matthewa Parise. Text obsahuje několik veršů žalmů a versiklů odkazujících na starozákonní hledání boží tváře, jehož naplnění vidí v kontemplaci tváře Kristovy. Obzvláště důležitá je pasáž Žalmu 4, 7, která je v latinské patristické tradici spojována se stvořením člověka: Bůh stvořil člověka ke svému obrazu, tento obraz byl prvotním hříchem znetvořen, ale ve svátosti křtu byl opět opraven. Závěrečná modlitba připisovaná papeži Inocenci iii. je zkomponovaná v klasickém římském stylu a spojuje tehdejší uctívání svaté roušky – připomínky Kristova utrpení – s jeho dílem vykoupení a se setkáním s Kristem jako soudcem „tváří v tvář“ na konci věků. Tento text se později stává stálým, opakujícím se rysem liturgických úkonů k poctě Svaté Tváře, které se však v jiných aspektech značně liší. Misál z archivů Kapituly

sv. Petra ve Vatikánu obsahuje přidaný soubor mešních modliteb s názvem Collecta ad faciem Christi (pravděpodobně vytvořený nejdříve v patnáctém století). Autor analyzuje tyto modlitby z hlediska jejich literární formy, biblických motivů a teologického obsahu. Kompletní mešní kánon „Svaté Tváře“ včetně čtení a liturgických zpěvů se nachází v raných tištěných diecézních misálech z přelomu patnáctého a šestnáctého století. Tyto spisy můžeme rozdělit do dvou skupin. Misály z Olomouce (1488), Krakova (po 1493), Pasova (1503), Mohuče (1510) a Augšpurku (1510) vychází především ze „Mše Svatého kříže“. Veraikon je zde uctíván jako viditelná připomínka Kristova utrpení a jeho vykupitelského díla a pohled na Svatou Tvář je vnímán především jako symbol očekávání a přípravy na uzření Krista jakožto soudce při jeho druhém příchodu. Slavnostnějším pojetím ohromují misály z Prahy (1498), Míšně (1502), Merseburgu (1502) a Vratislavi (1505). V tomto typu mešních kánonů, které byly složeny kvůli samotnému předmětu úcty, se pohled na Spasitelovu tvář stává zdrojem požehnání pro všechny, kdo jí přicházejí vzdát úctu.

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III.

The Promotion of the Veronica Cult

Abstract – The Roman Hospital of Santo Spirito in Sassia and the Cult of the Vera Icon – The genesis of the Roman hospital of Santo Spirito in Sassia and the local Order of the Holy Spirit provide the context for this study of the cult of the Vera Icon and its link to the hospital. As a consequence of Pope Innocent iii’s decree of 1208, the church of Santa Maria in Sassia became a site for the performance of stational liturgy, which included a procession with the Veronica icon from Saint Peter’s Basilica. This article deals first with the question of the symbolic communication the Veronica represented for the hospital of Santo Spirito in Sassia and then, conversely, clarifies the Order’s role in the spread of the Veronica cult in the city of Rome. Second, the author introduces the Order’s Liber Regulae, focusing particularly on its splendidly illuminated Rule originating around 1340–1350. The study demonstrates that some motifs in the Liber Regulae’s miniatures do not match contemporary reality and assumes that the divergence of the Veronica image represented an intentional part of the illuminations’ program. Keywords – Liber Regulae, Santo Spirito in Sassia, Order of the Holy Spirit, Innocent iii, Church rule, Vera Icon, Holy Face, cult

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Gisela Drossbach Augsburg University [email protected]

The Roman Hospital of Santo Spirito in Sassia and the Cult of the Vera Icon Gisela Drossbach

1. Introduction Never before nor afterwards has the rule of an order been produced in such an elaborately illuminated manuscript. For this reason, Gerhard Wolf and I organized an international workshop on this manuscript, the results of which are now published in a monograph1. In this paper, I will first discuss the genesis of the hospital and the Order of the Holy Spirit in the context of the papal letters of Innocent iii concerning the Vera Icon (1208), before moving on to the image of the Vera Icon itself in the Liber Regulae [Fig. 1].

2. Innocent iii and the Genesis of the Order of the Holy Spirit2 Let me begin with a brief chronology of the Order and the circumstances in which its rule was composed. The Order of Santo Spirito was the first non-military hospital order; it expressly distanced

*

My greatest thanks for translation, corrections and help to Dr. Magnus J. Ryan, Cambridge, uk, Dr. Danica Summerlin, Sheffield, uk, and Dr. John Wei, Harvard, Connecticut, usa. I thank also Prof. Amanda Murphy and Prof. Maria Pia Alberzoni for inviting me to this wonderful congress in beautiful Magdalene College, Cambridge, uk. 1 Caritas im Schatten von Sankt Peter. Der Liber Regulae des Hospitals von Santo Spirito in Sassia: eine Prachthandschrift des 14. Jahrhunderts (Publikation des Kunsthistorischen Instituts in Florenz, Max-Planck-Institut), Gisela Drossbach, Gerhard Wolf eds, Regensburg 2015. 2 For part 1 see: Gisela Drossbach,“Christliche caritas als Rechtsinstitut: Hospital und Orden von Santo Spirito in Sassia (1198 –1378)”, in Kirchen- und Staatskirchenrecht 2, Ilona Riedel-Spangenberger, Markus Graulich, Nobert Witsch eds, Paderborn 2005; Eadem, “Papa Innocenzo iii nell’autocomprensione storica dell’ordine ospitaliero di Santo Spirito in Sassia” in Innocenzo iii – Urbs et Orbis, Atti del convegno internazionale, (Roma, settembre 1998), Andrea Sommerlechner ed., Rome 2003, pp. 1327–1345; Eadem, “Caritas cristiana: Innocenzo iii fondatore dell’ospedale e dell’ordine di Santo Spirito”, Il Vetro. Rivista della civiltà italiana, xlv (2001), pp. 85 – 94. German translation: Gisela Drossbach, “Papst Innocenz iii als Stifter des Hospitals und des Ordens von Santo Spirito in Sassia“, Annali dell’Istituto storico italo-germanico in Trento, xxvii (2001), pp. 291–300; Eadem, “Ordo regularis ... per nos institutus esse dinoscitur – Zum Gründungsvorgang des Spitalordens zum Heiligen Geist durch Papst Innozenz iii.”, in Proceedings of the 10th International Congress of Medieval Canon Law, Syracuse, usa (Monumenta Iuris Canonici c, 11), Kenneth Pennington ed., Vatican City 2002, pp. 387 – 404.

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1 / Liber Regulae of the Hospital of Santo Spirito in Sassia in Rome, Incipit regula domus sanctis Spiritus in Saxia de Urbe: capitulum i / Archivio di Stato, Rome, fondo dell’Ospedale di Santo Spirito, ms 3193, fol. 15v 2 / Liber Regulae of the Hospital of Santo Spirito in Sassia in Rome / Archivio di Stato, Rome, fondo dell’Ospedale di Santo Spirito, ms 3193, fol. 15v (detail)

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itself from all military assignments and was devoted exclusively to the care of hospitals. The order was created by Pope Innocent iii (1198–1216) and would remain centered around the papacy. It expanded rapidly, particularly in Italy, and in later years the Roman motherhouse, the hospitale Sancti Spiritus in Saxia, would become the beneficiary of papal protection and papal privileges. Innocent’s role in the foundation of the Order was indispensable. With his letter of December 10, 1201, he gave the church of Santa Maria in Saxia in Rome, next to the Pilgrim’s Hospital of the English, to one Guido of Montpellier and the brothers who maintained the Hospital of the Holy Spirit in Montpellier 3. From the solemn privilege Inter opera pietatis, dated June 19, 1204, we know, first of all, that Innocent iii had built, on the site of the former Pilgrim’s House of the English, a hospital for the salvation of his predecessors, successors and cardinals, using alms from the Roman Church4. It also emerges from this privilege that Innocent bound the community of Guido and his brothers to an order, or regularis ordo5. We know that Innocent iii was responsible for establishing the cult of the Vera Icon with its inaugural procession on January 3, 1208. But things are more complicated and there is much more to know. Innocent issued the letter “Ad commemorandas nuptias” of the same day to the head and brothers of the Hospital of the Holy Spirit. The essentials of the letter are as follows6. On the first day after the Octave of the Epiphany, the liturgy prescribed a reading from the Wedding at Cana (John 2, 2–11) in the Holy Mass. For this day, a stationarium should be established

at the Hospital of the Holy Spirit in Saxia. In his letter, Innocent interpreted the Wedding at Cana (John 2, 1–11) as follows: as water became wine, so would works done through mercy and compassion become love: ex aqua fit vinum, cum ex merito Eleemosynae vis accenditur caritatis; the six jars of water demonstrated the work of mercy. As Jesus went to the Wedding at Cana, where his mother was, with his disciples, so the images of Jesus Christ should be carried from Saint Peter’s Basilica to the Hospital by the canons. The relics of Christ were to be transported and (publicly) shown to the wedding guests in a specially crafted container decorated with gold, silver and jewels. The pope opens the venerandum sacramentum with God’s blessing and shows the imitandum exemplum (publicly), and so performs an ostensio. One thousand paupers were to be cared for outside the Hospital and three hundred needy persons within its precincts. For this purpose, Guido and his brothers were to receive bread, wine, and meat from the papal almoner (out of the papal treasury) to the value of 17 gold pounds, while the canons were to receive twelve coins and a candle for the procession7. Because man does not live by bread alone, the pope and his cardinals would sing mass and give a sermo exhortatorius by the stationarium. In addition, an indulgence of forty days was granted. How are we to understand all of this and its relationship to the Veronica/Holy Face/Vera Icon? A Gospel text, the Wedding at Cana, is theatrically and publicly re-enacted, with the hospital as the main stage and Christ – through the icon – as an actor. The Gesta Innocentii iii strikingly

emphasize the public character of the hospital and of the Veronica8: Instituit [Innocentius iii] autem apud hospitale predictum stationem solemnem Dominica prima post octas Epiphanie in qua populus illic confluit christianus ad videndum et venerendum sudarium salvatoris, quod cum hymnis et canticis, psalmis et faculis, a basilica sancti Petri ad locum illum processionaliter deportant [...].

Innocent iii created the hospital and a charitable order9 and the Roman people loved all types of processions with cultic images. Through this combination of hospital and cult, the Veronica immediately became a crowd-puller10, but Innocent only wanted to propagate his spiritual guiding principle, his Leitidee and establish the Hospital of Santo Spirito as an exemplary charitable institution. If one were to break all this down into its component parts and prioritize them, these would be the re-enactment of a biblical text, the procession, the ostensio of images and the award of indulgences, all of which were certainly all publicly effective and important vehicles for the spread of the fame of the Roman Veronica. All these functions of the Vera Icon were subordinate to papal charity and the purpose of the Hospital. There is, however, another point to consider. Innocent not only built a new hospital, but also a brand new residence next to the grave of Saint Peter at the Vatican. At that time, the establishment of the residence and the Hospital of Santo Spirito and Saint Peter did not mean that Borgo had been brought under direct papal lordship, merely that it was now an important area under papal influence. In my opinion, the Veil of Veronica was never the capstone of Innocent’s effort to transform the Borgo Vaticano into the seat of papal authority. It is also worth noting here that the Vera Icon was of subordinate importance to that of the Hospital and caritas cristiana.

3. Liber Regulae and the Vera Icon 3.1. Versions of the Rule and Description of the Liber Regulae11 Let us now turn to the genesis of the rule [Fig. 2]. At its foundation, the Order did not yet have a rule. The sources, i.e. the papal letters of Innocent iii,

mention only the rationabiles institutiones, which can be seen perhaps as a sort of proto-regula or customary law. The prologue of the oldest surviving form of the rule says that Stefano Conti, cardinal priest of Santa Maria in Trastevere (1229–1254), and Raniero Capocci, cardinal deacon of Santa Maria in Cosmedin (1216–1250), promulgated the rule on behalf of a pope whose name is not specified. The year 1229 in the pontificate of Gregory ix (1227–1241) must thus be considered the earliest possible date for the composition of that rule. Twenty-one chapters were added to the rule before 1268 and it is this form which is found in the Codex 242 of the Borghese collection in the Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana. The establishment of the Rule of the Order of Santo Spirito as an illuminated manuscript, the so-called Liber Regulae, took place in the first half of the fourteenth century. It does not contain a substantially different version of the rule from that of the Borghese manuscript, but it differs in some points from the earlier version. Most importantly, Bullarium Sancti Spiritus in Saxia de Urbe 10 –13, Roma, Archivio di Stato, Archivio dell’Ospedale di Santo Spirito, busta 1. Reprint: Pietro De Angelis, Guido di Montpellier, Innocenzo iii, e la fondazione dell’ospedale Apostolico di Santo Spiritu in Santa Maria in Saxia, Rome 1962, pp. 40 –41. The dating “8. Dicembre 1201” in the Bullarium and in De Angelis is wrong, see Michele Maccarrone, Studi su Innocenzo iii. (Italia sacra 17), Padua 1972, p. 291, n. 1. 4 Register Innozenz’iii., Othmar Hageneder et al. eds (Publikationen des Historischen Instituts beim Österreichischen Kulturinstitut in Rom ii/1/7), Graz/Cologne 1997, 7.152, no. 95. Diplomatic notes to the papal letter, see Werner Maleczek, Papst und Kardinalskolleg von 1191 bis 1216. Die Kardinäle unter Coelestin iii. und Innocenz  iii. (Publikationen des Historischen Instituts beim Österreichischen Kulturinstitut in Rom. i. Abt. Abhandlungen 6), Vienna 1984. 5 Register Innozenz’ iii. (n. 4), 7.152 no. 95: “Statuentes, ut regularis ordo, qui secundum Deum et institutionem fratrum hospitalis sancti Spiritus in eodem loco per nos institutus esse dinoscitur, perpetuis ibidem temporibus inviolabiliter observetur”. 6 pl 215, col. 1270a–1271b, no. 179. Register Innozenz’ iii., Othmar Hageneder ed., Vienna 2007, 10.297–299, no. 179. 7 Cf. Christoph Egger, “Papst Innocenz iii. und die Veronica. Geschichte, Theologie, Liturgie und Seelsorge” in The Holy Face and the Paradox of Representation (Villa Spelman Colloquia 6), Herbert L. Kessler, Gerhard Wolf eds, Bologna 1998, pp. 181–203. Jochend Johrendt misunderstood this passage: Jochen Johrendt, Die Diener des Apostelfürsten. Das Kapitel von St. Peter im Vatikan (11.–13. Jahrhundert), Berlin 2011, p. 120, n. 157. 8 Gesta Innocentii iii, David Gress-Wright ed., in Idem, The “Gesta Innocentii iii”: Text, Introduction and Commentary; PhD thesis, (Bryn Mawr College, Bryn Mawr, pa 1981), p. 143. See also Drossbach, Christliche Caritas (n. 2), p. 77. 9 Drossbach, Christliche Caritas (n. 2), pp. 41– 90. 10 Egger, “Papst Innocenz iii.” (n. 7), p. 191. 11 For the relation between text and image in the Liber Regulae see: Gisela Drossbach, “Bild und Text im Liber Regulae des Hospitals von Santo Spirito in Sassia“ in Sozialgeschichte mittelalterlicher Hospitäler (Vorträge und Forschungen 65), Neithard Bulst, Karl-Heinz Spieß eds, Sigmaringen 2007, pp. 125–148, [https://journals.ub.uni-heidelberg. de/index.php/vuf/article/view/17809/11620, accessed on 12.06.2017]. 3

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3 / Liber Regulae of the Hospital of Santo Spirito in Sassia in Rome, De forma iuramenti, quam magister prestabit: capitulum lxxv/ Archivio di Stato, Rome, fondo dell’Ospedale di Santo Spirito, ms 3193, fol. 202v 4 / Liber Regulae of the Hospital of Santo Spirito in Sassia in Rome, De fratribus in fornicatione lapsis: capitulum xxxi / Archivio di Stato, Rome, fondo dell’Ospededale di Santo Spirito, ms 3193, fol. 93r

it contains a forgery claiming Innocent iii as the originator of the rule and also that he confirmed it, something that I will come back to later. Some formal aspects of the manuscript are worthy of note [Figs 3, 4]. The illuminations are all initials, not frontispieces as in papal law books – with one exception: the introductory imagery we have just seen. This indicates that the manuscript is something more in the nature of a commentary than of a full legal text12. Of the 105 initials – one for every chapter of the rule – 54 are historiated13. In this way, the manuscript of the Liber Regulae presents cameos or snapshots of single activities displayed not only in historiated initials, but also in marginal medallions or other small decorative elements. Early studies concerning the time and place of composition of the Liber Regulae were undertaken by the medical historians Carlo Cecchelli14 and Pietro De Angelis. They considered the miniatures to be influenced by the style in use at Avignon in the mid-fourteenth century. In my opinion, Robert Gibbs is right to date the manuscript to the early 1340s for stylistic

reasons, and Giovanna Murano’s codicological und paleographical analyses have shown that the manuscript was produced in a littera textualis, and is thus much more akin to a chancery script (Kanzleischrift) or the script favored by Roman legal notaries than it is to the script employed in monastic scriptoria elsewhere for the production of entire codices (Buchschrift)15. In these respects, as in several others, the Liber Regulae is very clearly distinct from the contemporary products of Bolognese workshops, dominant in Northern Italy. 12 Robert Gibbs, “The 13th- and 14th-Century Illuminated Statutes of Bologna in their Socio-political Context”, in Von der Ordnung zur Norm: Statuten in Mittelalter und Früher Neuzeit, Gisela Drossbach ed., Paderborn/Munich 2010, pp. 193 –200, sp. p. 199: “In the negative, the absence of the full legally designed and presented frontispiece missing from this manuscript, perhaps the Bolognese Statutes might be seen as having reached the artistic sophistication of their legal counterparts”. 13 Best description: Brigitte Kurmann,“Die Initialen des Liber Regulae: Bilderfindungen im Verhältnis von Regeltext und ikonographischer Tradition“, in Drossbach/Wolf, Caritas im Schatten von Sankt Peter (n. 1), pp. 21–32. 14 Carlo Cecchelli, La vita di Roma nel Medioevo. i. Le arti minori e il costume, vol. 1, Rome 1951–1952, pp. 623 – 627. 15 Robert Gibbs, “The Liber Regulae Master’s Artistic Sources”, pp. 75 – 88, and Giovanna Murano, “Autocelebrazione ed inventio in un capolavoro del Trecento”, pp. 159 – 175, in Caritas im Schatten von Sankt Peter (n. 1).

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On the other hand, Annette Hoffmann has shown that many of the reflections of Bolognese imagery can be traced directly to a Bolognese luxury manuscript, a Bible now in the Escorial which bears the arms of the Hospital Order of the Holy Spirit itself [Figs 5, 6] 16. Clearly this was available to the illuminator of the Liber Regulae who made extensive use of it, especially on the front page.

3.2. The Front Page of the Liber Regulae

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An initial I presents Christ standing in a perspectival box holding a book; a bas-de-page miniature shows the enthroned figure of Pope Innocent iii handing over the Liber Regulae to the members of the order with his left hand, and a figure wearing the habit of the order veiling his right hand: the image-relic of the Vera Icon, enshrined by a precious square and a circular frame is superimposed onto the latter. On the left is an angel, who holds the distinctive cross of the order up to the Vera Icon; the lion and dragon are at the Pope’s feet [Fig. 2]. Gerhard Wolf discusses the earliest visual testimonies for the Vera Icon which, however, should not be misunderstood as copies in the modern sense of the word. The same is true for the bas-de-page of the Liber Regulae17. It shows a serene beauty in the face of Christ, in contrast to the severe expression of papal authority in that of Innocent iii. Gerhard Wolf’s article analyzes the subtle balance of the composition of this page in and between the initial and the bas-de-page, with a brief consideration of the few other representations of popes in the manuscript,

whereas Christ is directly depicted only on this folio. There are only two other initials with the pope. However, there is another and for me far more important aspect of the frontispiece to consider: the juridical dimension of the frontispiece. As I have already mentioned, the model for the frontispiece is the Bolognese Bible in the Escorial and, as Robert Gibbs has shown, this is no coincidence18. One image above all others typifies Bolognese illumination of the late thirteenth and early fourteenth centuries, however, and it is prominent here on the principal opening at fol. 15v. This is the Distribution of Powers, an obvious development of the traditio legis taken from the Triclinium of Pope Leo which is still preserved imperfectly in the eighteenth-century reconstruction outside the Lateran basilica. The Distribution shows the law of the Church being given to its head, the Pope, and the civil law to its author, the Emperor. This image thus brings together the legal studies on which Bologna’s prominence largely depended, its close association with the publication of papal legislation through the universities of Bologna and Paris, and the papal overlordship which had subsequently been imposed upon the city. As Robert Gibbs shows, the Distribution of Powers typifies Bolognese illumination of the late thirteenth and early fourteenth centuries more than any other image. It depicts the opening declaration of the Decretum Gratiani that states that the human race is governed by two kinds of law, though it is not a complete interpretation of Gratian’s text. It is occasionally extended to Gregory ix’s Decretals,

5 / Bible of the Escorial, Liber Sapientiae, Frontispiece, Bologna, ca 1295 / El Escorial, Real Biblioteca de San Lorenzo, ms a. i. 5, fol. 259r 6 / Bible of the Escorial, Liber Sapientiae, Heraldry of the hospital of Santo Spirito in Rome, Bologna, ca 1295 / El Escorial, Real Biblioteca de San Lorenzo, ms a. i. 5, fol. 259r

to Tuscan painting as in Ambrogio Lorenzetti’s Allegory of Good Government and Orcagna’s Strozzi altarpiece, and, as we now see, it is deployed at the formal opening of the Statutes of Santo Spirito, where papal authority takes the place of the divine, rather as in Boniface viii’s Liber Sextus. Unlike these legal illuminations and unlike the Bible in the Escorial, however, the Liber Regulae draws upon its underlying model, the Distribution of Powers, for its binary content, pairing off the spiritual leadership of Christ in the Vera Icon and the cloth of the order given to the Master with the Statutes that are being presented (on the pope’s junior left hand) to the laity or novices. As Gerhard Wolf shows, in contrast to the other representations of popes in the manuscript, Christ is directly addressed only on this folio19.

4. The Juridical Dimension of the Vera Icon Innocent was not the originator of the rule. As we have already seen, in the time of Innocent only the rationabiles institutiones of Guido de Montpellier existed. So the text of the Liber Regulae contains a forgery which claims that Innocent iii was the originator of the rule and that he confirmed it. And, in fact, its frontispiece shows the forgery20. Why was it made? After all, in 1215 the Fourth Lateran Council proclaimed the canon that no religious community was allowed to accept a new rule. The complete anachronism of the front page of the Liber Regulae does not seem to have caused any concern, even though the cardinals Stephano Conti and Raniero

Capocci are mentioned in the prologue as the promulgators of the rule. The intention behind this fiction is surely as follows: the concocted history of the origin of the rule of the order is supposed to legitimize the new version of the rule and the persons who commissioned it. Innocent is shown as the legitimizing and symbolic figure. But what is not a forgery is the Vera Icon, which was a genuine interest of Innocent iii, and which also has the function of legitimizing the rule. Because the Vera Icon is the most important symbolic figure for the legal force of the rule, it appears only in the frontispiece, in contrast to other portraits of the pope in the manuscript which share that legitimizing function. I would also extend Gerhard Wolf’s interpretation of the Christ version of the Vera Icon as the mystical body of Christ [Fig. 7]. That metaphor for society is often portrayed as a master narrative: the body metaphor, also called the organological model. This metaphor is firmly rooted in the political theory of the High Middle Ages and was still common in early modern texts and images. The implicit effect of the body metaphor is to reify people into limbs, and thereby to diminish their personal value. The medieval formulation of the 16 Annette Hoffmann, “La Bibbia bolognese dell’Escorial e il Liber Regulae Hospitalis Sancti Spiritus. Ipotesi su un incontro”, Arte a Bologna, vi (2007), pp. 11–18; Eadem, “Der Liber Regulae und die Bologneser Bibel des Escorial – Die Unbekannten einer Beziehung”, in Caritas im Schatten von Sankt Peter (n. 1), pp. 61– 66. 17 Gerhard Wolf,“Christus im Gehäus und die vera icon in päpstlicher Hand. Überlegungen zu fol. 15v des Liber Regulae”, in Caritas im Schatten von Sankt Peter (n. 1), pp. 67–73. 18 Gibbs, “The 13th- and 14th-Century Illuminated Statutes” (n. 12). 19 Wolf, “Christus im Gehäus” (n. 17). 20 Drossbach, “Bild und Text” (n. 11).

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7 / Liber Regulae of the Hospital of Santo Spirito in Sassia in Rome / Archivio di Stato, Rome, fondo dell’ Ospedale di Santo Spirito, ms 3193, fol. 15v (detail)

5. Conclusion and Overview

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body metaphor occurs both in a more or less purely political shape and in connection with the mystical body of Christ at a meta-level, illustrating the specific ambiguity of medieval metaphors: society can be explained using the image of a body, while at the same time it is the body of Christ. The concept of Christian medieval society may here be reduced to head and body. On the front page of the Liber Regulae the head is clear. It is the Holy Face, the divine archetype, transferred to another sphere, painted in the dolce stil nuovo. And the body or the imitation of the mystical body of Christ is the Order of the Holy Spirit, symbolized by the habit. The concept of the Church as a mystical body with Christ as its head was fully developed around thirty years earlier in Boniface viii’s bull Unam sanctam21. The use of the Vera Icon alone clearly implies that the Liber Regulae is a very privileged piece of papal patronage and papal doctrine rather than a normal manuscript of statutes or a typical legal manuscript. Gerhard Wolf hypothesizes – following Matthew of Paris in Dobschütz’s interpretation – that the subordination addresses the imitatio Christi through the favor of the ospedalieri22. I agree with Wolf, but I also see a legal aspect and would emphasize instead the papal centralization and juridical meaning of the frontispiece like a stamp or seal of a notary, where the Holy Face is only one element in the whole symbolic program.

The message of the painted legal act is clear: the Vera Icon serves primarily to focus control and thereby legal power on the Liber Regulae. In the Borghese manuscript, the original rule could be adapted at any time by the addition of new regulations, leading to a continually changing legal reality. This continual adaptability had been lost in the Liber Regulae. However, through pictures it was possible to set new emphases, to produce, to preserve and enhance relevance and publicity. For this reason, it may be assumed that the Vera Icon was also made as an act of legitimization for the Hospital of Santo Spirito in Rome. From this perspective, the Vera Icon message of the Liber Regulae also extended to the urbs and its power took on a representative significance in the Roman public mind, at a time when the Veronica cult was at its peak. The Vera Icon emphasized all that was written in the rule: the specific monastic tradition of the Order of Santo Spirito and its new central spiritual ideas of charity, and brought to attention and legitimized its curial administrative structure. 21 On the issue of the bodily vision of the Church, in particular in reference to the Innocent iii and Boniface ix papacies, see also Paravicini Bagliani’s studies, e.g. Paravicini Bagliani, Eine Theorie der Hinfälligkeit, Munich 1997. 22 Wolf, “Christus im Gehäus” (n. 17), p. 60: „[…] insofern thematisiert diese Supraposition die imitatio Christi durch den Liebesdienst der ospedalieri”.

summary Římská nemocnice Santo Spirito in Sassia a uctívání Veraikonu

Nikdy předtím ani nikdy potom nebyly regule církevního řádu zaznamenány v tak propracovaně ilustrovaném rukopisu, jako tomu bylo v případě Liber Regulae řádu Svatého Ducha při římské nemocnici Santo Spirito in Sassia. Z tohoto důvodu byl také zorganizován mezinárodní workshop, jehož příspěvky byly vydány v monografii Caritas im Schatten von Sankt Peter. Gisela Drosbach ve svém článku upozorňuje na některé zodpovězené i dosud nevyřešené otázky – především na symbolický význam znázornění Veraikonu na frontispisu. Dle názoru autorky Veroničina rouška nikdy nebyla vyvrcholením snah Inocence iii. proměnit Vatikán v sídlo papežské autority, protože tento aspekt předčily zájmy nemocnice Santo Spirito a s ní související koncept caritas cristiana. Vyobrazení v Liber Regulae vycházejí z boloňských, florentských, římských a avignonských modelů. Vzhledem k této různorodosti vyvstává otázka o původu rukopisu. Autorka jej umísťuje do Říma čtyřicátých let čtrnáctého století. Titulní

strana Liber Regulae začíná písmenem „i“ a je na ní znázorněn Kristus stojící ve výklenku, který drží v ruce knihu. Miniatury ve spodní části stránky ukazují papeže Inocence iii., který podává levou rukou Liber Regulae členům řádu, přičemž pravou ruku má zahalenou. Nad ní se také nachází obraz-relikvie: Veraikon zasazený do dvojího – čtvercového a kruhového – zdobeného rámu. Nalevo se nachází anděl držící typický kříž řádu nad Veraikonem a u papežových nohou leží lev a drak. Drossbach ukazuje, že Veraikon nese mimo jiné i právní význam v kontextu centralizace papežské moci. Frontispis Liber Regulae by tak měl podobnou funkci jako notářské razítko či pečeť, v jehož rámci je Svatá Tvář pouze jedním z prvků celého symbolického programu. Sdělení tohoto iluminovaného právního úkonu je jasné: Veraikon slouží prvotně k tomu soustředit kontrolu, a tedy právní moc, na Liber Regulae. Proto můžeme tvrdit, že Veraikon zde byl umístěn jako prostředek legitimizace nemocnice Santo Spirito v Římě.

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Abstract – Eating the Face of Christ. Philip Good and his Physical Relationship with Veronicas – Philip the Good (1396–1467) updated his grandfather’s prayer book with many images, including no fewer than six depicting the Face of Christ. Larger images served as folios, and smaller images were sewn to pages. He handled these Veronicas intensely and even kissed them. Facial oils and dirt deposited in cumulative layers on the images testify to the duke’s intense facial contact with the Veronicas. Philip’s Veronicas received another kind of treatment as well: the paint of two has been scraped off, revealing the parchment underneath. Carefully avoiding the eyes, the knife-wielder has concentrated on the paint from the forehead and nose. Why? This article proposes that the paint may have been lifted off so that the duke could actually ingest the very substance of his favorite images, possibly during his attenuated demise of pneumonia. In this way, the duke would have been restoring a medicinal function to the image-icon, which had, after all, been brought to Rome as a cure. Other owners of small Veronicas likewise scraped them, possibly for medicine. If this hypothesis is correct, then it also explains why such images were often rendered in thick paint that could easily be freed up and consumed. Keywords Philip the Good (Duke of Burgundy), medieval manuscripts, miraculous cures, painted Veronicas

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Kathryn M. Rudy University of St Andrews [email protected]

Eating the Face of Christ Philip the Good and his Physical Relationship with Veronicas Kathryn M. Rudy

Philip the Bold commissioned an enormous prayer book in 1376 and then proceeded to use it heavily. After he died in 1404, the manuscript found its way into the hands of his grandson Philip the Good1. All of the inherited signs of wear in his grandfather’s immense prayer book may have encouraged the younger Philip to treat it as a living, physical, functional manuscript rather than as some showpiece. As Anne van Buren has shown, Philip the Good had the book dismantled and had texts and images added to it before having the Grandes Heures rebound in two volumes around 1450 2. They are now in Cambridge and Brussels3. These volumes absorbed, inter alia, six parchment sheets that depict the Face of Christ4. Each of these has a different size, style and provenance. Philip 1

According to Patrick M. de Winter, “The Grandes Heures of Philip the Bold, Duke of Burgundy: The Copyist Jean l’Avenant and His Patrons at the French Court”, Speculum, lvii/4 (1982), pp. 786 – 842, the Grandes Heures passed to John the Fearless in 1404 (when they

are also mentioned in an inventory); after John was assassinated, the manuscript was updated for his widow, Margaret of Bavaria. From there it passed to Margaret’s son, Philip the Good. It is one of the largest pre-1400 books of hours. 2 The volumes are now Brussels, Koninklijke Bibliotheek, ms 11035–37 and Cambridge, Fitzwilliam Museum, ms 3–1954. Anne Hagopian Van Buren,“Dreux Jehan and the Grandes Heures of Philip the Bold”, in Als Ich Can: Liber Amicorum in Memory of Professor Dr. Maurits Smeyers, Bert Cardon et al. eds, (Corpus of Illuminated Manuscripts = Corpus Van Verluchte Handschriften), Leuven 2002, pp. 1377–1414, considers the role of Dreux Jehan and also presents a systematic analysis of the original and added components of the manuscript. As Van Buren writes on p. 1383, “The Grandes Heures are one of the most disrupted and most worn by use of medieval books. Gatherings are interrupted, truncated, augmented, or displaced”. 3 See Francis Wormald, Phyllis M. Giles, “Description of Fitzwilliam Museum Ms. 3 –1954”, Transactions of the Cambridge Bibliographical Society, iv/1 (1964), pp. 1–28; A Descriptive Catalogue of the Additional Illuminated Manuscripts in the Fitzwilliam Museum Acquired between 1895 and 1979 (Excluding the McClean Collection), Francis Wormald, Phyllis M. Giles eds, Cambridge 1982; Megan H. Foster, Pilgrimage through the Pages: Pilgrim’s Badges in Late Medieval Devotional Manuscripts, PhD Thesis (University of Illinois), Urbana, 2011, pp. 94–122. De Winter connects the two volumes with notes in archival records: de Winter, “The Grandes Heures” (n. 1), pp. 786 – 842; and Idem, La Bibliothèque de Philippe le Hardi, Duc de Bourgogne (1364–1404): Étude sur les Manuscrits à Peintures d’une Collection Princière à l’Époque du Style Gothique International, (Documents, Études et Répertoires / Institut de Recherche et d’Histoire des Textes), Paris 1985, p. 183. 4 Kathryn Rudy, Postcards on Parchment: The Social Lives of Medieval Books, New Haven/London 2015, pp. 176 – 184.

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the Good collected these images successively over time, which reveals his sustained interest in this theme; and he venerated them in a particularly physical way by handling them and touching their surfaces to the point where the images are severely darkened with use. Moreover, he seems to have used a blade to scrape the paint from the faces. As I will suggest, near the end of his life he may have used the images as spiritual food. This paper’s aim is to speculate on how and why he treated these images of the Face of Christ in such a physical manner. To do this, I investigate Philip’s broader patterns of devotional performance and consider his behavior against cultural norms of the Late Middle Ages, namely the rugged handling and possible ingestion of images of the Face of Christ for their perceived medicinal effects. 

Emotional Attachment

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Parchment paintings depicting the Veronica refer to the prototype kept in Rome; however, the status of these objects as souvenirs of Rome is questionable. It is more likely that these came from different sources made throughout Europe. Given the significant number of survivors, they must have been made in large quantities. Parchment paintings had any number of uses, partly determined by how the recipient chose to keep the object, and partly by the size of the leaf. Most extant flat Veronicas survived because they were preserved in manuscripts, which have protected something that was otherwise ephemeral. While pilgrims who went to Rome would certainly have had the opportunity to purchase miniature replicas of the Veronica in a variety of media, such “souvenirs” were also apparently produced north of the Alps, where they might have served as mementos from virtual journeys, or as relics of a famous, distant place, whether their owner had visited it physically or virtually. After all, the Veronica had a famous history of travelling to the afflicted, rather than having the afflicted travel to it, and replicas were considered as efficacious as the real thing.  The images of the Face of Christ Philip the Good added to the Grandes Heures are all parchment paintings, that is, images painted on parchment that were not necessarily destined for a codex, but

had any number of functions as loose objects. Philip the Good, or his book maker, affixed four small loose images of the Face of Christ onto a blank, ruled page of the Grandes Heures (fol. 96r; [Fig. 1]). These have been attached with linen thread that pierces the page several times, as the back of the page reveals [Fig. 2]. This demonstrates that all four images were added to the page in a single campaign of sewing. After a blank folio (fol. 97), he inserted a larger parchment painting so that it formed a page in the book (fig. 98r; [Fig. 3]). Although artists with various levels of skill made these five images with different techniques, the book’s owner has conceptually grouped them together on fols 96r and 98r because they all represent the same subject. As such, they appear as a collection, mounted in the book. It is possible that Philip left fol. 97 blank in the anticipation of collecting and sewing further Veronicas to that page. Indeed, his collecting activities did continue, as evidenced by yet another large Face of Christ, which appears at the beginning of the manuscript (fol. 8v) and was also large enough to form an entire page [Fig. 4] 5. It seems likely, therefore, that Philip owned at least six images of the Face of Christ before 1450 and had these incorporated into his book. But why did he need so many? Because copies of the Veronica were understood to possess all of the supernatural properties of the original, there were powerful motivations for reproducing the image endlessly, just as there were for collecting it endlessly. Producers made them and collectors collected them because they were effective and immediate. Their effects were widely understood. Two of the four images have further added value: the incipit of the prayer Salve sancta facies. As the sheets are too small to contain the entire prayer, they only contain the opening words. They thus assume that the beholder would know the entire prayer and be able to recite it from memory, based on this prompt. This suggests that the images crystalize a pervasive image-text ritual, held in memory.   5

I am not sure why Philip the Good ignored the image on fol. 8v. Signs of wear on the recto of the same leaf show offsets of sewing threads, which were used to affix round badges to the previous folio (fol. 7), which has intense signs of wear. Thus, fol. 8 was in place at an early date. Clearly, the duke concentrated his attention to the Veronicas on fols 96 – 98.

1 / Four different parchment paintings depicting the Veronica, all pasted to a single leaf of the Grandes Heures of Philip the Bold / Brussels, Koninklijke Bibliotheek ms 11035 –37, fol. 96r 2 / Opening of the Grandes Heures of Philip the Bold, showing 15th-century stitches holding the small Veronicas in place / Brussels, Koninklijke Bibliotheek, ms 11035 –37, fol. 96v–97r 3 / Parchment painting depicting Veronica holding up her veil, with the prayer Salve sancta facies forming an integral component at the bottom; folio inserted into the Grandes Heures of Philip the Bold / Brussels, Koninklijke Bibliotheek, ms 11035–37, fol. 98r 171

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Parchment paintings depicting the Veronica usually feature sparse designs executed simply. Although the four examples sewn to fol. 96r differ in size, aspect ratio, and composition, they all present the Face of Christ as a very dark silhouette, whose attenuated features terminate in a bifurcated beard. The blackness of the face eats light and swallows most of the details, thereby reducing the need for nuanced modelling. The two sheets in the upper tier include the contextualizing detail of the female saint. The painter did not need to master the human figure to paint these, since most of Veronica’s body is obfuscated by the enormous sudarium.  Three of the four parchment paintings show the Face of Christ within a round nimbus. Thus, the main compositional elements comprise simple geometric shapes, which an amateur could master. 

What is most striking about the images is the thickness of their paint, the boldness of their compositions, and their small size. In short, these could be produced with someone with few skills and limited materials, perhaps upcycling offcuts from the manuscript industry. Made by amateur painters and scribes, the sheets were entrepreneurial endeavors by a non-artist class. This amateurishness contrasts with the way people treasured the objects. As the Veronicas do not fit the manuscript well, they were undoubtedly not made for it. It is unlikely that these parchment paintings were designed to be used in a book at all. Rather, they may have been designed as objects to hold, keep in a box, or tack onto the wall. Because they originated with a famous icono-relic prototype and bore the association with a miraculous image6, these objects transcended questions of “quality”, such that a very elite manuscript might come to include them. Perhaps this fact also licensed owners to handle the images more, because they were external to the book, and amateur, but at the same time provocatively and attractively authentic. These images therefore would have a status within the book beyond that of the established, commissioned images: they were special objects of devotion precisely because they did not originate in the book’s production.

How the Veronicas in the Grandes Heures Were Handled Whereas professional photographs of the manuscript decontextualize the folios, flatten them, and reduce some of the signs of wear by “correcting”the color, an informal snapshot gives a better sense of the extent of Philip’s physical and oral devotions. The extent of the wear is palpable when one views the openings from 95v– 98r, fanned out [Fig. 5]. Fol. 95v is ruled and has the Salve sancta 6

See Hans Belting, “In Search of Christ’s Body. Image or Imprint?”, in The Holy Face and the Paradox of Representation, Papers from a Colloquium held at the Bibliotheca Hertziana, (Rome and the Villa Spelman, Florence, Villa Spelman Colloqui, 6), Herbert L. Kessler, Gerhard Wolf eds, Bologna 1998), pp. 1–11; and the other essays in that and in the current volume.

4 / Parchment painting depicting Veronica holding up her veil, with a prayer to God the Father added to the bottom; folio inserted into the Grandes Heures of Philip the Bold / Brussels, Koninklijke Bibliotheek, ms 11035–37, fol. 8v 5 / Hand-held image showing the wear to the Face of Christ images and accompanying texts / Brussels, Koninklijke Bibliotheek, ms 11035–37, fol. 95v–98r

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facies inscribed on it in a hand from the time of the rebinding (ca 1450). Fols 96 – 97 were also ruled but mostly blank, implying that the planner left open the possibility that they could receive more script, such as more prayers to Christ’s face. Indeed, the top of fol. 96r contains a short prayer to Veronica and her image, but it did not fill the page, and therefore it left more than half the folio blank. This blank parchment demanded fill, and the duke did so with four small images. Philip apparently considered all of the Veronicas sewn onto fol. 96r authentic and did not limit himself to one especially good image. Each of them, no matter how bad and no matter how different from the others, was invested with its meaning. He therefore needed to perform devotion to them all, because they were all an accretion of little miracles, each one bearing its own miraculous weight.  And perform devotion, he did. As a collection, the images on 96–98 formed a constellation that repeatedly drew the duke’s attention. They have all therefore incurred a common level of grime in addition to whatever wear they received in their previous career as loose objects. Ground-in dirt reveals the duke’s affection for these images: he has rubbed and touched those on 96r so that the details are no longer visible, so buried are they beneath the soil. This veil of dirt extends to fol. 98r, the inserted full-page Veronica, which is large enough to accommodate images of Sts Peter and Paul. As with fol. 96r, the duke has apparently stroked this image, handled its text, and kissed the image of the face. Clearly his attentions did not extend to the top fifth of the sheet, where Sts Veronica, Peter and Paul are represented, absent signs of wear. The material evidence suggests that his osculations were reserved for the Face of Christ alone.  Not just the images, but the area all around them is darkened with wear, as if he had inserted his mouth and lips and his entire head into the opening of the large book. This caused the oil from his skin and the moisture from his mouth and nose to come in contact with the pages. Because the small sheets have a certain thickness, they stand out in relief from the page. They each have a halo of clean parchment around them, where the apparently filthy face of the duke could not reach. The dirt is so substantial near the bottom of fol. 96r

that it has seeped through the parchment and is visible on the verso. The pattern of the dirt reveals the protrusions (such as the threads) caked in dirt, while the crevices, which the duke’s face would not have reached, remain clean. Moreover, he has stained not only the folios with the images, but also the facing folios: fol. 95v with the Salve sancta facies inscribed on it is caked in dirt. The text folio has been darkened not only through dirt transferred from the duke’s face, but it also contains offset dirt from the images and small amounts of paint (especially the rubricator’s red) that adhered to the slightly damp, tacky surface, when the book had been loved then closed.  This kind of accumulated deposit is consistent with ritualized activity over a long period of time. The book’s owner has repeatedly touched this page of Veronicas, so that the parchment skin caressed Philip’s own lips and cheeks, and he thereby spread layer after layer of bodily oil and grime into the very material of the two-page spread. Whereas most manuscripts’ lower corners are filthy, those on fol. 96 are actually cleaner than the surrounding area, as if the duke wiped with his hands some of the dirt deposited on the page by his face. In short, the type of wear on fols 96–98 is consistent with a pattern of habitual handling and kissing, possibly over of a period of seventeen years, from 1450 when the book was rebound and these Veronicas were sewn in, until 1467 when he died.

Scratching Paint and Rituals of Ingestion Inspecting two of the Veronicas reveals another kind of wear: severe paint loss. Within the image on fol. 98r, Jesus’s forehead and the bridge of his nose and his upper cheeks have been scraped down to the parchment, while his eyes are still fully intact. Furthermore, near his right temple and extending upward through his hair, a white line signals paint loss. Another deep scratch appears just below his mouth. These lines seem to have resulted from contact with a sharp instrument, such as a scalpel, with which a beholder deliberately scraped some of the paint but also made a few stray marks. Wielding the blade with surgical intent, the scraper has carefully avoided the eyes. While iconoclasts universally attack the

eyes represented in paintings and sculptures, the Scraping the image ritualistically presupposes person who scraped the Veronica, by contrast, pur- that the copy transmitted the properties of the posely avoided the eyes. To scrape out someone’s original, which consisted of a piece of cloth soaked eyes was just too brutal. Furthermore, this way, in Christ’s body fluids. The duke scraped, or had Jesus could watch the duke carry out the ritual of someone scrape for him, the paint of the Face of ingestion that followed. These marks – although Christ, because he considered the image a subextreme and destructive – are consistent with the stitute for Christ’s flesh. After scraping up these ultimate image-loving motive: the will to take the “fluids” with a knife, Philip would then have been image into one’s own body. This was possible be- able to collect these particles of pigment (or blood, cause the image was considered both image and or divine substance) and ingest them. To make the icon, an embodiment of Christ’s presence. A sim- Savior easier to swallow, the duke’s doctor could ilar pattern of scraping appears on the upper left- have mixed the particles in water so that Philip hand image sewn to fol. 96r. The knife bearer has could drink the concoction in what must have aimed for the forehead, nose, fleshy cheeks and been a solemn ceremony. In fact, the duke’s body mouth of Jesus, but has carefully avoided scrap- (his hand and facial grease, his spittle, perhaps ing the eyes. Clearly this is not the work of some his tears) had already comingled with the imaglater iconoclast who has attacked the image out of es when he deposited a loving veil of his body hate for its subject, nor to express disapproval of fluids on them. Now the direction of the loving image-making in general; but rather, this damage exchange would be reversed, as Jesus would travreflects a continued veneration of the images to el to Philip’s lips. which all of the dirt and signs of wear attest. Ingesting the dust from sacred relics as a desThe physicality of the image of the Face of perate, eleventh-hour cure had an illustrious histoChrist is part of its history. Its legendary material ry. When Gregory of Tours (539–594) was suffering presence as a healing aid stems from the story of from debilitating dysentery, and when all regular Abgar, told elsewhere in this volume. The Golden medical interventions had failed, he ingested dust Legend’s version of the Passion also speaks to the from the tomb of St Martin. According to the acimage’s curative powers: shortly after Pilate or- count, Gregory said: dered Jesus crucified, the sickly Roman emperor “’Let them bring dust from the holy master’s tomb and make a potion for me from it. And if this does Tiberius Caesar learned of a physician who could not cure me, every means of escape is lost’. Then the cure all diseases. This physician was, of course, deacon was sent to the tomb of the holy bishop just Jesus. Tiberius sent a messenger named Volusian mentioned and he brought the sacred dust and put it to fetch the healer from Jerusalem and bring him in water and gave me a drink of it. When I had drunk back to Rome, but Volusian arrived after Jesus’ exsoon all pain was gone and I received health from the ecution. According to the legend, Volusian brought tomb. And the benefit was so immediate that although this happened in the third hour, I became quite well Veronica’s image back to Rome. Looking at it reand went to dinner that very day at the sixth hour”7. stored Caesar’s health. As the narrative makes plain, the image possessed curative powers that St Martin’s contact relic worked a miracle when worked its medicine when the patient gazed upon Gregory drank the dust. Far from being a folk remit. Significantly, the patient did not require faith or edy, it was practiced by one of the most powerful belief in order to reap the working of the image: the men in Christendom. act of looking itself was sufficient to obtain a cure. Other parchment paintings depicting the VeThis story led to the association of the image of ronica have likewise been scratched or scraped, the Face of Christ with miraculous healing. The which suggests that ingesting the Face of Christ duke may have treated the face as the source of was a pervasive practice, and that some of the medicine, of some miraculous cure. If so, he was myriad images of this subject were created as not alone. The ultimate way to possess an image, The Four Books of the Miracles of St. Martin, Bk 2, Ch. 1 [http:// more than owning it, was eating it: destroying it 7 From sourcebooks.fordham.edu/source/gregory-mirac.asp, last accessed on 27. 11. 2016]. through one’s own consumption.

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6 / Ampule stamped with the Veronica, lead-tin, 15th century / private collection

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medicine8. A small, fifteenth-century ampule may refer to this same practice [Fig. 6] 9. Stamped onto the miniature jug is Christ’s symmetrical, confrontational image; the bifurcated beard and long hair which form a “w” shape at the bottom of the face, plus the square of cloth framing it, leave no doubt that this ampule is yet another material witness to the Veronica. The purpose of an ampule, of course, is to preserve a liquid form of the sacred, in this case, perhaps Holy Face scrapings mixed with water.  The workings of these images were therefore similar to those of textual amulets, which have received recent scholarly attention10. Texts, and sometimes images, functioned in this way by working an effect on a believer who merely makes bodily contact with the textual carrier. In other words, one merely needed to carry the supernatural words

in order to enjoy their protection. Many such amulets were associated with childbirth, and one example in Princeton consists of a square piece of parchment with apotropaic words inscribed upon it, which has been folded and apparently pressed to a woman’s belly during childbirth11. Her sweat has made the ink run.  To achieve even more proximity with the miraculous words, shapes, or images, one could eat them. As Jocelyn Wogan-Browne has shown, various apotropaic practices within Christianity involved eating words and images12. Such images may have functioned as contact relics, or even held a status as identical with their referents. She writes: “Some assumptions of hagiographic writing germane to its liturgical uses provide a theoretical underpinning in which hagiographic texts, in all their material components – parchment, script, images –, can be

seen as presenting (rather than re-presenting) the saint”13. In other words, every image (re)presenting the saint is divine and is connected to its prototype. Wogan-Brown analyses an example in London, British Library, ms Sloane 3564, which is a French charm for women in childbirth. It instructs the bearer to inscribe these magical words in an apple and consume them14. Use of contact relics was certainly not limited to “popular” audiences, but even queens and nobles used relics of St Margaret to ease childbirth15. Likewise, the Virgin’s Chemise, the principal relic held at Chartres Cathedral, was reputed to protect its bearer during battle and childbirth. Mary herself was said to have worn it at the Conception and Birth of Jesus, and miracle stories emphasize that it had “lain against her naked skin”16. Copies of the Chemise also protected their wearers, and people visiting the relic could have copies made for themselves. Men would wear it under their cuirasses during battle, and women would wear it on their naked skin during childbirth, as Mary had. Charles v owned a miraculous chemise in 1380, the duchess of Orléans had four of them in 1409, and Jean, duke of Berry had two in 141617. Moreover, the latter owned a small painting on leather depicting the Veronica, which was pasted to the front of the Très Belles Heures de Jean de Berry (Brussels, Royal Library, ms 11060–61)18. My point here is that physical rituals with contact relics and replicas of them were not limited to illiterate people, but had many adherents among the nobility, both men and women. Class or gender did not limit use of such relics. Gary Vikan has shown that certain tokens of St Symeon Stylites were designed to be consumed19. Byzantine believers touched images because they were like relics, direct conduits to a human prototype. Most famously, relic-icons of miraculously imprinted cloth had a reception that treated them both for their relic-ness and their icon-ness: objects such as the so-called Mandylion of Edessa were venerated because of their iconic likeness and because they had touched the body of Christ. Likewise, enterprising image makers produced small tokens depicting Symeon. They made these of clay from the area near the column atop which Symeon sat. In other words, the images themselves formed

contact relics of the saint. These images depicted Symeon in his basket, a severely abbreviated image of a column, which was otherwise difficult to fit onto a disc of clay less than two inches in diameter. These imaged discs were lightly baked rather than fully fired. This made them crumbly rather than hard, strong, ceramic. Believers ritualistically used the “holy dust” of the saint in the hopes of miraculous cures. According to stories from Symeon’s vita, a monk from the Magic Mountain offered a cure to a certain prefect named Theodore Pikaridios, who suffered from an intestinal disorder. The prefect was to use “the dust of [Symeon’s] eulogia”. (Eulogia are unconsecrated hosts distributed to non-communicants, but in this case the term refers to the wafer-like discs of clay representing Symeon distributed at his shrine). The monk told Theodore to: “take some, break them up in pure water, in faith drink them up, and [then] wash yourself with this water, and you will see the glory of God”20. The Symeon tokens, in all their copies, were both relics and icons and therefore doubled the presence of their divine prototype. The Face of Christ was an even more powerful relic-icon, copied in many more forms over a wider geographical swathe than any other Christian image. Clues about use and reception in some 8

9 10 11 12

13 14 15 16 17 18

19

20

For example, see the images of the Veronica pictured in Rudy, Postcards on Parchment (n. 4), p. 197, fig. 178; p. 269, fig. 254; p. 270, fig. 255; p. 271, fig. 256. These have all been scraped. I heartily thank Dr Hanneke van Asperen for bringing this ampule to my attention. Don C. Skemer, Binding Words: Textual Amulets in the Middle Ages, University Park, pa 2006, with further references. For an image, see Ibidem, p. 248, fig. 10. Jocelyn Wogan-Browne, “The Apple’s Message: Some Post-Conquest Hagiographic Accounts of Textual Transmission”, in Late-Medieval Religious Texts and Their Transmission: Essays in Honour of A. I. Doyle, Alastair J. Minnis ed., Cambridge 1993, pp. 39 –53. Ibidem, p. 43. Ibidem, p. 49, quoting Tony Hunt, Popular Medicine in ThirteenthCentury England, Cambridge 1990, p. 361, n. 135. E. Jane Burns, “Saracen Silk and the Virgin’s ‘Chemise’: Cultural Crossing in Cloth”, Speculum, lxxxi/2 (2006), pp. 365–397. Ibidem, p. 365. Ibidem, p. 368. Millard Meiss, French Painting in the Time of Jean De Berry; the Late Fourteenth Century and the Patronage of the Duke, 2 vols, London 1967, vol. i, pp. 201, 321. Gary Vikan, “Ruminations on Edible Icons: Originals and Copies in the Art of Byzantium”, in Retaining the Original: Multiple Originals, Copies, and Reproductions, (Studies in the History of Art), Kathleen Preciado ed., Washington, dc 1989, pp. 47–59. Ibidem, p. 56, translating and quoting Paul van den Ven, La Vie Ancienne de S. Syméon Stylite le Jeune (521–592), (Subsidia Hagiographica), Brussels 1962.

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surviving copies suggest that it, too, was involved in a set of rituals of ingestion. As I have shown above, two of the Faces of Christ in Philip’s prayer book have been carefully scraped. In light of this physical evidence, one plausible hypothesis is that the duke ate the image, flake by flake. Related parchment paintings preserved in other manuscripts suggest that this was a practice spread throughout northern Europe, and perhaps beyond. (Because images are not usually catalogued according to their damage, and often the damage is not mentioned in catalogue entries, and authors/publishers often eschew severely worn images in their publications, such images are difficult to locate systematically.) For example, a parchment painting glued into a compilation manuscript, made in various parts of France and assembled/bound around 1500, has comparable damage (’s-Heerenberg, ms 2)21. This image has been affixed to the book in this location, simply because there was space available to accommodate it. This parchment painting is similar to those that Philip had attached. Here again, the user has deliberately scraped the image, seemingly with the goal of loosening some of the pigment to complete a ritual that depended on the image’s physicality. Similar marks of deliberate wear appear in small paintings of the Face of Christ discussed by Jeffrey Hamburger22. As Hamburger points out, small paintings with this image were often used in manuscripts as osculatory targets, areas that the user/reader is supposed to kiss. These images, therefore, fulfilled a ritual of oral touching. It was only a short leap to ingest the image. Philip, as I am arguing, may very well have made this leap.  Indulgenced rubrics and image-based prayers touted the salubrious effects of the Veronica. Another strand of the worship of the Face of Christ treated the image as powerfully apotropaic. For example, some of the translations of the Salve sancta facies bear a rubric such as one found in a book of hours made by the sisters of St Ursula in Delft in the 1470s or 1480s: rub: Anyone who looks upon the Veronica with devotion will have from the pope in Rome 3000 days of venial 178

indulgence, and he will not die that day suddenly or with an unforeseen death. inc: I greet you, merciful face… rub: Soe dat beelde vanden vero[152v]nica aensiet mit devocien hi hevet vanden paeus van romen iijc dagen oflaets. Ende hi en sterft niet bynnen dien dage onversienre of quader doot. inc: Ic gruet u ghebenedide aenschiin... [Oxford, Bodleian Library, ms Douce 243, fol. 152r/v]

This image, in other words, had powerful effects on the spiritual health of the dying; seeing it would guarantee that one would not die unconfessed or suddenly. It was the ultimate spiritual food. Here is one scenario that is consistent with the patterns of dirt and wear in this manuscript: after seventeen years of intense oral contact with the images of the Face of Christ sewn into his book, Philip the Good lay on his death bed in 1467 with pneumonia, finding it exceedingly difficult to breathe. As his health weakened and his death neared, he abandoned kissing the images in his prayer book. In a last-ditch effort to comfort Philip, his valet scraped two of the duke’s most beloved images from his favorite prayer book, added the scrapings to water, and brought the suspension to the duke’s mouth so that he could ingest the ultimate via tecum and comingle his flesh with that of his beloved images. One can see in the pattern of dirt that the knife scraped away the paint of the black face, but no more dirt was layered upon the now-exposed parchment: scraping the faces of Christ was the last thing that happened to these pages before the book was closed for the last time as a devotional prayer book. Philip the Good died in Bruges in 1467 at the age of 69. After that, his prayer book became a relic of him and was preserved as a museum object. 21 The image is pasted into a composite manuscript prayer book made in France. ’s-Heerenberg, The Netherlands, Collection Dr. J.H. van Heek, Huis Bergh Foundation, ms 2 (inv. 259). See Anne S. Korteweg, Catalogue of Medieval Manuscripts and Incunabula at Huis Bergh Castle in ’s-Heerenberg, ’s-Heerenberg 2013. I treat this manuscript at greater length in Piety in Pieces: How medieval readers customized their manuscripts, Cambridge 2016, pp. 233 – 244, with an image of the Veronica on p. 242, fig. 218. 22 Jeffrey F. Hamburger, The Visual and the Visionary: Art and Female Spirituality in Late Medieval Germany, New York 1998, ch. 7. See also Herbert Kessler, “Turning a Blind Eye: Medieval Art and the Dynamics of Contemplation”, The Mind’s Eye: Art and Theological Argument in the Middle Ages, Jeffrey Hamburger, Anne-Marie Bouché eds, Princeton 2006, pp. 413 –439.

summary

Pozření Kristovy tváře Filip iii. Dobrý a jeho fyzický vztah k Veraikonům

Filip iii. Dobrý (1396–1467) nechal doplnit modlitební knihu svého děda, Filipa  ii. Smělého, o několik iluminací, z nichž minimálně šest zachycovalo tvář Krista. Větší výjevy tvořily celá folia a menší byly přišity na speciálně vyhrazené strany. S těmito Veraikony Filip často manipuloval, a dokonce je i líbal. Stopy po používání se objevují v celém rukopisu. Zbytky obličejových olejů a vrstvy nečistot svědčí o vévodově přímém a intenzivním kontaktu s Veraikony. Způsob, kterým jsou tato vyobrazení do rukopisu začleněna napovídá, že je vévoda soustředil do jedné části, se kterou poté opakovaně manipuloval. Kromě toho se s Veraikony zacházelo i jiným způsobem: barevné vrstvy u dvou z nich byly seškrábány až na pergamenový podklad. Ten, kdo barvu seškrábal, se opatrně vyhnul očím a zaměřil se pouze na oblast čela a nosu. Ale proč? Kathryn Rudy navrhuje hypotézu, že barva mohla být seškrabána z toho důvodu, aby vévoda mohl pozřít samotnou substanci svých oblíbených obrazů. Muselo se tak stát ke konci vévodova života, protože žádné další stopy po

obličejových olejích se na obnažených částech pergamenu nedochovaly. Je možné, že seškrábaná barva se stala jakousi speciální ingrediencí léčivé tinktury pro vévodův zhoršující se zápal plic. Filip nakonec nemoci podlehl, nicméně nabídnout vévodovi šanci dovolit své nejoblíbenější modlitební knize – a zejména jejím iluminacím, se kterými tak vroucně manipuloval – aby doslova splynuly s jeho tělem, byl poslední pokus o jeho zázračné uzdravení. V tomto směru by vévoda obnovoval léčivou moc obrazu-ikony, která byla koneckonců do Říma přinesena jako lék. Daleko od vévodova sídla a jeho zbožnosti seškrabávali i jiní vlastníci malých Veraikonů vrstvy barev, možná také ve víře v  jejich léčivé vlastnosti. Pokud je autorčina hypotéza správná, vysvětluje také, proč byly takové obrazy často malovány hustými nánosy barev, které mohou být snadno seškrabány z pergamenového podkladu. Značilo by to, že malíři Veraikonů předpokládali použití svých obrazů k léčebným účelům – tedy k tomu, aby byly seškrabány a pozřeny.

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Abstract – Sui pretiossisimi vultus Imago. Veronica and the Practice of Indulgences in the 13th and at the Beginning of the 14th Century – Both the "true icon" and "pardons" became especially popular during the thirteenth century. This paper considers the possible connection between the two phenomena by examining the history of papal indulgences connected with the veneration of Veronica during that period. The following questions are raised: When and how did the custom begin to supplicate and grant letters of indulgence to spread the cult of the precious relic? Who first took the initiative, the canons of St. Peter's or the popes? What consequences did these pardons have with regard to the practice of indulgences in Rome? What role did Veronicaindulgences play for establishing the first Holy Year? The paper concludes that, even after the Jubilee of 1300 and the transfer of the Curia to Avignon, the Veronica continued to be associated with indulgences: this is evidenced by the illumination of numerous letters of indulgence collectively granted from curial prelates to petitioners throughout Europe. Keywords Veronica, indulgences, Papacy, Rome, St Peter’s Basilica, Santo Spirito in Sassia, Holy Year Parole chiave Veronica, indulgenze, papato, Roma, Basilica di San Pietro, Santo Spirito in Sassia, Anno Santo

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Étienne Doublier Bergische Universität Wuppertal [email protected]

Sui pretiossisimi vultus Imago Veronica e prassi indulgenziale nel xiii e all’inizio del xiv secolo Étienne Doublier

Se si consulta uno dei tanti cataloghi delle Indulgentiae ecclesiarum Urbis Romae, diffusi dalla metà del xiv secolo soprattutto a nord delle Alpi, non sfuggirà come le indulgenze quantitativamente più consistenti risultino quasi sempre quelle lucrabili attraverso la venerazione della Veronica1. A questa altezza cronologica, il sudarium Domini era indubbiamente la reliquia più popolare di Roma e quella a cui erano associate le indulgenze maggiori2. 1

Si vedano esemplificativamente Bernhard Schimmelpfennig, “Römische Ablassfälschungen aus der Mitte des 14. Jahrhunderts”, in Fälschungen im Mittelalter. Internationaler Kongreß der Monumenta

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Germaniae Historica (München, 16–19 September 1986), 5 voll., (mgh Schriften, xxxiii/1–5), Hannover 1988, vol. 5, pp. 637–658, sp. p. 650; Nine Miedema, Die römischen Kirchen im Spätmittelalter nach den „Indulgentiae ecclesiarum urbis Romae“, (Bibliothek des Deutschen Historischen Instituts in Rom 97), Tubinga 2001, p. 326–327; Eadem, Rompilgerführer in Spätmittelalter und Früher Neuzeit: Die „Indulgentiae ecclesiarum urbis Romae“, (Frühe Neuzeit 72), Tubinga 2003, pp. 95, 158, 215 (per ulteriori esempi si cerchi nell’indice del medesimo volume la voce Veronica). Cf. Hartmut Kühne, Ostensio reliquiarum: Untersuchungen über Entstehung, Ausbreitung, Gestalt und Funktion der Heiltumsweisungen im römisch-deutschen Regnum, (Arbeiten zur Kirchengeschichte 75), Berlino 2000, pp. 877–887. Sulla venerazione di immagini sacre nella Roma medievale cf. Gerhard Wolf, Salus populi Romani: die Geschichte römischer Kultbilder im Mittelalter, Weinheim 1990. Sulle tradizioni iconografiche specificamente inerenti il volto di Cristo si veda dello stesso Schleier und Spiegel: Traditionen des Christusbildes und die Bildkonzepte der Renaissance, Monaco di Baviera 2002.

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Sia la Veronica che l’indulgenza erano tuttavia “fenomeni” relativamente recenti, avendo entrambi acquisito enorme popolarità solo nel corso del xiii secolo3. Nel presente intervento ci si occuperà delle origini di tale particolare nesso tra indulgenze e culto della Veronica. Dopo aver passato in rassegna le remissioni penitenziali duecentesche legate a diverso titolo alla Veronica ed alla sua venerazione, si cercherà di individuare alcune linee di tendenza, prestando particolare attenzione all’approccio delle istituzioni e dei soggetti, alla cui iniziativa tali indulgenze risultano riconducibili. Le testimonianze circa remissioni penitenziali lucrabili nelle chiese di Roma, ancora sporadiche nel xii secolo, divennero sempre più numerose nel corso del Duecento, allorché le indulgenze romane iniziarono ad essere menzionate sia nelle guide per pellegrini, per la prima volta, probabilmente, nel 1210, che in fonti cronachistiche, come pure in scritti teologici e giuridici4. La maggiore frequenza delle testimonianze è da porre in relazione con la progressiva crescita della popolarità dell’istituto indulgenziale riscontrabile nel corso del xiii secolo in pressoché tutte le regioni della christianitas5. Per quanto riguarda le remissioni specificamente legate alla venerazione della Veronica, credo possano essere individuate tre tipologie di indulgenze o, per meglio dire, tre tipi di approcci da parte dei fruitori di esse, i quali, per quanto fortemente interdipendenti tra loro, presentano al tempo stesso tratti specifici propri. Un primo tipo di approccio, dominante nella prima metà del xiii secolo, è strettamente legato all’istituzione ed alla promozione della statio presso Santo Spirito in Sassia6. Fin dai suoi inizi, la solenne processione della domenica dopo l’ottava dell’Epifania fu dotata dai pontefici romani di indulgenze che favorissero la partecipazione dei fedeli e l’erogazione di elemosina. La prima concessione risale, com’è noto, ad Innocenzo iii, il quale, nel 1208, concesse una speciale remissione penitenziale a quanti avessero preso parte alla liturgia stazionale7. Nel testo della lettera Ad commemorandas nuptias, indirizzata al rettore ed ai frati di S. Spirito, la concessione dell’indulgenza fu posta in parallelo con la distribuzione di cibo per i bisognosi, una delle opere di misericordia corporali menzionate nello scritto papale, la quale

pure avrebbe dovuto aver luogo in tale circostanza: questa sarebbe servita a saziare il corpo, quella l’anima8. Un’immagine analoga si rinviene nel Sermo viii de dominica post Ephiphaniam, redatto dal papa per la medesima occasione9. L’entità della remissione ammontava ad un anno. Si tratta di una misura che, a tale altezza cronologica e nel contesto del pontificato innocenziano, può essere considerata alquanto consistente: sotto il nome di Innocenzo iii sono infatti tradite soltanto poche remissioni penitenziali devotionis causa, meno di dieci allo stato attuale delle fonti, e tutte di entità piuttosto limitata10. Indulgenze di un anno o addirittura superiori sembrano essere state accordate solo in combinazione con consacrazioni o celebrazioni liturgiche officiate in prima persona dal pontefice. Così avvenne, ad esempio, per la dedicazione della chiesa dell’abbazia cistercense di Fossanova nel 1208 e per quella di S. Maria in Trastevere nel 121511. Che anche la statio presso S. Spirito abbia beneficiato d’un siffatto privilegio costituisce sicura testimonianza del rilievo tributato da Innocenzo iii alla neo-istituita celebrazione ed alle istituzioni coinvolte: sia il Capitolo di S. Pietro, sia, soprattutto, S. Spirito in Sassia, a cui la lettera era indirizzata. Non è facile stabilire se l’iniziativa di concedere l’indulgenza risalga a Innocenzo iii, a S. Spirito o a S. Pietro. La parsimonia e l’attenzione con cui tale pontefice elargì remissioni penitenziali – una parsimonia che trova riscontro anche nella lxii costituzione del iv Concilio Lateranense12 – indurrebbero tuttavia a ritenere che tale remissione fu concessa non senza il decisivo concorso del pontefice. Ulteriore testimonianza, se non dell’iniziativa, quantomeno di un cosciente consenso/assenso del papa all’impiego di una remissione penitenziale per tale finalità, potrebbe essere la menzione dell’indulgenza sia nel già ricordato Sermo viii, che nei Gesta Innocentii iii: è interessante notare che, all’infuori delle indulgenze per la crociata, si tratta dell’unico caso in cui i Gesta ed i Sermones accennino a remissioni penitenziali pontificie13. La concessione del 1208 fu rinnovata, nei decenni successivi, su richiesta dei rettori di S. Spirito, da almeno quattro papi: Onorio iii, Gregorio ix, Innocenzo iv ed Alessandro iv14. In tre circostanze (1208, 1223 e 1255), la lettera fu anche inserita nei

registri papali15. Se per la redazione del documento del 1208 si può ipotizzare una compartecipazione di Innocenzo iii quale promotore dell’iniziativa, le successive concessioni devono essere ricondotte al rettore ed ai frati di S. Spirito, mentre i papi si limitarono a rinnovare le disposizioni dei loro predecessori apportando modifiche minimali. In tutti questi casi, l’impiego dell’indulgenza non sembra essere stato finalizzato tanto a promuovere la popolarità della Veronica, la quale indirettamente ne risultò senza dubbio rafforzata, quanto piuttosto a sostenere S. Spirito. Le remissioni rilasciate tra 1208 e 1255 rivestono, a ben vedere, un ruolo analogo a quello della Veronica e fungono, al pari di quest’ultima, quali magneti o attrazioni in grado di conferire all’evento particolare solennità, intensificando in questo modo la partecipazione dei devoti ed il flusso di erogazioni pecuniarie16. Finalità consimili sembrano aver ispirato un mandato di Nicolò iv del 1292 tradito esclusivamente dai registri camerali, nel quale si ordina ai cardinali vescovi, in caso di assenza del pontefice dall’Urbe, di presiedere personalmente alla statio della domenica dopo l’ottava dell’Epifania ed accordare ai fedeli un’indulgenza di un anno e 40 giorni17. 3

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Sull’indulgenza nel Medioevo resta fondamentale: Nikolaus Paulus, Geschichte des Ablasses im Mittelalter, 3 vols, Darmstadt 2000. Da prospettiva teologica: Bernhard Poschmann, Der Ablaß im Licht der Bußgeschichte, (Theophaneia 4), Bonn 1948; Martin Ohst, Pflichtbeichte: Untersuchungen zum Bußwesen in hohen und späten Mittelalter, (Beiträge zur historischen Theologie 89), Tubinga 1995, pp. 111–123. Con particolare attenzione alle dinamiche istituzionali ed al ruolo degli ordini mendicanti: Misericorditer relaxamus. Le indulgenze fra teoria e prassi nel Duecento, a cura di Roberto Paciocco, Luigi Pellegrini, (Studi medievali e moderni 1), Chieti 1999; Roberto Paciocco, “I frati Minori ed i summaria indulgentiarum. Cura d’anime e ‘falsificazioni’ tra due e trecento”, Franciscana. Bollettino della Società Internazionale di Studi Francescani, iii (2001), pp. 119–189; Idem, Canonizzazioni e culto dei santi nella christianitas (1198–1302), (Medioevo francescano, Saggi 11), Assisi 2006, pp. 199–235. In lingua inglese si veda la sintesi di Robert Shaffern, The Penitents’ Treasury. Indulgences in Latin Christendom, 1175–1375, Scranton/Londra 2007. Cf. Paulus, Geschichte (n. 3), vol. 2, pp. 228–239; Michele Maccarrone, “L’indulgenza del Giubileo del 1300 e la basilica di San Pietro”, in Romana Ecclesia Cathedra Petri, a cura di Michele Maccarrone, Pietro Zerbi, 2 voll., Roma 1991 (Italia Sacra. Studi e documenti di storia ecclesiastica 47–48), vol. 2, pp. 1158–1170. Sui fattori e le istituzioni che concorsero a tale sviluppo mi permetto di rinviare al mio Ablass, Papsttum und Bettelorden im 13. Jahrhundert, in corso di stampa presso Böhlau. A tal proposito si veda anche Étienne Doublier, “Die Päpste und der Siegeszug des Ablasses im 13. Jahrhundert”, (Papsttum in mittelalterlichen Europa 6), Colonia 2017. in Die Päpste. Amt und Herrschaft in Antike, Mittelalter und Renaissance, a cura di Michael Matheus, Bernd Schneidmüller, Stefan Weinfurter, (Die Päpste 1), Ratisbona 2016, pp. 341–355. Su questa istituzione si rinvia alla monografia di Gisela Drossbach, Christliche caritas als Rechtsinstitut. Hospital und Orden von Santo Spirito in Sassia (1198–1378), (Kirchen- und Staatskirchenrecht 2), Paderborn 2004.

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Si veda su tale concessione Flora Lewis, “The Veronica: Image, Legend and Viewer”, in England in the Thirteenth Century, a cura di William Mark Ormrod, (Harlaxton medieval studies 1), Stamford 1985, pp. 100–106; Brenda Bolton, “Advertise the Message: Images in Rome at the Turn of the Twelfth Century”, Studies in Church History, xxviii (1992), pp. 117–130, sp. pp. 122–123, 127–128; Christoph Egger, “Papst Innocenz iii. und die Veronica. Geschichte, Theologie, Liturgie und Seelsorge”, in The Holy Face and the Paradox of Representation, a cura di Herbert L. Kessler, Gerhard Wolf, Bologna 1998, pp. 181–203, sp. pp. 187–192; Giovanni Morello, “La Veronica nostra”, in La Storia dei Giubilei, a cura di Gloria Fossi, Firenze 1997, pp. 160–167, sp. p. 163. Una descrizione della cerimonia si trova nell’Ordinarium Innocentii iii, De Tempore, Dom. ii post Epiph., in Stephen Joseph-Peter Van Dijk, The Ordinal of the Papal Court from Innocent iii to Boniface viii and Related Documents, (Spicilegium Friburgense 22), Friburgo 1975, pp. 157–158. 8 August Potthast, Regesta Pontificum Romanorum (1198–1304), Berolini 1875 (di qui in avanti: Potthast), n° 3260; pl, vol . 215, col. 1270: Ut autem nos, qui Domino revelante venerandum aliis aperuimus sacramentum, eo etiam inspirante imitandum aliis praebeamus exemplum, concedimus, statuimus et iubemus ut pro mille pauperibus extrinsecus adventantibus et trecentis personis intus degentibus decem et septem librae usualis monetae, ut singuli accipiant tres denarios, unum pro pane, alterum pro vino, aliumque pro carne, ab eleemosynario summi pontificis annuatim vobis in perpetuum tribuantur, et canonicis supradictis, qui praescriptam effigiem Salvatoris processionaliter deportabunt, singulis duodecim nummi et cereus unius librae qui deferatur accensus, de oblationibus confessionis beati Petri praestentur. Quia vero non in solo pane vivit homo, sed in omni verbo quod procedit ex ore Dei, debet huic stationi Romanus pontifex cum suis cardinalibus interesse, ut et missarum solemnia ibi celebret, et exhortatorium faciat de hac celebritate sermonem, neve fidelis populus famelicus ab his nuptiis revertatur, praeter materialem et doctrinalem, spiritualem quoque sibi cibum impendat, remissionem unius anni de iniunctis sibi poenitentiis indulgendo. 9 pl, vol. 217, col. 350: Ne quis ergo famelicus ab his nuptiis revertatur, universi qui hac in tentatione conveniunt, ut de caetero liberalius et hilarius se exhibuerint salubriter celebrare, de iniunctis poenitentiis unus remittatur annus ad ampliorem obtinendam indulgentiam peccatorum, ut sic aquam convertat in vinum sponsus Christus, qui est benedictus in saecula saeculorum. Amen. 10 Paulus, Geschichte (n. 3), vol. 1, pp. 121–122. 11 Potthast n° 3465; Bernhard Schimmelpfennig, “Ein Text zur Kirchweihe von S. Maria in Trastevere”, in Kunst und Liturgie im Mittelalter, a cura di Nicolas Bock, Monaco di Baviera 2000, pp. 39–45, sp. p. 45. 12 Constitutiones Concilii quarti Lateranensis una cum Commentariis glossatorum, a cura di Antonio García y García, Città del Vaticano 1981, p. 103. 13 pl, vol. 214, col. 144: Instituit autem apud hospitale praedictum stationem solemnem Dominica post octavas Epiphaniae, in qua populus illic confluit Christianus ad videndum et venerandum sudarium Salvatoris, quod cum hymnis et canticis, psalmis et faculis, a basilica Sancti Petri ad locum illum processionaliter deportant, et ad audiendum et intelligendum sermonem exhortatorium, quem ibi facere debet Romanus pontifex de operibus pietatis, et ad promerendam et obtinendam indulgentiam peccatorum, quam exercentibus se ad opera misericordiae pollicetur. 14 Potthast n° 7046, 15711. 15 mss Reg. Vat. 7a, fol. 35r–v; Reg. Vat. 12, fol. 64r–v, ep. 203; Reg. Vat. 24, fol. 23v, ep. 189. Cf. Jochen Johrendt, Urkundenregesten zum Kapitel von St. Peter im Vatikan (1198–1304), (Studi e testi 460), Città del Vaticano 2010, n° 12, 27 e 62. 16 Nella lettera del 1223 indirizzata da Onorio iii ai frati di S. Spirito in Sassia, il pontefice esortava in questo modo i suoi successori, Collectio bullarum sacrosanctae basilicae Vaticanae, vol. 1, Roma 1747, p. 110: Monemus igitur et obsecramus successores nostros per Jesum Christum [...] ut hanc institutionem, quae ipso teste de pietatis fonte processit, faciant inviolabiliter observari. 17 Les Registres de Nicolas iv, a cura di Ernest Langlois, 2 voll., Parigi 1886–1893, vol. 2, n° 7344: Cum per apostolicam sedem fuerit laudabiliter ordinatum ut ymago [...] seu sudarium appellatur a basilica Principis apostolorum de Urbe usque ad hospitale Sancti Spiritus in Saxia, sibi vicinum [...] singulis annis sollempniter deferatur, fraternitati vestre presentium tenore mandamus quatinus hac vice prefatam ymaginem ab eadem basilica usque ad hospitale predictum nominato die, ante missarum sollempnia, vos vel alter vestrum deferatis processionaliter et devote et convenienti inibi populo reverenter ut convenit ostendatis; et omnibus vere penitentibus et confessis qui eodem die ad hospitale jam dictum devote accesserint unum annum et xl dies de iniuncta sibi penitentia auctoritate presentium relaxetis. Anche negli statuti di Niccolò iii per il Capitolo di S. Pietro era stata ingiunta ai canonici la celebrazione della statio: Collectio (n. 16), pp. 182–183.

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Un approccio almeno in parte differente si riscontra nelle due importanti lettere che lo stesso Nicolò iv rilasciò il 24 e 25 febbraio 1289 su richiesta dell’arcipresbitero e dei canonici di S. Pietro18. Anche in questo caso, le concessioni pontificie non sembrano porsi come obiettivo precipuo l’intensificazione del culto della Veronica, poiché esso viene dato sostanzialmente per scontato. Nell’arenga Ille qui solus il “sudario del Signore” costituisce, infatti, la prima prerogativa della basilica, già di per sé in grado di assicurare al sacro edificio preminenza al sopra di tutte le chiese dell’orbe terrestre, oltre che un massiccio concorso di fedeli19. Al tempo stesso, la Veronica è indirettamente presente anche nella dispositio del documento del 25 febbraio: tra i giorni in cui risulta possibile lucrare la remissione di tre anni e tre quadragenae, è qui menzionata anche la domenica dopo l’ottava dell’Epifania20. Lo scopo primario di questa lettera, al pari di quella del giorno precedente, non sembra debba essere tuttavia individuato nella promozione delle singole festività e celebrazioni liturgiche elencate, ivi inclusa quella della Veronica. Senza dubbio si mirava anche a questo e si ottennero risultati in tal senso. La sollecitudine dei petenti è, però, in prima istanza rivolta all’esaltazione della basilica di S. Pietro quale principale fonte di grazie indulgenziali della città eterna e dell’intera christianitas. Attraverso il suo rapporto privilegiato con i successori di Pietro, le sue straordinarie reliquie e, soprattutto, il suo immenso tesoro di remissioni, essa, per dirla con le parole di Michele Maccarrone, diventava addirittura partecipe dell’economia della salute di Gesù Cristo21. L’accento non è posto qui tanto sulle singole remissioni, festività o reliquie, quanto piuttosto sull’insieme complessivo da esse risultante. Ciò rappresenta un significativo cambiamento di approccio rispetto a quanto riscontrabile sino a pochi decenni prima. Anche S. Pietro, al pari di S. Spirito in Sassia, aveva, infatti, avuto cura di far privilegiare alcuni particolari momenti dell’anno liturgico mediante indulgenze papali. Nel 1240, Gregorio ix aveva ad esempio concesso, dietro petizione del cardinale di S. Maria in Trastevere ed arcipresbitero del Capitolo vaticano Stefano Conti, un’indulgenza di tre anni e tre quadragenae per i visitatori della basilica da Pentecoste alla festa dei santi Pietro e

Paolo (29 giugno)22. La possibilità di lucrare tale indulgenza era stata poi estesa da Urbano iv (1263) fino alla festa di san Pietro in Vincoli (1 agosto)23. Precedentemente, nel 1260, Alessandro iv aveva accordato un’altra remissione, questa volta due anni e due quadragenae, ai partecipanti alla processione di San Marco (25 aprile), che si concludeva proprio a S. Pietro, ingiungendo, per di più, al reticente clero romano di prendervi parte24. Anche Niccolò iii aveva infine elargito una remissione di un anno e 40 giorni per la visita dell’altare di S. Nicola della medesima basilica25. In tutti questi casi, non diversamente da quanto riscontrabile in relazione alle indulgenze per la statio presso S. Spirito in Sassia, le remissioni rappresentavano soprattutto un incentivo ulteriore (nei documenti si parla di illectiva praemia) per favorire la partecipazione dei fedeli ad una determinata festa o celebrazione liturgica. Il conseguente incremento di offerte ed elemosina, seppure non menzionato esplicitamente, doveva esser parte di questo meccanismo. A partire dagli anni Settanta, e poi soprattutto negli anni Ottanta del xiii secolo, l’approccio dei petenti lascia invece registrare un significativo cambiamento: la preoccupazione principale non sembra più esser costituita dalla promozione di una festività, bensì dall’accumulo di un numero più elevato possibile di anni di indulgenza, nell’ambito di una frenetica competizione tra istituzioni ecclesiastiche26. Detto in altri termini: ormai ci si procurava un’indulgenza non tanto per solennizzare una specifica celebrazione liturgica, bensì per affermarsi nei confronti delle chiese concorrenti, nell’ambito di una sorta di gara a chi detenesse il tesoro indulgenziale più ampio. L’indulgenza era diventata un bene fine a se stesso. Al centro non c’era tanto l’opera indulgenziata, quanto l’indulgenza in sé. Questa svolta, che altrove trovò espressione nella prassi delle indulgenze cosiddette collettive, è percepibile a Roma specialmente a partire dal pontificato di Nicolò iv. Il ruolo giocato da tale pontefice in ordine ad un epocale incremento della prassi indulgenziale può difficilmente essere sottovalutato. Ciò può essere esemplificato sulla base di alcuni dati statistici: mentre i papi suoi predecessori concessero mediamente un centinaio

di indulgenze, il primo frate minore sul trono di Pietro ne rilasciò non meno di 2400, oltrepassando di gran lunga anche l’entità media sino ad allora osservata27. È in questi anni che nell’Urbe si scatenò una vera e propria corsa alle indulgenze, con le diverse chiese della città impegnate ad ampliare il proprio patrimonio indulgenziale attraverso concessioni autentiche o presunte tali. Ed è in questi anni che la basilica di S. Pietro riuscì ad affermare la propria preminenza “cultuale” rispetto a tutte le altre chiese di Roma, e non solo, anche e soprattutto mediante il proprio tesoro di remissioni. Mentre la maggior parte delle istituzioni ecclesiastiche dell’Urbe ricevette, infatti, remissioni di uno o due anni, lucrabili, per giunta, solo in poche occasioni, S. Pietro beneficiò di indulgenze ottenibili in ciascun giorno dell’anno, e che, al massimo grado possibile, potevano oltrepassare i sette anni e le sette quadragenae28. L’enumerazione senza precedenti dei giorni e delle festività indulgenziati nelle due lettere del febbraio 1289 lascia supporre l’esistenza un vero e proprio “calendario indulgenziale” e ben rende l’idea dell’importanza tributata dai canonici vaticani a tale pratica devozionale [Tabelle 1, 2]. L’istituzione del Giubileo, avvenuta solo pochi anni più tardi, dovrebbe, come rilevato da Michele Maccarrone e recentemente da Jochen Johrendt, essere pertanto ricondotta non tanto all’iniziativa di Bonifacio viii, quanto piuttosto alle pressioni del Capitolo di S. Pietro, il quale, già da alcuni tempi, aveva messo in atto una meticolosa e sistematica prassi indulgenziale29. Seppure l’intensificazione del culto della Veronica non costituisse probabilmente l’obiettivo principale delle concessioni del 1289, la popolarità del “sudario del Signore” sembra aver conosciuto, proprio a cavallo tra Due e Trecento ed in corrispondenza con l’intensificazione della prassi indulgenziale vaticana, un notevole incremento. Tanto più consistenti divennero le indulgenze ordinarie e straordinarie di S. Pietro, tanto più, di riflesso, crebbero la fortuna e la notorietà della “vera icona”, così come l’associazione di essa all’idea del perdono. Il Liber sul primo giubileo del cardinale Jacopo Stefaneschi riferisce che, ancor prima della proclamazione dell’Anno Santo, il flusso di

pellegrini verso S. Pietro era aumentato notevolmente sino a divenire massiccio proprio nel giorno in cui era esposta la reliquia30. Come ci informa inoltre la cronaca di Giovanni Villani, durante tutto l’anno 1300, a consolazione dei pellegrini, nella basilica vaticana ogni venerdì e in occasione delle festività solenni veniva mostrata la sacra effige31. Ci sono tuttavia anche altri elementi che testimoniano una crescente popolarità della Veronica, 18 Cf. Johrendt, Urkundenregesten (n. 15), n° 186, 187. Si veda su queste lettere Maccarrone, “L’indulgenza” (n. 4), pp. 1166, 1178–1180. 19 Collectio (n. 16), p. 213: Ille qui solus suam fundavit ecclesiam, et super petram fidei mox nascentis erexit, beato Petro aeternae vitae clavigero, caelestis et terreni simul imperii iura committens, insignem eius basilicam, ad honorem ipsius in Urbe constructam, et sui nominis titulo insignitam, tanto veneratione maiori constituit digniorem, quanto ipsam inter ceteras orbis ecclesias dignitate praecellere voluit et praerogativis pluribus decoravit. In ea namque sui pretiosissimi vultus ymaginem, quam Veronicam fidelium vox communis appellat, in singularis amoris insigne tribuit venerari. In ea gloriosissimum Corpus eiusdem aetherei ianitoris et innumerabilium martyrium aliorumque sanctorum veneranda reliquias collocavit, ut quo plura in ipsa veneranda concurrent, eo amplius erga eam cunctorum devotio et reverentia cresceret. 20 Ibidem, p. 214: Cupientes igitur eandem basilicam congruis honoribus frequentari et fideles Christi ad complacendum ei quasi quibusdam illectivis praemiis, indulgentiis videlicet et remissionibus invitare, omnibus vere poe­ nitentibus et confessis singulis annis diebus, quibus ipse eandem basilicam personaliter visitabunt, unum annum et quadraginta dies; a dominica vero de adventu usque ad primam dominicam post octavas Epiphaniae [...] tres anno et tres quadragenas [...] misericorditer relaxamus. 21 Maccarrone, “L’indulgenza” (n. 4), p. 1179. 22 Potthast n° 10898. 23 Potthast n° 17834. 24 Potthast n° 18598. 25 Potthast n° 21633. 26 A questo “clima” accenna anche Maccarrone, “L’indulgenza” (n. 4), pp. 1165–1166. 27 Sulle indulgenze di Niccolò iv si veda, per ora, Luciano Adriano Spina, “Indulgenze alle chiese parrocchiali d’Italia dai registri di Niccolò iv (1288–1292)”, L’Italia Francescana, lvi (1981), pp. 55–74, 191–214. Per ulteriori contestualizzazioni si rinvia al mio Ablass (n. 5). 28 Le indulgenze di Niccolò iv per le chiese romane sembrano rispecchiare una gerarchia di esse: S. Pietro e S. Giovanni in Laterano ricevettero remissioni di entità variabile, fino a sette anni e sette quadragenae; S. Maria Maggiore ottenne tre volte un’indulgenza di tre anni ed altrettante quadragenae; concessioni di tre anni e tre quadragenae furono rilasciate anche per S. Lorenzo fuori le mura, S. Paolo fuori le mura e S. Agnese; con una remissione di due anni fu privilegiata S. Cecilia; indulgenze di un anno e 40 giorni ricevettero S. Parassede, S. Prudenziana, S. Salvatore in Pesoli, S. Agnese, S. Anastasio, S. Nicola in Carcere Tulliano, S. Benedetto degli Eremiti, S. Agata, S. Silvestro, SS. Lorenzo e Damaso, S. Andrea de fractis, SS. Sergio e Bacco, S. Stefano degli Ungheresi, S. Lucia delle quattroporte, S. Niccolò del prefetto, S. Andrea de mortarariis, S. Maria in Via Lata, S. Tommaso in formis, S. Matteo sulla Merulana, S. Nicola de Columna, S. Ninfa, S. Giovanni Evangelista, S. Maria in Campo Marzio, S. Egidio, S. Alessio, S. Maria in Valicella e S. Giacomo de Sestignano. 29 Cf. Maccarrone,“L’indulgenza”(n. 4), pp. 1184–1185; Jochen Johrendt, Die Diener des Apostelfürsten: das Kapitel von S. Peter im Vatikan (11.–13. Jahrhundert), (Bibliothek des Deutschen Historischen Instituts in Rom 122), Berlino 2011, pp. 335–350. 30 Iacopo Stefaneschi, De centesimo seu iubileo anno, a cura di Paul Gerhard Schmidt, (Edizione nazionale dei testi mediolatini 1, Serie ii, 1), Tavernuzze (Firenze) 2001, p. 4. 31 Giovanni Villani, Chronica: Chroniche di Giovanni, Matteo e Filippo Villani, vol. 1, Trieste 1857, p. 182.

185

Ianuar. 1 Circ. Dni 2 3 4 5 6 Epiphaniae 7 8 9 10 11

Februar. 1 2 Purificatio Ma. 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11

Martius 1 2 3 4 Quinquages. 5 6 7 Die cinerum 8 9 10 11

Aprilis 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11

Maius 1 Phil. et Jud. 2 3 Inventio Crucis 4 5 6 7 8 Dedicatio Mich. 9 10 11

Iunius 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Pentecoste 11

Iulius 1 2 Proc. et Martin.* 3 4 5 6 Oct. Petri P. 7 8 9 10 11

August. 1 Vinc. Petri 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Laurentii 11

Septembr. 1 Egidii 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 Nativit. Mar. 9 10 11

Octobr. 1 2 3 4 Francisci 5 6 Consac. M. C. 7 8 9 10 11

Novembr. 1 Omn. ss. 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 Ded. Salvatoris 10 11 Martini

Decembr. 1 2 I Advent. 3 4 5 6 Nicolai 7 8 9 10 11

12 13 Oct. Epiph. 14 Do. p.o.Epi. 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 Conv. Pauli 26

12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 Cathedra Petri 23 24 Matthiae 25 26

12 Gregorii* 13 14 15 Longini* 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 Annunciatio 26

12 13 14 15 Palarmar. 16 17 18 19 Cena Domni 20 Parasceve 21 22 Pascha 23 D. Lun. p. P. 24 25 Marci 26

12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26

12 13 Antonii 14 15 16 17 Oct. Pentecos. 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 Joh. et Pauli*

12 13 14 15 16 17Alexii* 18 19 20 21 22 Magdalenae * 23 24 25 Jacobi * 26

12 Clarae 13 14 15 Assuntio Mariae 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 Bartholomaei 25 26

12 13 14 Exaltatio Cr. 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 Matthei 22 23 24 25 26

12 13 14 15 16 17 18 Lucae 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26

12 13 14 15 16 17 18 Ded. P. et P. 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 Oct. Ded. P. P. 26

12 13 Luciae 14 15 16 Gaudete 17 18 19 20 21 Thomae 22 23 24 25 Nativit. Dni. 26 Stephani

27 28 29 30 31

27 28

27 28 29 30 31

27 28 29 30

27 28 Lit. maiores 29 Lit. maiores 30 Lit. maiores 31 Ascensio Dni

27 28 Leonis* 29 Petri et Pauli 30

27 28 29 30 31

27 28 29 30 31

27 28 29 Michaelis 30

27 28 Sim. et Jud. 29 30 31

27 28 29 30 Andreae

27 Joh. Evang. 28 29 30 31 Silvestri

Petronillae

Ianuar. 1 Circ. Dni

Februar. 1

Martius 1

Aprilis 1

Maius 1 Phil. et Jud.

Iunius 1

Iulius 1

August. 1 Vinc. Petri

Septembr. 1 Egidii

Octobr. 1

Novembr. 1 Omn. ss.

Decembr. 1

2 3 4 5 6 Epiphaniae 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 Oct. Epiph. 14 Do. p. o. Epi. 15 16 17 18 19

2 Purificatio M. 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19

2 3 4 Quinquages. 5 6 7 Die cinerum 8 9 10 11 12 Gregorii* 13 14 15 Longini* 16 17 18 19

2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 Palarmar. 16 17 18 19 Cena Domni

2 3 Inventio Crucis 4 5 6 7 8 Dedicatio Mich. 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19

2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Pentecoste 11 12 13 Antonii 14 15 16 17 Oct. Pentecos. 18 19

2 Proc. et Martin. 3 4 5 6 Oct. Petri P. 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17Alexii * 18 19

2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Laurentii 11 12 Clarae 13 14 15 Assuntio Mariae 16 17 18 19

2 3 4 5 6 7 8 Nativit. Mar. 9 10 11 12 13 14 Exaltatio Cr. 15 16 17 18 19

2 3 4 Francisci 5 6 Consac. M. C. 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 Lucae 19

2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 Ded. Salvatoris 10 11 Martini 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 Ded. P. et P. 19

2 I Advent. 3 4 5 6 Nicolai* 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 Luciae 14 15 16 Gaudete 17 18 19

20 21 22 23 24 25 Conv. Pauli 26 27 28 29 30 31

20 21 22 Cathedra Pt. 23 24 Matthiae 25 26 27 28

20 21 22 23 24 25 Annunciatio* 26 27 28 29 30 31

20 Parasceve 21 22 Pascha 23 D. Lun. p. P. 24 25 Marci 26 27 28 29 30

20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 Lit. maiores 29 Lit. maiores 30 Lit. maiores 31 Ascensio Dni

20 21 22 23 24 25 26 Joh. et Pauli 27 28 Leonis 29 Petri et Pauli 30

20 21 22 Magdalenae 23 24 25 Jacobi 26 27 28 29 30 31

20 21 22 23 24 Bartholomaei 25 26 27 28 29 30 31

20 21 Matthei 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 Michaelis 30

20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 Sim. et Jud. 29 30 31

20 21 22 23 24 25 Oct. Ded. P. P. 26 27 28 29 30 Andreae

20 21 Thomae* 22 23 24 25 Nativit. Dni. 26 Stephani 27 Joh. Ev* 28 29 30 31 Silvestri

Tab. 1 / Calendario delle indulgenze della basilica di S. Pietro modellato sulla lettera Ille qui solus del 24 febbraio 1289 (festività mobili dell’anno 1291) Tab. 2 / Calendario delle indulgenze della basilica di S. Pietro modellato sulla lettera Ille qui solus del 186 25 febbraio 1289 (festività mobili dell’anno 1291) 186

7 anni e 7 quadragene 3 anni e 3 quadragene 1 anno e 40 giorni 40 giorni 3 anni e 3 quadragene 2 anni e 2 quadragenae 1 anno e 40 giorni

1 / Lettera dello scrittore pontificio Silvestro, 22 febbraio 1300 / Cortona, Biblioteca del Comune e dell'Accademia Etrusca di Cortona, ms 101.6

come pure un progressivo rafforzarsi del nesso ideale tra il sudarium e l’indulgenza. Lo stesso giorno in cui fu promulgato il Giubileo, il 22 febbraio 1300, Silvestro de Adria, scriptor della cancelleria apostolica, redisse una lettera circolare indirizzata al clero della Cristianità in cui trascriveva il dettato della bolla di indizione, ne chiariva dei passaggi controversi e rispondeva ad alcuni quesiti rivolti al pontefice32. Una delle copie attraverso cui è tradito tale scritto, custodita oggi presso la Biblioteca del Comune di Cortona e precedentemente appartenuta, con ogni probabilità, al convento di S. Domenico della stessa città, presenta, nella parte superiore e inferiore della pergamena (62,5 x 22,5 cm) due miniature speculari raffiguranti il volto di Cristo tra i santi Pietro e Paolo [Fig. 1] 33. Tali raffigurazioni – che potrebbero detenere un valore corroborante, qualora risalissero al 1300, o evocativo, qualora inserite pochi anni dopo – si richiamano inequivocabilmente alle reliquie che il fedele poteva venerare durante il pellegrinaggio giubilare. Mentre, tuttavia, la visita dei corpi dei due apostoli era esplicitamente prescritta dalla bolla Antiquorum habet fida relatio34, e ciò potrebbe spiegare la presenza di Pietro e Paolo nella pergamena cortonese, la venerazione della Veronica non rientrava tra le condizioni formali per lucrare l’indulgenza giubilare. La raffigurazione in una copia della lettera dello scriptor Silvestro, per di più in posizione centrale, di una reliquia non direttamente legata all’ottenimento della grazia giubilare, costituisce un ulteriore indizio della forte associazione simbolica tra la Veronica e l’idea e la pratica dell’indulgenza che, al principio del Trecento, s’era affermata anche al di fuori  di Roma. 32 Cf. Angelo Mercati,“La lettera dello scrittore pontificio Silvestro sul Giubileo del 1300”, in Cronistoria dell’anno santo 1925. Appunti storici, dati statistici, atti ufficiali con appendice storico-bibliografico, a cura della Segreteria generale del Comitato, Roma 1928, pp. 1191–1198. 33 Su questo documento si vedano Un documento cortonese sul Giubileo del ‘300: la lettera di Silvestro scriptor pontificio, a cura di Edoardo Mori, Elisabetta Mori, (Accademia etrusca, Cortona. Note e documenti 16), Cortona 2000; Patrizia Rocchini, “Magister Silvester de Adria”, in I papi della memoria. La storia di alcuni grandi pontefici che hanno segnato il cammino della Chiesa e dell’umanità, catalogo della mostra, a cura di Giulia Ghia, Federica Kappler, Roma 2012, p. 140. 34 Potthast n° 24917. Sul giubileo del 1300 resta fondamentale Arsenio Frugoni, Il Giubileo di Bonifacio viii, (Quadrante Laterza 102), Roma/Bari 1999. Sulle indulgenze di Bonifacio viii si veda il mio “Libra misericordiae: le indulgenze di Bonifacio viii”, Rivista di Storia della Chiesa in Italia, lxiv (2010), pp. 347–380.

188

In tal contesto è forse il caso di ricordare come, in questi stessi anni, la Veronica si facesse strada anche quale motivo dominante delle insegne pellegrinali (i cosiddetti Pilgerzeichen o pilgrim badges) in luogo dei volti degli apostoli Pietro e Paolo, ancora prevalenti nel xii secolo e per gran parte del Duecento35. Tanto il perdono dei peccati, quanto il pellegrinaggio romano stesso, s’identificavano insomma sempre più con “l’immagine del suo preziosissimo volto”. L’accenno alla ricezione del sudarium al di fuori dell’ambiente romano consente di passare a trattare il terzo ed ultimo tipo di “indulgenze” legate alla Veronica, le quali sussumono anche un differente approccio alla reliquia ed alle sue potenzialità. Ci si riferisce qui a quelle indulgenze che non furono impetrate dai rettori di S. Spirito o dai canonici vaticani, che non vennero neanche rilasciate per iscritto dalla cancelleria papale, e che poco o nulla ebbero a che fare con il pellegrinaggio nella città eterna. Ciononostante si tratta di indulgenze che, al pari di quelle “ufficiali”, e talora persino più di esse, contribuirono ad alimentare la devozione nei confronti del sudarium. Già intorno alla metà del xiii secolo, Matthew Paris riferì nei suoi Chronica maiora non solo di un singolare prodigio verificatosi durante la processione del 1216, ma anche di una particolare orazione che Innocenzo iii avrebbe composto in onore della sacra effige, e, per la cui semplice recitazione, avrebbe promesso ai fedeli un’indulgenza di dieci giorni36. Ora, fermo restando che, come rimarcato da Christoph Egger, abbiamo a che fare più con una tradizione locale che con una reale concessione pontificia, è importante notare come, già a metà del Duecento, circolassero anche Oltremanica leggende circa il particolare potere remissorio della Veronica37. Le indulgenze rilasciate da Innocenzo  iii e da alcuni dei suoi successori, inequivocabilmente vincolate ad un luogo (S. Spirito), ad una data (la domenica dopo l’ottava dell’Epifania) e ad un’opera (la partecipazione alla statio), erano state, a quanto sembra, reinterpretate e trasformate in remissioni “mobili”, dipendenti esclusivamente da un atto (l’orazione), realizzabile in ben più semplici circostanze. Inoltre ci troviamo probabilmente di fronte alla più antica testimonianza di una remissione

lucrabile attraverso la venerazione “virtuale” di un oggetto, o, più precisamente, come addita lo stesso Matthew Paris, di una riproduzione di esso38. Negli stessi anni in cui il monaco di S. Albano compilava i suoi Chronica, una remissione penitenziale per alcuni versi simile veniva realmente accordata da Innocenzo iv e propagata in particolar modo dall’ordine dei frati Predicatori: a quanti avessero recitato un’orazione per l’anima del re di Francia Ludovico, il papa prometteva una remissione di 10 giorni39. Anche se non è dimostrabile che proprio tale indulgenza abbia funto da modello per Matthew Paris, essa costituisce senz’altro un indizio di come, intorno alla metà del Duecento, indulgenze ottenibili mediante una semplice orazione, fossero esse autentiche o meno, cominciassero a conoscere una certa circolazione, al punto da esser elargite persino dalla cancelleria apostolica. In combinazione con il culto della Veronica, un siffatto tipo di remissioni sembra essersi diffuso soprattutto nel corso del xiv secolo, e poi, ancor di più, dopo l’introduzione della stampa, allorché divennero sempre più popolari tradizioni secondo cui orazioni fatte risalire a diversi papi da recitare davanti a riproduzioni della Veronica, avrebbero fruttato parecchie migliaia di anni di remissione. Dai 10 giorni attribuiti da Matthew Paris a Innocenzo iii si passò, nel giro di pochi decenni, ai 10 000 giorni attribuiti a Giovanni xxii e agli oltre 10 000 anni dei cataloghi Indulgentiae ecclesiarum urbis Romae40 . Questa pratica, di cui l’indulgenza di Matthew Paris costituisce solo il primo e, quasi certamente, più antico esempio, testimonia il fortissimo nesso creatosi tra immagine di Cristo, vicario di Cristo e indulgenza. Un ulteriore esempio della vitalità e fortuna del “legame ideale” tra Veronica ed indulgenza, anche e soprattutto dopo il trasferimento della curia ad Avignone, e indipendentemente dalla partecipazione alla statio e dal pellegrinaggio a S. Pietro, è costituito dalle cosiddette indulgenze collettive avignonesi [Fig. 2] 41. Allorché negli anni Venti del xiv secolo le lettere di indulgenza collettive rilasciate dai prelati residenti in curia iniziarono ad essere illuminate attraverso miniature, uno dei primi e più popolari motivi ad essere impiegato, fu proprio quello del volto del Salvatore a forma “triangolare”42.

Secondo un recente studio di Martin Roland e Andreas Zajic, i prelati chiamati all’emissione delle lettere di indulgenza collettive avrebbero in questo modo adottato un motivo universalmente accettato, il quale si prestava non solo a riempire l’iniziale u (la maggior parte delle lettere di indulgenza collettiva si apriva con la formula Universis sancte matris ecclesie filiis), ma richiamava al tempo stesso l’attenzione dell’osservatore attraverso un’immagine immediatamente riconducibile all’idea del perdono dei peccati43. Il fatto che tali lettere siano circolate soprattutto a nord delle Alpi, testimonia quanto il nesso indulgenza/Veronica fosse ormai radicato nella devozione europea. Riassumendo si può osservare come, a partire dal xiii secolo, venne progressivamente costituendosi una particolare associazione tra culto della “vera icona” e prassi indulgenziale, la quale conobbe numerose declinazioni su base locale e contribuì a fare della Veronica una delle reliquie maggiormente interessate dalla dilagante diffusione delle remissioni penitenziali. Diversi furono i fattori che determinarono un siffatto sviluppo, senza che sia possibile identificare una programmaticità di lungo periodo riconducibile ad una sola istituzione, sia essa la sede apostolica, S. Spirito in Sassia o S. Pietro in Vaticano. Mentre per altre devozioni e culti affermatisi nel Duecento – si pensi a quello di Edmondo di Abingdon o dei neo-canonizzati frati mendicanti44 – si può parlare di una sistematica promozione attraverso indulgenze, concepita e coordinata da precisi soggetti istituzionali, lo stesso discorso non sembra valere per la Veronica, la diffusione della cui popolarità mantenne un carattere maggiormente spontaneo e policentrico. Essa non abbisognò di una mirata promozione attraverso indulgenze. Eppure, questo il paradosso, fu costantemente associata ad esse naturaliter. Per quanto riguarda il Duecento ed i primi decenni del Trecento, sono stati individuati almeno tre diversi tipi di indulgenze variamente legate alla Veronica ed alla sua venerazione, i quali, a loro volta, rispecchiano gli approcci dei differenti soggetti coinvolti. Innocenzo iii, pontefice estremamente parco nel largire indulgenze, concedendo la prima remissione penitenziale nel 1208, non poteva prevedere gli sviluppi successivi ed intendeva in

primo luogo favorire la partecipazione dei fedeli alla neo-istituita statio, come pure l’erogazione di offerte a beneficio di S. Spirito. Ad essere promosso non doveva essere tanto il culto della Veronica, quanto l’ospedale presso l’antica chiesa di S. Maria in Sassia. La Veronica e l’indulgenza assolvevano in questo contesto la funzione di “magneti” preposti ad attirare le masse di fedeli. Anche le successive concessioni accordate dai successori di Innocenzo iii su richiesta di S. Spirito in Sassia detenevano un carattere analogo. Leggermente differente sembra essere stato invece l’approccio del Capitolo di S. Pietro il quale mirava, attraverso i privilegi del 1289, soprattutto a veder riconosciuta la propria supremazia in materia di indulgenza rispetto alle altre chiese di Roma, e non solo. Al centro delle concessioni di Nicolò iv non c’era la “vera icona”, la quale pure veniva per la prima volta riconosciuta quale principale prerogativa della basilica e a cui risultava connessa una remissione di tre anni e tre 35 Sulle insegne pellegrinali si vedano Andreas Haasis-Berner, “Pilgerzeichenforschung: Forschungsstand und Perspektiven”, in Spätmittelalterliche Wallfahrt im mitteldeutschen Raum, a cura di Hartmut Kühne, Wolfgang Radtke, Gerlinde Strohmaier-Wiederanders, Berlino 2002, pp. 63–85; Andreas Haasis-Berner, Pilgerzeichen des Hochmittelalters, (Veröffentlichungen zur Volkskunde und Kulturgeschichte 94), Würzburg 2003, nonché i database [http://www.kunera.nl] e [http://pilgerzeichen.de]. Sui signa del pellegrinaggio a S. Pietro ed in particolare sull’affermazione della Veronica si veda Alessandra Rodolfo, “Signa super vestes”, in Romei e Giubilei. Il pellegrinaggio medievale a San Pietro (350–1350), a cura di Mario D’Onofrio, Milano 1999, pp. 151–156. 36 Matthaei Parisiensis monachi Sancti Albani Chronica maiora, a cura di Henry Richard Luard, 6 voll., (Rerum britannicarum Medii Aevi scriptores, 57, 1–6), Londra 1872–1882, vol. 3, pp. 7–8. 37 Egger, “Papst Innonenz iii.” (n. 7), pp. 197–202. 38 Matthaei Parisiensis Chronica (n. 36), p. 7: in honore ipsius effigei, quae Veronica dicitur, quandam orationem composuit elegantem; cui adjecit quendam Psalmum, cum quibusdam versiculis, et eadem dicentibus decem dierum concessit indulgentiam, ita scilicet, ut quotienscunque repetatur, totiens dicenti tantumdem indulgentiae concedatur. Multi igitur eandem orationem cum pertinentiis memoriae commendarunt, et ut eos major accenderet devotio, picturis effigiarunt hoc modo. 39 Acta capitulorum generalium Ordinis Praedicatorum, a cura di Benedictus Maria Reichert, vol. 1, (Monumenta Ordinis Fratrum Praedicatorum historica 3), Roma 1898, p. 66. 40 Cf. Kühne, Ostensio reliquiarum (n. 2), pp. 883–887. 41 Si veda sulle lettere di indulgenza collettive Alexander Seibold, Sammelindulgenzen. Ablaßurkunden des Spätmittelalters und der Frühneuzeit, (Archiv für Diplomatik, Beiheft 8), Colonia 2001. 42 Si veda ora il database [http://www.monasterium.net/mom/IlluminierteUrkunden/collection, ultimo accesso 30. 05. 2017]. La maggior parte delle illuminazioni recanti il motivo della vera icona furono emesse tra 1323 e 1328. Un ulteriore motivo con il volto del Salvatore è attestato fino al 1344, laddove un apice della produzione è riscontrabile tra 1328 e 1331. 43 Martin Roland, Andreas Zajic, “Illuminierte Urkunden des Mittelalters in Mitteleuropa”, Archiv für Diplomatik, lix (2013), pp. 241–432, sp. pp. 316–321. 44 Paciocco, Canonizzazioni (n. 3), pp. 199–235.

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2 / Esempio delle indulgenze collettive avignonesi, anno 1323 / Landesarchiv nrw, Abteilung Rheinland, Rheydt, Nr. 1

quadragenae, bensì la basilica stessa, il suo legame con la sede petrina, le sue preziose reliquie, le sue innumerevoli indulgenze e, di conseguenza, la sua funzione salvifica. Il fatto che intorno alla Veronica ed alle due istituzioni ad essa legate, vuoi per promuovere la statio di S. Spirito, vuoi per esaltare il carattere santuariale della basilica vaticana, si accumulassero man mano numerose remissioni penitenziali pontificie, deve aver favorito, al di là dalla funzione immediata di suddette concessioni, la costituzione ed il consolidamento di un nesso ideale tra Veronica e indulgenze papali. Ciò è testimoniato chiaramente da quelle indulgenze variamente legate alla venerazione del sudarium, ma non riconducibili né al Capitolo di S. Pietro né ai frati di S. Spirito, e che si diffusero in tutta Europa indipendentemente dalla reale iussione pontificia. Proprio queste indulgenze – nell’ambito di un fecondo processo di intereazione tra concessioni autentiche e fittizie, tra tradizioni romane e reinterpretazioni periferiche – si rivelarono, alla lunga, tra i principali canali atti a favorire la diffusione del nesso ideale tra immagine di Cristo, vicario di Cristo e perdono dei peccati.

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„Sui pretiossisimi vultus Imago“ Veraikon a udílení odpustků ve 13. a na počátku 14. století

Během vrcholného středověku se Veraikon stal nejpopulárnější relikvií Říma i celého křesťanstva. Svědčí o tom hojné udílení odpustků, které se v seznamu indulgentie ecclesiarum urbis Rome váže na její uctívání. Původ tohoto fenoménu nacházíme ve třináctém století a v prvních desetiletích století čtrnáctého. V tomto období je možné rozlišit tři druhy odpustků, které různým způsobem souvisí s kultem Veraikonu, a z nichž každý upřednostňuje jiný přístup. První typ převažuje v první polovině třináctého století a vztahuje se k ustanovení statio při kostele Santo Spirito in Sassia. V roce 1208 Inocenc iii. poprvé udělil velké množství odpustků věřícím, kteří se zúčastnili stacionární liturgie, jež se slavila v neděli po svátku Tří Králů. Tyto odpustky, vyhlášené především v zájmu bratrů ze Santo Spirito, byly v následujících desetiletích obnoveny Honoriem iii., Řehořem ix., Inocencem  iv., Alexandrem iv. a Mikulášem iv., a bezesporu přispěly k nárůstu popularity procesí, během nějž se Veraikon přenášel ze Sv. Petra do zmíněného kostela Santo Spirito. Druhý typ odpustků se objevuje po polovině třináctého století a váže se na iniciativu kanovníků Sv. Petra, kteří především od osmdesátých let usilovali o to, aby se z baziliky stalo centrum udělování

odpustků ve Věčném městě. I když tyto snahy vatikánské kapituly nesměřovaly pouze k podpoře kultu Veraikonu, k jeho posílení došlo rostoucím proudem poutníků vrcholícím vyhlášením Svatého roku 1300. Svědčí o tom i skutečnost, že se Veraikon stal právě na konci třináctého století jedním z nejoblíbenějších poutnických odznaků vyráběných kanovníky Sv. Petra, a to i přesto, že úcta k Veroničině roušce nebyla podmínkou získání jubilejních milostí. Třetí typ odpustků zahrnuje všechny ty, které se vázaly na uctívání Veraikonu, ale nešlo je získat ani v Santo Spirito in Sassia ani ve vatikánské kapitule. Nejstarším příkladem je miniatura Kristovy tváře vložená Matthew Parisem do jeho Chronica maiora. Tam je zmíněno, že kdokoliv se pomodlí zvláštní modlitbu před svatým portrétem, dostane se mu desetidenního odpuštění trestů, které podle tradice vyhlásil papež Inocenc iii. Tento typ obrazů, který můžeme rekonstruovat spíše na základě legend než z potvrzených udělování odpustků, se vyskytoval od čtrnáctého století především v oblastech na sever od Alp. Také tato kategorie odpustků, podobně jako první dvě, podporovala ideální propojení mezi obrazem Krista, Kristovým vikářem a odpuštěním hříchů.

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Abstract – From Holy Images to Liturgical Devices. Models, Objects and Rituals around the Veronicae of Christ and Mary in the Crown of Aragon (ca 1300–1550) In comparison to other European territories, it can be said that the Roman relic of the Veronica of Christ did not enjoy particular popularity with the Crown of Aragon during the last centuries of the Middle Ages. However, the royal promotion of a Veronica of the Virgin Mary by 1400 not only fostered the associated veneration of the Face of Christ, but also produced a series of liturgical objects (Veronicae) that were immediately adopted in most of the cathedrals and major churches of the Aragonian realm. Keywords Holy Face of Christ, Veronica of the Virgin, Crown of Aragon, 14th–16th centuries, liturgy, cathedrals

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Marc Sureda i Jubany Museu Episcopal de Vic [email protected]

Holy Images Liturgical Devices Models, Objects and Rituals around the Veronicae of Christ and Mary in the Crown of Aragon (1300–1550)1 Marc Sureda i Jubany

The Veronica of the Virgin: Roman Origins and Royal Promotion Around 1400, some icon-like images of the Virgin came to be particularly venerated in several places in the Crown of Aragon2. Since the time of Gudiol i Cunill, scholars have explored the origins and dissemination of this kind of image and the public liturgy used in connection with it, catalogued the versions and listed them according to types3. Although the Virgin Mary had been widely represented in the Aragonese painting 1

This paper includes results of the research project “sedes memoriae. Espacios, usos y discursos de la memoria en las catedrales medievales de la Tarraconense. I: Memoria institucional, legados personales” (har2015-63870-r), funded by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitivity. I am indebted for their help in different aspects to Herbert Kessler, Pere Beseran, Albert Cortés, Joan Domenge, Félix de la Fuente, Josep Galobart osb, Rafael Ginebra, Miquel dels S. Gros, Aden Kumler, Sadurní Martí, Catalina Mas, José M.

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Nasarre, Peter Parshall, Jordi Sacasas, Biel Seguí, Montserrat Sureda & Richard King, Francesc Tornero, Alberto Velasco, Jacobo Vidal and Susana Villacampa. With this expression, or simply the word “Aragon”, we refer to the lands under the rule of the kings of Aragon in the late Middle Ages, that is, mainly the kingdoms of Aragon, Mallorca and Valencia and the county of Barcelona (the latter corresponding to modern-day Catalunya). The adjective “Aragonese” will be used in the same sense. Josep Gudiol i Cunill, “Les Veròniques i”, Vell i Nou, ii–ii/xiii (1921), pp. 1–11; Idem, “Les Veròniques ii”, Vell i Nou, ii–ii/xiii (1921), pp. 67–76; more recently Marta Crispí Cantón, “La difusió de les Veròniques de la Mare de Déu a les catedrals de la Corona d’Aragó a finals de l’Edat Mitja”, Lambard, ix (1996), pp. 83–103; Eadem, “La Verònica de Madona Santa Maria i la processó de la Puríssima organitzada per Martí l’Humà”, Locus amoenus, ii (1996) pp. 85–101; Michele Bacci, “Kathreptis, o la Veronica della Vergine”, Iconographica, iii (2004) pp. 11–37; idem, “Epigoni orientali e occidentali dell’immagine di Cristo ‘non fatta da mano d’uomo’”, in L’immagine di Cristo dell’acheropita alla mano d’artista, Christoph L. Frommel, Gerhard Wolf eds, Vatican City 2006, pp. 43–60; Joan Molina Figueras, “Iconos marianos, leyendas y monarquía en la Corona de Aragón (s.  xiii–xv)”, Hortus Artium Medievalium, xx (2014), pp. 783–791.

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of the fourteenth century, the popularity of this kind of image was generated by a precise type of Marian portrait featuring only the Virgin’s head, which was called a Veronica of Mary. The images of this type are divided into two main groups4. The first extant and documented example is a footed reliquary containing the comb of the Virgin, essentially configured by a rectangular bejeweled frame showing a parchment with the face of Mary drawn on it [Fig. 1]. In 1397, this parchment was already a private possession of King Martin, who lent it for the procession in honor of the Immaculate Conception that he himself fostered in Barcelona; in the following year, the precious frame and foot were created by the Valencian goldsmith Bartomeu Coscollà. In the royal documents, it is named “la molt devota Verónica de madona Santa Maria”. The object, used by the king for private devotion – but also to keep control over the feast and procession of the Immaculate Conception – was passed down to his successors and was finally donated by King Alphonse el Magnànim to Valencia cathedral in 1437, where it is kept now5. The prestige of this royal icon generated a series of very close copies preserved in the cathedrals of Vic [Fig. 2], Tortosa, Huesca and Mallorca, as well as in such other churches as La Sang in Alcover and – probably – Santa Maria del Pi in Barcelona; a few other examples remain in private collections6. Except for the copies of Huesca and El Pi7, they were painted and colored, in contrast to the royal prototype. Accepting Gudiol’s intuition, modern scholars agree about its origins: the Roman Madonna Avvocata which survives in a number of Roman icons Crispí, “La difusió” (n. 3), pp. 88–93; Tina Sabater, La pintura mallorquina del segle xv, Palma de Mallorca 2002, pp. 122–123; Bacci, “Kathreptis” (n. 3), p. 27. 5 Crispí, “La Verònica” (n. 3), pp. 86–87; Francesca Español Bertran, “Relicario de la Verónica de la Virgen”,in El Renacimiento Mediterráneo, exhibition catalogue (Madrid, Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza and València, Museu de Belles Arts 2001), Mauro Natale ed., Madrid 2001, pp. 149–152, with bibliography. 6 That of Huesca, with the drawing on a white background and very close to the original, is in turn considered a sixteenth-century copy. Gudiol,“Les Veròniques ii”,(n. 3), pp. 67–76; Josep M. Gudiol Ricart, Santiago Alcolea Blanch, Pintura gótica catalana, Barcelona 1987, p. 96, with bibliography; Crispí, “La difusió” (n. 3). 7 Arxiu Parroquial de Santa Maria del Pi (=apsmp), b294 (Llibre Negre), fol. 376: “una altra bella Veronica de Nostra Dona dargent daurada, la ymatge es deboxada de graffi en paper blanquit”. I am indebted to my friend Jordi Sacasas, curator at Santa Maria del Pi for this observation.

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1 / Bartomeu Coscollà, the Marian Veronica of King Martin, goldsmithery, 1398 / Catedral Metropolitana de Valencia 2 / Jaume Cabrera (attribution), Marian Veronica of Vic cathedral, 1st quarter of the 15th century / Museu Episcopal de Vic

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(San Sisto, Santa Maria in Via Lata, Santa Maria in Ara Coeli, Santa Maria del Rosario, etc.) is, in turn, linked to the Byzantine type of the Hagiosoritissa and fits perfectly with the processional uses that King Martin extended to his devotional object8. Like its Roman models, the image was considered a derivation of St Luke’s portrait9. The legend was well known particularly since the beginning of the fourteenth century thanks to the Catalan translations of Voragine’s Life of St Luke10; by the end of the century, such famous preachers as St Vicent Ferrer or Francesc Eiximenis included the episode in their sermons11, and around 1370 Llorenç Saragossà even represented the miracle of the miraculous painting in an altarpiece commissioned by the carpenters and painters’ guild of Valencia12. Kessler has proposed that the royal parchment might have been a gift from (anti)Pope Benedict xiii, emulating the gestures of Clement vi towards Jean le Bon or Urban v towards Emperor Charles iv. Although the object in itself seems to be quite modest (perhaps similar to the simple drawings sold in Rome by pictores veronicarum) and the former papal gifts seem to have consisted of diptychs, Kessler has noted a possible miraculous resonance in the fact that it is only drawn and not painted13. The rapid spread of the model in the cathedrals of the region, corresponding to the royal promotion, and the careful preservation of its uncolored nature in some cases, invite us to keep this possibility in mind. The second group presents Mary with the same gesture, but is far from a strict repetition of the Madonna Avvocata’s archaic style; the Virgin is portrayed with half-closed eyes generally looking downwards, her head covered with a supplementary – normally blue – cloth over a white inner veil. Most of the extant examples come from the Valencian area, including the panel from Valldecrist (now in Valencia) and those of the churches of Cocentaina, Pego, Xulella, Morella or Xàtiva; others are preserved in museums of Mallorca, Vic, and Madrid and in private collections. A face of this type was also painted in the upper panel of an altarpiece of Montsó (Huesca), now in Museu de Lleida14. In a variant shown in the panels from Valldemossa (Museu de Mallorca) and La Gleva (Museu Episcopal de Vic), the Virgin holds the

edge of her white cloth, a feature that Kessler has related to a version of the Veronica legend (the Vengeance Nostre Seigneur as documented around 1200) in which the Virgin herself takes the veil to obtain the miraculous image of Christ at the foot of the Cross15. The earliest panel, probably coming from the Carthusian monastery of Valldecrist (Castelló), is currently attributed to Gonçal Peris Sarrià and dated to 1405–141016; no example of this type, thus, dates from before King Martin’s parchment. This group also has connections with standard representations of the Virgin in late fourteenth-century Aragonese, Italian, and French painting, but the choice of a more intimate, melancholic type seems to express a shift of the Virgin’s image from Madonna Avvocata to Mater Dolorosa17.

The Face of Christ in Late Medieval Aragonese Painting This introductory overview of the Marian Veronica phenomenon demonstrates its importance in the late medieval Aragonese context, the normality in using the term applied to representations of the Virgin’s face, and the material autonomy of some of these Marian portraits18. The Face of Christ proliferated in Aragon as it did in other European regions at the same time, but without similar royal promotion and mostly integrated in double or double-sided panels including the face of the Virgin. The originality of the molt devota Verònica de santa Maria is probably the reason why, since Gudiol’s time, scholars have paid less attention to it19. In fact, the literary basis of the Face of Christ in Aragon was the same as for the legend of St Luke. Gudiol and Crispí20 have identified the vernacular versions of the key texts that, unlike the Latin sources, became accessible to the public, particularly through preaching. The legend of Abgar as transmitted by Voragine was available in Catalan since around 1300 in the Vides de Sants Rosselloneses21; the most important witness to it is a manuscript dated around 1400 and preserved in Vic, together with a fourteenth-century Latin version22. A rare direct visual translation of the Abgar episode is to be found in a panel from the Clarisse convent altarpiece in Vic, painted by Lluís

Borrassà before 1415 and already noted by Gudiol23: Jesus’ letter, handed by St Judas Thaddeus under the eyes of St Simon and the court, heals King Abgar by touching his face, while a courtier in the background proffers the Mandylion [Figs 3 a, b]. The panel is also exceptional due to the close relationship between text and image: the first words of the letter, closely corresponding to the Catalan versions are carefully reproduced. Most probably, they had been given to the painter by the patron, Bartomeu Soler, or even by Fra Tomàs Olzina, a Franciscan friar known by both persons, confessor of King John i and a close colleague of Francesc Eiximenis (1327–1409), the most influential Franciscan preacher in Aragon at that time. In his Catalan version of the Vita Cristi, Eiximenis included a brief mention of the Abgar legend as well as a description of Christ’s likeness24. The whole altarpiece’s complex iconographical plan, still unexplained in detail, is probably to be attributed to this learned Franciscan entourage25. Moreover, the model chosen for the head of the Virgin of Hope in the lower central panel is again that of King Martin’s Marian Veronica, which had gained popularity by that time. According to the theological and liturgical interpretation then given to the royal relic, the choice may have been intended to put the Virgin’s Immaculate Conception in visual relationship with the announced Birth of Christ, which would be in accord with the Franciscan defense of the theology26. “El tipu iconogràfic sembla correspondre al trecentisme italià”, Gudiol, “Les Veròniques ii”(n. 3), p. 70; Crispí,“La Verònica”(n. 3), pp. 89–90; Español, “Relicario de la Verónica” (n. 5); Bacci, “Kathreptis” (n. 3), p. 27; Herbert Kessler, “Paradigms of Movement in Medieval Art: Establishing Connections and Effecting Transition”, Codex Aquilarensis, xxix (2013), pp. 29–48, sp. p. 44. 9 Gudiol, “Les Veròniques ii” (n. 3), p. 71 quotes the text pronounced during the ritual exposition of the icon in Valencia cathedral, according to a late fifteenth-century manuscript which very naturally explains the coexistence of both the heavenly and terrestrial origins and includes the denomination advocada: “Bona gent lo gloriós secretani e devot molt car de la verge maria monsenyor sant luch evangelista, apres que la dita verge fou passada de aquesta vida e fou rebuda en los cels per esser perpetual advocada de nosaltres peccadors hauya gran desíg que la pogues veure. Així que un jorn stant en aquest desig ell se adormí e quan se desperta troba davant dell una tovallola hon apparia la faç gloriosa de la verge maría, tal propiament com ella era. Aquesta santa verónica es en roma de la qual se son stades pertretes algunes entre les quals es aquesta una de aquelles”. See the complete text and chronological considerations in Josef Teixidor, Antigüedades de Valencia, Roque Chabás ed., Valencia 1895 [1767], ap. iv, pp. 395–398. On the attribution of the acheropita condition to a larger number of Marian images in the late Middle Ages, see Bacci, “Epigoni orientali” (n. 3), pp. 45–47. 10 See Vides de Sants Rosselloneses Traducció catalana del s. xiii de la Llegenda Daurada de Jacopo da Varazze, Charlotte Maneikis Kniazzeh, 8

Edward J. Neugaard, Joan Coromines eds, Barcelona 1977. 11 Eiximenis describes the Ara Coeli icon in his Vita Christi (1397–1398), referring to the legend of St Luke and thus offering a version of Mary’s likeness which fits with the king’s parchment. According to him, Mary’s face was painted “ab aquelles continents que ella fahia quant estava deiús la creu del Salvador crucificat en lo Munti Calvari”. Universitat de Barcelona, crai-Reserva (=ub), ms 1106, f. 25, quoted in Gabriel Llompart, “Apuntes folklóricos en la Vita Christi de Francesc Eiximenis”, Revista de dialectología y tradiciones populares, xxxv (1980), pp. 87–100, sp. p. 89. 12 Gudiol, “Les Veròniques ii”, (n. 3), pp. 67–68; Crispí, “La difusió” (n. 3), pp. 84–85; Bacci, “Kathreptis” (n. 3), p. 29. Crispí, “La Verònica” (n. 3), pp. 88–89. 13 Kessler, “Paradigms” (n. 8), pp. 38, 44. It is worth remembering that the Salus Populi Romani icon was believed to have been drawn miraculously and then painted by St Luke, while the contrary was proclaimed in the case of the Tempuli Madonna. Gerhard Wolf, Salus Populi Romani, Weinheim 1990, pp. 161–170, 318–320. On the papal gifts of diptychs, possibly of Byzantine origin, see Crispí,“La Verònica” (n. 3), pp. 95–96, with bibliography. 14 Crispí, “La difusió” (n. 3), pp. 88–92. 15 Kessler, “Paradigms” (n. 8), p. 45. 16 Joan Aliaga, “Verónica de la Virgen y Anunciación”, in El Renacimiento Mediterráneo (n. 5), cat. 2, pp. 153–156; Francesc Ruiz Quesada, “Una obra documentada de Pere Nicolau per al rei Martí l’Humà. El políptic dels set Goigs de la cartoixa de Valldecrist”, Retrotabulum, viii (2013), pp. 14–21. 17 Gudiol, “Les Veròniques ii”, (n. 3), p. 71; Crispí, “La Verònica” (n. 3), pp. 90–91, n. 34, and p. 98. This coincides with Eiximenis’ description of the Virgin’s attitude in the Calvary (n. 11). 18 Crispí, “La Verònica” (n. 3), pp. 96–99. 19 Remarkable exceptions are Etelvina Fernández González, “Del Mandylion a la Verónica: sobre la vera icona de Cristo en la edad media”, in Imágenes y promotores en el arte medieval, Maria Luisa Melero, Francesca Español, Ana Orriols, Daniel Rico eds, Barcelona 2001, pp. 353–371, and particularly Marta Crispí Cantón, “La Santa Faz de Cristo en la pintura gótica catalana. Iconografía y fuentes textuales”, in Modelos, intercambios y recepción artística, Actas del xv Congreso nacional de Historia del Arte (ceha), Palma de Mallorca (20–23 de octubre de 2004), Palma de Mallorca 2008, pp. 57–70. 20 Gudiol, “Les Veròniques i”, (n. 3), pp. 2–7; Crispí, “La Santa Faz” (n. 19), pp. 61–63, 68–69. 21 Vides de Sants (n. 10), iii, pp. 369–375. 22 Gudiol, “Les Veròniques i”, (n. 3), pp. 2–4; Josep Gudiol i Cunill, Catàleg dels llibres manuscrits anteriors al segle xviii del Museu Episcopal de Vich, Vic 1930, pp. 180–183. The volumes are preserved in the Biblioteca i Arxiu Episcopal de Vic (=abev), acv ms 174 (Llegenda Aurea, per el beat Jaume de Varezze, ca 1400), and acv ms 173 (Jacobi de Voragine Legenda Aurea, 14th century). 23 Gudiol, “Les Veròniques i”, (n. 3), pp. 4–5; after him Fernández, “Del Mandylion” (n. 19), pp. 357–358, and Crispí, “La Santa Faz” (n. 19), pp. 65–66. 24 “Aquella divinal cara e tota reverent, longua e quelcom scura per la gran penitencia que despuy que nasché al mon havia feyta, les celles que havia altes e pontades, el nas gran e bell, el front ampla e la bocha e les dents, fort belles e blanques e la barba poqueta mas biforcada, los ulls fort bells e quelcom guasets, els cabells fins als musclos, declinants a color castanya, la sua veu era tubal e penetrant, el seu esguart axí reverent que soptosament provocava al hom a pahor e a temor […]”.ub, ms 1106, f. 192v, quoted in Llompart,“Apuntes folklóricos”(n. 11), p. 92. The description seems to have been created after the Lentulus’ Letter or other Vitae Christi quoting it (Ernst von Dobschütz, Christusbilder, Leipzig 1899, p. 319); the darkness of the Face, a feature described in the hymn Ave facies praeclara, is the only hint of a possible influence from the Roman relic. Hans Belting, Bild und Kult, Munich 1990, pp. 246–247. On Eiximenis’ Vita Christi see also Albert Hauf, La “Vita Christi” de Fr. Francesc Eiximenis (1340?–1409), y la tradición de las “VC” medievales, unpublished doctoral dissertation, Universitat de Barcelona 1976. 25 Francesc Ruiz Quesada,“Lluís Borrassà. Virgen de la Esperanza, San Miguel y Santa Clara. San Francisco y las tres órdenes franciscanas”, in Cathalonia. Arte gótico en los siglos xiv–xv, exhibition catalogue (Madrid, Museo del Prado 1997), Maria Rosa Manote, Francesc Ruiz, Frances M. Quílez eds, Madrid 1997, pp. 148–154, sp. p. 152. 26 Crispí, “La Verònica” (n. 3), p. 88.

199

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3 a, b/ Lluís Borrassà, The apostles Simon and Thadeus heal King Abgar with Christ’s letter, panel of the altarpiece of St Clare in Vic, ca 1415 / Museu Episcopal de Vic 201

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Well known through Voragine’s Catalan translation, the Veronica legend was also transmitted in such sources as the Destrucció de Jerusalem (a version of the Vindicta Salvatoris) and the so-called Gamaliel, a book in which a pious Jew is supposed to narrate the trial of Christ. Among other volumes27, both the Gamaliel and the Destrucció are preserved in an interesting incunable, printed in Montserrat in 1493 and preserved in Vic28. In this Destrucció, in contrast to other versions29, Veronica wipes Christ’s face during the Via Crucis but only realizes the existence of the imprint at Calvary, after a remark by the Virgin; in turn, the Gamaliel contains a similar variant. Another manuscript, Barcelona bc 710 (dated 1450–1500)30, contains a very interesting version of the Destrucció in which the imprint of Christ’s face is attributed not to Veronica, but to the Virgin at the foot of the Cross. This original feature of the Catalan versions31 agrees with the previous traditions of the Vengeance Nostre Seigneur invoked by Kessler to explain the Virgin’s gesture at the panels of Valldemossa and La Gleva32, and thus seems to clarify this model’s specific literary background in this geographical context. Apart from that, the iconographic cycles of the Mandylion and the Veronica as such are virtually absent from the Aragonese painting. The only fairly frequent representation that could be linked to the latter is the cloth with the Face of Christ, sometimes painted among the Arma Christi in the predellas of some altarpieces33. In a similar context, in the upper panel of the St Anthony altarpiece from Montsó (ca 1430–1445), now in the Museu de Lleida34, the tiny Calvary is flanked by a Veronica of the Virgin – of the Sarrià type – and the Face of Christ on a white cloth [Fig. 4]. In these cases, despite the absence of the crown of thorns or drops of blood which reveal the Mandylion as the essential model35, the context is clearly that of the Passion: in Montsó, the proximity to Calvary would suggest a direct relation to the Via Crucis and, thus, with the veil of Veronica, would fit with the Dolorosa type chosen for Mary’s head36. In a later context, in which German or Italian prints were available, we find discretely painted Veronicae with the Veil and Face, as in the upper canopy of the Pietà panel from

Banyoles (near Girona), painted by Pere Mates around 154037. The earlier presence of the Face of Christ in Aragonese Gothic painting is attested in some examples where, at first glance, the Facies appears not to be a translation of the aforementioned sources, but rather complementary to other programs. The first ones come from the city of Lleida: in the north wall of the choir of the old medieval cathedral (La Seu Vella), the cycle of the Life of Christ, painted before 1330, includes twenty-four Holy Faces in the spandrels between the scenes38; and in a panel dated 1330 –1345 from the church of Sant Llorenç (now in the Museu de Lleida) showing the Virgin and Child, the Face of Christ decorates the center of the upper tracery [Fig. 5] 39. Both iconographies have counterparts in somewhat later examples: in the retable of Santo Sepulcro church in Zaragoza (ca 1360), Jaume Serra included two faces of Christ in the spandrels between the crests40, while a single Facies provides the culmination of the central pinnacle in the altarpiece of Santa Maria de Rubió (Anoia), dated 1360–138041. Despite their position, these Faces are not merely decorative. Analyzing the programs of the Lleida wall painting and the Rubió and Zaragoza altarpieces – in the last case, particularly taking into account its dedication to the Resurrection – both Alcoy and Crispí understand the Facies as an eschatological feature, as a memento of the program’s final sense or as the culmination of the 27 Ernst von Dobschütz, Christusbilder (n. 24), pp. 290, 282–292. On the presence of these texts in Catalan, Spanish or Portuguese in other manuscripts or incunables, see Jaume Riera Sans, “La invenció literària de Sant Pere Pasqual”, Caplletra, i (1986), pp. 45–60. 28 abev, inc. 193; Xavier Altés, Alexandre Olivar, Catàleg dels incunables de la Biblioteca Episcopal de Vic, Vic 2000, cat. 92, p. 49. 29 Gudiol,“Les Veròniques i”,(n. 3), p. 7; John Oliver Hand,“Salve sancta facies: some thoughts on the iconography of the Head of Christ by Petrus Christus”,Metropolitan Museum Journal, xxvii, (1992), pp. 7–18, sp. p. 10. 30 Edited by Josep Hernando i Delgado,“La Destrucció de Jerusalem...: uns escrits apòcrifs, de cavalleries i antijueus, en català de la baixa edat mitjana”, Miscel·lània de textos medievals, 5 (1989), pp. 5–116. 31 Crispí, “La Santa Faz” (n. 19), p. 62. 32 Kessler, “Paradigms” (n. 8), p. 43. 33 Crispí, “La Santa Faz” (n. 19), p. 66. 34 Gudiol, “Les Veròniques ii”, (n. 3), p. 73; Ximo Company, “Retaule incomplet de Sant Antoni Abat”,in Pulchra. Catàleg del Museu Diocesà de Lleida, Ximo Company, Isidre Puig. Jesus Tarragona eds, Lleida 1993, cat. 131, pp. 91–93; Rafael Cornudella,“Retaule de Sant Antoni Abat”, in Catalunya 1400. El gòtic internacional, exhibition catalogue (Barcelona, mnac 2012), Rafael Cornudella ed., Barcelona 2012, cat. 39, pp. 214–216. 35 A synthetic view of the overlapping traditions in Hand, “Salve sancta” (n. 29).

36 Gudiol, “Les Veròniques ii”, (n. 3), pp. 71–73; Crispí, “La Verònica” (n. 3), p. 98. 37 Charles Rathfon Post, A History of Spanish Painting, vol. xii, Cambridge (Massachusetts) 1958, pp. 147–149; Joaquim Garriga, “Pere Mates”, in De Flandes a Itàlia, exhibition catalogue (Girona, Museu d’Art 1998), Joaquim Garriga ed., Girona 1998, pp. 205–207. 38 Rosa Alcoy,“Els cicles murals de la Seu Vella de Lleida”,in Seu Vella. L’esplendor retrobada, Joan Busqueta, Montserrat Macià eds, Lleida 2003, pp. 67–78, 70–72; Rosa Alcoy, Pere Beseran, “Els primers tallers trescentistes a Lleida”, in L’Art Gòtic a Catalunya. Pintura i, Rosa Alcoy ed., Barcelona 2005, pp. 119–124, sp. pp. 119–121. 39 Rosa Alcoy, Pere Beseran,“Taula de la Verge amb el Nen i àngels”,in Pulchra (n. 34), pp. 87–88; Alcoy/Beseran,“Els primers”(n. 38), p. 124; Crispí, “La Santa Faz” (n. 19), p. 64. The Face at the summit of the panel can be found in some Italian examples of the second half of the fourteenth century or later, as the culmination of a Passion

(Roberto di Oderisio, Masolino) or Last Judgment series (Bartolo di Fredi). Il volto di Cristo, Gerhard Wolf, Giovanni Morello eds, Rome 2000, cat. iv.22, p. 133; Hans Belting, Das Bild und sein Publikum im Mittelalter, Berlin 1981, pp. 69–71, 100–101; see also Carlo Bertelli, “The Image of Pity in Santa Croce in Gerusalemme”, in Essays in the History of Art Presented to Rudolf Wittkower, Douglas Fraser, Howard Hibbard, Milton J. Lewine eds, London 1967, pp. 40–55, sp. p. 53, quoted in Herbert Kessler, “Face and Firmament: Dürer’s Angel with the Sudarium and the Limits of Perception”, in L’immagine di Cristo (n. 3), pp. 143–165, sp. p. 150. 40 Gudiol, “Les Veròniques ii” (n. 3), p. 73; Maria del Carmen Lacarra, “L’obra i la influència de Jaume Serra a Aragó”, in L’Art Gòtic (n. 38), pp. 278–283; Crispí, “La Santa Faz” (n. 19), pp. 64–65. 41 Rosa Alcoy, “La Barcelona pictòrica de Ramon Destorrents”, in L’Art Gòtic (n. 38), pp. 234–250, sp. pp. 242–247; Crispí, “La Santa Faz” (n. 19), p. 64.

4 / Jaume Ferrer (attribution), The Calvary flanked by two Veronicas, panel of the altarpiece of St Anthony in Montsó, ca 1430–1445 / Museu de Lleida: diocesà i comarcal 203

story told in the rest of the painting; in short, a visual anticipation of the heavenly contemplation of God’s Face42. Accordingly, in the panel from Sant Llorenç, the Incarnation is crowned by the vision of the Glory of God, emulating the synthetic decorative plan of a Byzantine church. The general background, of course, is the beatific vision associated with the Face of Christ, which had developed earlier in Western Christianity43. In our precise context, Rosa Alcoy has cleverly pointed to the topicality of the beatific vision at the beginning of the fourteenth century and its coincidence with the appearance of these images in Navarra to explain the presence of the first Faces in Lleida. The original doctrine of Pope John xxii (1316–1334), contained in his own sermons and in the works of Cardinal Ceccano, denied the possibility of such a vision before the Final Judgment, and so the Facies became an intermediate alternative for the righteous dead; in this context, according to Alcoy, the wall paintings in Lleida cathedral could have been promoted by Bishop Arnau Sescomes (1327–1334), who developed a particular devotion to Christ and who immediately became Archbishop of Tarragona (1334–1346). These thoughts were particularly contested in Aragon not only by the Dominicans and “spiritual” Franciscans, but also by Patriarch Joan d’Aragó, Archbishop of Tarragona just before Sescomes (1327–1334) and a member of the royal family. Pope John xxii retracted the arguments shortly before his death, and his successor Benedict xii definitively condemned the original theories44. There is no need to place every Face in relation to one or other side of this theological dispute; both positions were in favor of such images, particularly considering their Eucharistic implications45. Especially on altarpieces, they would have a clear liturgical counterpart: their position and round shape echoed the elevated Host, underlining the eschatological anticipation in the frame of the earthly liturgy, which is a figure of the eternal one, and even, as in Zaragoza, underlining axes of triple Faces and thus perhaps stressing a Trinitarian idea46. Not by coincidence, Joan d’Aragó associated the vision of God’s Face with that of His very essence – designated by the word species, that is, the same used for the

Eucharistic bread and wine47. On the other hand, the likening of the full and final beatific vision to the sunlight and that of the Facies, in contrast, to the light of a candle developed by Cardinal Ceccano48 may point in a similar direction, if we recall the circumstances in which this Eucharistic association could have been perceived. During the elevation of the Host, the Faces (like the rest of the high parts of the altarpiece) may have received more light by the raising of the elevation candle, as if offering a glance into Heaven per speculum in aenigmate. Without rejecting the importance of the theological debates, this liturgical and Eucharistic perception would undoubtedly have been more significant to most of the clergy and faithful. This is furthermore revealed by the great popularity enjoyed since the 1320s by the feast and procession of Corpus Christi in the Aragonese cities, whose artistic implications have also been estimated in other aspects49. From a formal point of view, all these Faces have standard features: a bearded, forward-looking, serene and non-temporal Face of Christ, some with a cruciform halo and the ordinary threeedged outline, albeit drawn without particular concern to reproduce the Roman Veronica. As in other contexts, their remote origin is to be found in the first Roman representations of the Facies still derived from the Mandylion, later synthesized in pilgrim badges or other serially-produced objects particularly after the 1300 Jubilee Year50. Small variations may be attributed to the different skills and originality of the painter, rather than to the influence of different sources. The same features under similar circumstances can be recognized in the Faces painted during most of the fifteenth century, adapted to current stylistic trends. As for the aforementioned altarpiece from St Clare in Vic, it is tempting to imagine that the same person who provided Borrassà with a copy of Abgar’s letter in Catalan could have given him a sketch of the characteristic Veronica outline, or perhaps even a panel with the oriental Mandylion, like the ones that were frequent objects of trade, documented in Catalonia since the second half of the fourteenth century51. But in fact, the descriptions in the Vitae Christi and, particularly, the knowledge of the previous tradition may

have been sufficient for rendering a generic and idealized Face of Christ. In the case of the Montsó Calvary, the Face on the cloth shows a cruciform halo and a two-pointed beard nearly merged into an abundant cascade of hair, as if Christ’s neck is omitted. However, in spite of these unique features, this was a pattern very closely reworked by the same painter on other occasions, as in the Christ presiding over the Last Supper panel from Linya (now in Solsona)52. Also, the typical features of the suffering Christ (crown of thorns, drops of blood) were sometimes incorporated into the traditional model, but without changing the sober expression of the divine Face. 42 Alcoy, “Els cicles murals” (n. 38), p. 71; Crispí, “La Santa Faz” (n. 19), p. 65. 43 E.g. Paul Binski, “The Faces of Christ in Matthew Paris’s Chronica Majora”, in Tributes in Honor of James H. Marrow, Jeffrey Hamburger, Anne Korteweg eds, London 2006, pp. 85–92. 44 Rosa Alcoy, “La felicidad de los santos y de los hombres y mujeres que no lo fueron”, in Art i devoció a l’edat mitjana, Rosa Alcoy, Pere Beseran eds, Barcelona 2011, pp. 93–108, sp. pp. 100–104. The texts and the history of this discussion in Marc Dykmans, “Le cardinal Annibal de Ceccano et la Vision Béatifique (1331–1336)”, Gregorianum, l (1969), pp. 353–382; idem, Les sermons de Jean xxii sur la vision béatifique, Rome 1973; idem, Pour et contre Jean xxii en 1333: deux traités avignonnais sur la vision béatifique, Vatican City 1975. See also Josep Gil Ribas, “El debat medieval sobre la visió beatífica. Noves aportacions (ii)”, Revista Catalana de Teologia, xxviii/1 (2003), pp. 135–196; Kessler, “Face and Firmament” (n. 39), pp. 151–152. It is perhaps not accidental that some eighty years later the two orders were depicted together with the Abgar legend in the Vic altarpiece, promoted in a Franciscan setting. 45 Herbert Kessler, “Il Mandylion”, in Il volto (n. 39), pp. 67–76, sp. pp. 74–75; Gerhard Wolf, “Or fu sì fatta la sembianza vostra?: sguardi alla ‘vera icona’ e alle sue copie artistiche”, in Il Volto (n. 39), pp. 103–114, sp. pp. 104–108. 46 I thank Aden Kumler for drawing attention to this possible Trinitarian nuance in the case of the Zaragoza altarpiece. 47 Marc Dykmans, “Lettre de Jean d’Aragon, patriarche d’Alexandrie, au pape Jean xxii sur la vision béatifique”, Analecta Sacra Tarraconensia, xlii (1969), pp. 143–168, sp. pp. 153 and 164. 48 Alcoy, “La felicidad” (n. 44), p. 101. 49 Agustí Duran y Sanpere, La fiesta del Corpus, Barcelona 1943, p. 69; Marc Sureda, “L’arrivée du Corpus Christi en Espagne: les premières processions catalanes”, in Colloque Europae Thesauri. La procession et les objets qui l’accompagnent (Angers, 15 au 17 septembre 2010), pp. 3–4, available on http://www.europaethesauri. eu/articles.php [10/04/2016]. For the iconography of Corpus Christi, see Cèsar Favà, “El retaule eucarístic de Vilafermosa i la iconografia del Corpus Christi a la Corona d’Aragó”, Locus amoenus, viii (2005), pp. 105–121. 50 Wolf, “Or fu” (n. 45), pp. 106–107, and also Il Volto (n. 39), cat. iv.2–iv.4 and iv.11–iv.14. 51 Josep Gudiol i Cunill, “Icones i retaulons”, Vida Cristiana, cxviii (1927), p. 63; Daniel Duran Duelt, “Icons and Minor Arts: a Neglected Aspect of Trade Between Romania and the Crown of Aragon”, Byzantinische Zeitschrift, cv/1 (2012), pp. 29–52; for a wider context, see Belting, Bild und Kult (n. 24), pp. 369–390. 52 Rosa Alcoy, “Sant Sopar”, in Museu Diocesà i Comarcal de Solsona. Romànic i Gòtic, Josep Maria Trullén, Joachim Calderer eds, Barcelona 1990, cat. 127, pp. 180–183 (attributing it to Jaume Ferrer i); Rafael Cornudella, “Sant Sopar”, in Catalunya 1400 (n. 34), cat. 30, pp. 184–185 (who attibutes it to Pere Teixidor).

5 / The Virgin with Child and angels, panel from the church of St Llorenç in Lleida, 1339–1345 / Museu de Lleida: diocesà i comarcal

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6  a, b / Diptych with two Veronicas from La Gleva (Osona), ca 1500 / Museu Episcopal de Vic

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In the diptych from Valldemossa, now in the Museu de Mallorca, attributed to Bernat Martorell (or one of his followers) and dated to the second quarter of the fifteenth century53, the Face of Christ on a golden background is a fine stylization of the previous model in the context of the later International Gothic style, with a two-pointed beard and hair falling at the sides, prominent ears, and no nimbus but frond-like rays coming from the four points of the head, in accordance with a scheme very popular in the first half of the fifteenth century54. The anonymous painter of the La Gleva diptych (before 1500) [Fig. 6] 55 must have had the Valldemossa models in front of him: while the Virgin is identical, the Christ is also a direct – but less skilful – copy (note the lines on the forehead), albeit here with a crown of thorns and drops

of blood instead of the rays, and on a brownish background which creates a diffusion effect. The similar, more pleasant but differently oriented version of the Mallorca Cathedral reliquary (ca 1445), without thorns, halo or rays, points to the common generic prototype. A variant can be observed in a panel of the St Andrew altarpiece from Barcelona Cathedral, painted by Lluís Borrassà before 1421 (now in a private collection)56, and in some later Valencian Faces such as those of Pego (before 1450), Sueca (ca 1470?, including the crown of thorns), or that in the Durrieu collection in Paris (1460–1470, replacing the potencée cross with rays)57: Christ’s hair falls to the sides in groups of two or three locks, which recalls a model frequently found in post-Byzantine painting which was possibly known in Aragon through imported icons58.

However, these faces always look forwards and have features adhering to regional tradition. Since the mid fifteenth century, it was also common to find devotional panels with the Facies painted in the new Flemish manner, frequently imported objects derived from the Eyckian Rex Regum which spread throughout Europe59. The panel in the Museu Nacional d’Art de Catalunya (Barcelona) is attributed to Albrecht Bouts; the Salvator Mundi in the Museu Episcopal de Vic may come from a model by Petrus Christus, and the one in the Museu d’Art de Girona has been linked to the workshop of Van der Weyden that produced the reverse portrait in the National Gallery of London60. In contrast, the expressive Santa Faç painted by Joan Gascó [Fig. 7] (1513) shows a dramatic Christ, with its depiction of thorns, blood, spittle and

53 Gudiol, “Les Veròniques i” (n. 3), pp. 4 and 7; Crispí, “Díptic de les dues Veròniques”, in Mallorca gòtica, exhibition catalogue (Barcelona, mnac and Palma, Llotja 1998–1999), Gabriel Llompart ed., Barcelona 1998, pp. 175–177, with bibliography, and “La Santa Faz” (n. 19), pp. 67–68; Sabater, La pintura (n. 4), pp. 127–130; Kessler, “Paradigms” (n. 8), p. 43. The accompanying text, with underlying implications on the perception of sacred images, as pointed out by Kessler, could have been drawn from Durand’s Rationale, lib. 1, cap. 3. 54 Hand, “Salve sancta” (n. 29), pp. 10–16; Wolf, “Or fu” (n. 45), p. 107 and cat. iv.26; Kessler, “Paradigms” (n. 8), p. 43. 55 Gudiol, “Les Veròniques i” (n. 3), p. 9; Post, A History (n. 37), vol. iii, p. 162. 56 Francesc Ruiz Quesada, “Els primers contactes artístics de Lluís Borrassà amb la catedral de Barcelona”, Butlletí de la Reial Acadèmia de Belles Arts de Sant Jordi, xv (2001), pp. 297–313, sp. pp. 308–310. 57 Joan Aliaga, Mauro Natale, “Verónica de la Virgen / Santa Faz”, and Gennaro Toscano, “Verónica de la Virgen y de Cristo” in El Renacimiento Mediterráneo (n. 5), cat. 3, pp. 157–161, and cat. 47, pp. 329–331; Marta Crispí “Verónica bifacial”, in Orient en Occident. Antigues icones valencianes, Nuria Blaya ed., Valencia 2000 pp. 213–214. 58 Wolf, Morello, Il Volto (n. 39), cat. iii.7 and III.13. 59 Hand, “Salve sancta” (n. 29). 60 Joaquim Garriga, Salvator Mundi, (Museu d’Art de Girona. Peça del Mes, març 2008), Girona 2008.

7 / Joan Gascó, The Holy Face of Christ, by 1513 / Museu Episcopal de Vic

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8 / The Holy Face of Christ, painting on leather, end of the 15th – beginning of the 16th century / Museu Episcopal de Vic 9 / The Holy Face of Christ, painted relief on paper, end of the 15th – beginning of the 16th century / Museu Episcopal de Vic

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chains. The model of this Christus dolens, shared with Bartolomé Bermejo and often attributed to imprecise Flemish sources61, could rather be Italian (Fra Angelico, 1430–1450), ultimately coming from Tuscan readings of Brigit of Sweden’s mystical visions62. It is interesting to note that the characteristic linear outline of the Roman Veronica seems to be conspicuous by its absence in this account63, contrasting with its contemporary spread in other regions and places (obviously Rome, but also Genova, Bohemia or Germany – e.g. Prague or Wienhausen)64. There were two main direct copies of the Roman relic documented in the Iberian Peninsula by that time. The Santo Rostro of Jaén (Andalusia) is first recorded in 1453 but could have been given by Pope Gregory xi to Bishop Nicolás de Biedma in 1376, probably as an affirmation of his episcopal authority65. The Santa Faz of Alicante, on the southern border of the Kingdom of Valencia, had been brought from Rome by the priest Pedro Mena shortly before 1489, in this instance probably to assert the pretension of an independent diocese which had been launched in 1415 and only became established in 156466. The images were soon identified as, respectively, the “second” and “third”cloths miraculously imprinted during the Via Crucis – that of Alicante claiming an additional Byzantine origin – which performed their own miracles67. However, as we have seen, they did not interfere with the way the Face of Christ was pictured in Late Gothic Aragonese painting. Instead, these images produced their own filiation (Llutxent 1510, for instance) and, especially, their series of devotional prints68, sometimes intermingled with one another. Another derivative version of these images were the gilded and painted leather sheets with the Sancta Facies – with or without the crown of thorns – abundantly present in many Catalan and Spanish collections. A Veronica en cuyr in King Martin’s inventory may have been of this type, although the surviving examples do not normally pre-date the late fifteenth century [Fig. 8] 69. The guadamecil technique and the Spanish inscriptions in many of them point to their being produced on the Iberian Peninsula (well-known guadamecil workshops were located in Andalusia and Castile,

61 Miquel Mirambell, “Santa Faç”, in La pintura gòtica hispanoflamenca, exhibition catalogue (Barcelona, mnac and Bilbao, Museo de Bellas Artes 2003), Francesc Ruiz, Ana Galilea eds, Barcelona 2003, pp. 352–357. 62 Wolf, “Or fu” (n. 45), p. 113; Il Volto (n. 39), cat. iv.27 and especially iv.28. 63 The possible similarity of the Christ in the double-sided Veronica in St Martin’s church in Valencia with that of the Sancta Sanctorum cannot be properly evaluated because it disappeared during the Civil War. Photographs seem to show abundant repainting, while the Virgin points to post-Byzantine models. Núria Blaya,“Verònica de Crist i Verge amb l’Infant”, in Orient (n. 57), pp. 233–234.

64 Il Volto (n. 39), cat. iv.13–14; for Bohemia, cat. iv.17–20. 65 Manuel López Pérez, El Santo Rostro de Jaén, Córdoba 1995, pp. 20–21. 66 Joseph Fabiani, Disertación histórico-dogmática sobre la Sagrada Reliquia de la Santísima Faz […], Alicante 1763. 67 Lopez, El Santo Rostro (n. 65), pp. 37–40; Jaime Villanueva, Viage Literario a las Iglesias de España, vol. ii, Madrid 1804, pp. 59–61 and 80. Curiously, the Gamaliel and the Destrucció de Jerusalem were once attributed to Pedro Pascual, Bishop of Jaén; although this person probably never existed. Riera, “La invenció” (n. 27). 68 As for Jaén, Lopez, El Santo Rostro (n. 65), pp. 45–46 and 109–112. 69 Gudiol, “Les Veròniques i” (n. 3), pp. 9–11.

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but also in Valencia and Barcelona)70, which would favor the dissemination of the outline presented as the Jaén relic71. However, the image consists, in fact, of little more than a simple three-edged outline filled with indistinct dark facial features, that anyone could have adapted from a sketch or print; the crown of thorns featuring in some of them, but absent in Rome as well as in Jaén, likewise points to very frequent overlapping. These objects were conceived primarily for devotional purposes (perhaps as cheaper alternatives to the Flemish panels), but due to their durability, they could also be easily used in the decoration of sacred objects such as Mass book covers (Museu Nacional d’Art de Catalunya, inv. 00003469-000) or Tabernacle doors (Museo Nacional de Artes Decorativas, Madrid, inv. ce00537). It is also likely that many drawings and prints had come directly from Rome, like those made by the pictores veronicarum, that any pilgrim could bring home. However, there are virtually no examples of late medieval Roman images produced on perishable materials preserved in the region. A very rare exception is a painted paper or paste print miraculously conserved in the Museu Episcopal de Vic since 1918, that was found in a remote corner of the Pyrenees (Torre de la Curriu, Gòsol) [Fig. 9]. There, the Facies with the signs of the Passion is framed in grotesque motifs colored in red and green, including an unidentified coat of arms within a wreath, all surrounded by a prayer inspired by those directed to the Roman relic72. The characteristically linear Face of Christ, the frame, and the words are created by the relief print, while the very crude painting adds more vivid facial features, brown hair and, significantly, thorn scars and drops of blood on the forehead and neck. Apart from the painted Passion signs, its general aspect corresponds very closely to that of the Vatican Veronica as shown to the faithful in the earliest printed representations of this ceremony (for instance, in the Mirabilia). Accordingly, the decorative patterns would point to an Italian (perhaps Roman) workshop active during the second half of the fifteenth century. Although relief paper prints are well known as a general typology, it seems that this precise subject is not commonly found73. However, it may

have been more popular than we would imagine: in Vic alone, Gudiol documented at least three similar objects in sixteenth-century inventories74. In addition to its rarity, the object is interesting because of its paradoxical nature. While flatness was considered an essential characteristic of the acheiropoietai Faces of Christ miraculously printed on cloth, and their reproduction on flat paper by printing were the ideal means to recreate this specific characteristic75, the use here of relief, instead, emphasizes a different idea: that of volumetric incarnation, which would rather recall Theodore Studite’s seal metaphor or, perhaps more closely, according to the mentality of the time, relief printing on Eucharistic Hosts76.

The Objects and Their Uses The most distinctive feature of the Face in the Crown of Aragon during the fifteenth century, then, is not related to the rendering of Christ’s likeness or the desire to reproduce a precise Christological relic, but to the type of object containing the image77. Indeed, many of the aforementioned examples are integrated into diptychs, double-sided panels or sets of two panels with the faces of both Jesus and Mary, which were used in accordance with the various churches’ specific needs and traditions. The reason is to be found again in King Martin’s Marian Veronica, which served as their prime model not only in iconographic but also in liturgical terms. All the studied costumaries, however, agree on one fact: with the exception of the Roman relic of Alicante78, there is no liturgical feast specifically linked to the Aragonese Veronicas, as they were not used on any particular occasion or in any specific manner79. The royal Veronica was itself used in various ways. After King Martin’s death, it served as a royal personal relic80. Held in the possession of the Valencian see since 1437, the object was considered to be one of the major relics of the cathedral and, as such, was solemnly exhibited to the faithful on Good Friday (later on Easter Day or Easter Monday) in a special structure built before the high altar81. Moreover, it was included in the Corpus Christi procession, the most solemn in the city, and in such other special occasions as the procession to

pray for rain in 146182. But similar functions were simultaneously accomplished in the same church by other objects, different in shape but typologically comparable. Before the King’s donation, Valencia cathedral had acquired a silver full-length statue of the Virgin with the facial features of the royal parchment: the image was probably required as in other cathedrals of the Crown, but here rendered in a very original and rich three-dimensional fashion83. This second object received some relics as well, such as those donated by Pope Calixtus iii in 1458 (the milk and veil of the Virgin, and Jesus’ cloth and shirt)84, and was also used in important processions, such as the one introducing the High Mass on Christmas Day, when it was carried by the bishop himself85. Thirdly, a rectangular double-sided panel used in cathedral processions asking for rain was named in 1699 “la faz de Cristo llamada la Verónica”. Imprecisely dated to the first half of the fifteenth century, the object shows on one side a stylized Face of Christ with halo, cruciform rays, crown of thorns and a purple tunic with embroidered neck, while the Flemish-looking Virgin and Child have no evident relationship with the Marian Veronica. In this case, the attested name and the poor state of the Virgin side, in contrast to the many repaintings of Christ’s Face, is in accord with a mainly Christological use and significance86. This is unsurprising, considering that it had to coexist with the two illustrious Marian Veronicas within the rich liturgy of Valencia cathedral. In Barcelona, even after the royal reliquary was removed, the procession was faithfully perpetuated until the seventeenth century. The importance of the Veronica was apparently so decisive that a substitute was needed: another portrait of the Virgin was used in the ceremony according to the 1522 cathedral inventory, but probably existed already before 149287. We do not know if this was a direct replica of the royal relic, as is the footed Tortosa panel88. But it may equally have been a double-sided panel with Christ’s bust on one side and the Virgin (with or without the Child) on the other89. This typology, also able to comprehend other relics, was present at least in the 70 José Ferrandis, Cordobanes y guadamecíes, Madrid 1955, pp. 43 and 109–110. 71 Lopez, El Santo Rostro (n. 65), pp. 109–112.

72 Gudiol, “Les Veròniques i” (n. 3), pp. 10–11. Inscription in the halo: faciem meam non averti a conspuentibus in me. In the frame: o dulcis facies ihesu christi nostri redemptoris / qui multis in passionis saciata fuis / ti opprobriis fac nos quesumus / tui […] pie doloris. Similar (but not identical) texts can be found in prayer books of the 15th century, such as Erbstorf iv.15, f. 7v (“Salve dulcis facies Ihesu Christi amabilis angelis […]”) (Renate Giermann, Hermann Härtel, Handschriften des Klosters Erbstorf, Wiesbaden 1994, p. 73). 73 I would like to thank Herbert Kessler and Peter Parshall for their precious advice on this subject. 74 “dos veronicas grans de paper picat”,1523; “una veronica de paper blanch”, 1547; “hun retaulet de fust ab una veronica de cera”, 1553. Gudiol, “Les Veròniques i” (n. 3), p. 11. 75 Lisa Pon, A Printed Icon in Early Modern Italy, Cambridge 2015, pp. 60–62 and 65–67. 76 Herbert Kessler, Spiritual Seeing, Philadelphia 2000, p. 70; Pon, A Printed Icon (n. 75), pp. 57–60; Aden Kumler, “The Multiplication of the Species”,res: Anthropology and Aesthetics, lix–lx (2011), pp. 179–191. See also the contribution of Aden Kumler in this same volume. 77 Crispí, “La Santa Faz” (n. 19), pp. 67–68. 78 In Alicante, after the first papal indulgences granted by Innocent viii in 1490, a proper of the Mass and Office for a feast on March 17th was approved by Pope Clement vii in 1525. The text of the Roman grant seems to suggest that the nine lessons written according to the local legend were accompanied by the liturgical texts used in Rome: “Quod possint celebrare Festum vultus Salvatoris Nostri, sub ritu Duplicis Maroris decimaseptima die Martii et quod si in Dominica venerit fiat de Festo et Dominica transferatur ad secundam Feriam et quod dicant Officium proprium de dicto Festo”. However, the most solemn celebration was still a yearly procession on the second Thursday after Easter, in which the relic (now a copy) leaves its sanctuary to visit the co-cathedral church of St Nicholas. Fabiani, Disertación (n. 66), pp. 34–35 and 72. 79 The exciting title “In solemintate iconie Domini Salvatoris” for the text of one of the votive masses in the Mallorcan missal of 1506 corresponds to a version of the Holy Cross Mass and Office. El Missal Mallorquí de 1506, Gabriel Seguí ed., Barcelona 2003, n. 495; Gabriel Llompart, “Longitudo Christi. Una aportación al conocimiento de la piedad popular catalana medieval”, Analecta Sacra Tarraconensia, xl/1 (1967), pp. 93–115, sp. pp. 99–101. 80 Crispí, “La Verònica” (n. 3), p. 92–93. 81 Teixidor, Antigüedades (n. 9), pp. 395–396; Villanueva, Viage (n. 67), pp. 43–46. A “vulp” (vultus of Christ?) was similarly venerated the same day in Tarragona cathedral, according to the 1369 costumary. Andrés Tomás Ávila, El culto y la liturgia en la catedral de Tarragona (1300–1700), Tarragona 1963, pp. 208–209; Arquitectura y liturgia. El contexto artístico de las consueta catedralicias en la Corona de Aragón, Eduardo Carrero ed., Palma de Mallorca 2014, p. 314. 82 Ibidem, pp. 358, 385 (1527: “lo cap de la Verge Maria”) and 392 (“que dicen ser de mano de San Lucas”). 83 Francesca Español, “Relicario de la Virgen con el Niño”, in El Renacimiento Mediterráneo (n. 5), pp. 170–172. 84 Peregrín-Luis Llorens, Relicario de la catedral de Valencia, Valencia 1964, pp. 185–187; on the Marian relics in the Crown of Aragon, see Marta Crispí, “Relíquies i devoció mariana en la Catalunya baixmedieval”, in Hagiografia peninsular en els segles medievals, Francesca Español, Francesc Fité eds, Lleida 2008, pp. 115–134. 85 Arquitectura y liturgia (n. 81), p. 358. 86 Jaime Sancho, “Icona bifacial”, in Orient (n. 57), pp. 214–215. 87 Núria de Dalmases, Orfebreria catalana medieval: Barcelona 1300–1500, Barcelona 1992, vol. i, p. 40; Crispí, “La difusió” (n. 3), pp. 97–98. 88 A scene from the high altarpiece of Tortosa cathedral would suggest that this panel could have been carried by the bishop in some processions: Josep Alanyà,“La Santa Cinta, tresor del bisbat de Tortosa”,in Lvx Dertosae, exhibition catalogue (Tortosa, Catedral de Santa Maria 2004), Ramon Miravall ed., Tortosa 2004, pp. 59–77, sp. p. 62; idem, Culte a la Puríssima al bisbat de Tortosa, Tortosa 2007, p. 160. However, the scene more probably represents a Corpus Christi procession, since the altarpiece is dated in the mid-fourteenth century and the Marian image is not documented before 1400. Jacobo Vidal, “La Baixada de la Cinta, 500 anys. Algunes qüestions d’iconografia”, Recerca, xii (2008), pp. 11– 64, sp. p. 23. 89 Gudiol, “Les Veròniques ii” (n. 3), pp. 73–76.

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cathedrals of Valencia, Mallorca (ca 1445), Vic90 (ca 1450), Girona (1496) and other important churches such as Ripoll abbey (1535)91. In most cases, this footed object was patterned on the outline of the heads or busts and enhanced with gold, silver, and jewels, often configuring a halo and rays. In Girona, a double-sided Veronica was given to the chapter in 1496 by an anonymous donor – perhaps Bishop Berenguer de Pau92 – who probably perceived the lack of such an object as a deficiency93. The panel [Fig. 10] shows, on one side, a very stylized version of King Martin’s Virgin, but with the Child and colored; the other side has an equally stylized Facies with neck and tunic and without thorns. A Flemish influence on the painter is noticeable, whatever his identity94. The donor specified that it was to be used for processions, and also asked for a relic to be incorporated into it, preferably Christological or Marian: “de la Camisa de Jesu Christo, ó cosa de Maria Santíssima”. The relic eventually chosen was a sample of the Virgin’s milk, a typical Palestinian souvenir, probably the same brought to Girona from Rome more than 150 years before by members of the Mont-rodon family95. The object became a feature of most of the cathedral’s processions: the post-tridentine consueta had it carried by a bishop’s representative in the procession of Sext on Christmas Day, and until the Second Vatican Council, the officiating priest held it during the so-called “claustral procession”, celebrated on the first Sunday of every month after High Mass and associated with the veneration of the Virgin as the cathedral’s titular dedication96. Indeed, the shape of the Girona double Veronica demonstrates a Marian preeminence: not only was the panel primarily conceived to show the Virgin and Child (the nimbus of the Child creates, on the other side, a strange protuberance besides Christ’s face), but also Mary’s side is clearly the more decorated as well as containing the relic. The Mallorca double-sided Veronica, dated ca 1445 in its final state97, is a painted panel with the outline of the faces of Christ and the Virgin on a luxurious tree-shaped support, crowned by angels with actual relics, among them that of the Column of Flagellation. Ruiz Quesada has stressed its possible association with the Lignum Crucis and, particularly, the tree of original sin98,

thus pointing to the Immaculate Conception, which fits with the adoption of a very stylized version of the royal Veronica for the Virgin’s face. However, its liturgical use is documented in many other feasts, including Christmas, New Year’s Day, Epiphany, Easter, Pentecost, Expectatio partus, Purification, Incarnation and Assumption, and also in the processions pleading for rain. According to the 1511 costumary, on most of these days the Veronica was carried by the subdeacon in the procession which walked along the cloister prior to the day’s High Mass, and then by the deacon for the proclaiming of the Gospel; on some occasions, the text specifies that it had to be held “ab lo vultus Dei devant” (or “ab la fas de Iesucrist devant”) (Pentecost, Expectatio partus) or “ab la fas de Nostra Dona devant” (Immaculate Conception, Purification, Incarnation)99. Footed and double-sided rectangular panels became popular in other churches of the Kingdom by that century, thus reflecting the traditions developed in the respective cathedrals; this would be the case of the panel in Pego (Alicante), a parish in the archdiocese of Valencia100. Significantly enough, the reliquary of the Santa Faz in Alicante, whose main feast features a procession, adopted this form too and incorporated on the back a Veronica of Mary similar to those of Pego or Cocentaina. But processions were not the only use of these objects. The Vic cathedral post-tridentine costumary reveals the inclusion of a bifacial panel of this type101 in the treasure’s display on the high altar, within a very carefully codified ornamental system according to the rank of the feasts. Although by then (1657) a silver statue of Nostra Senyora de Concepció presided over the altar in the most solemn celebrations, the double-sided Veronica was still used on other feast days “que no son tant principals, com la Transfiguració y la Visitació”, when it was placed “en lo mitx del altar, segons la festivitat o de Christo, o de Nostra Senyora”102, that is, showing one side or the other depending on the character of the liturgy, as we have seen in the Mallorca costumary for processions. The easy alteration of the altar’s decoration or the procession’s character seems to be a good application (if not directly an explanation) for the object’s design103.

There also existed sets of two footed panels representing Christ and the Virgin that could be used in a similar manner. The first ones can be dated to the mid-fifteenth century104, but the type soon proliferated in other churches such as Santa Maria del Pi and Santa Maria del Mar in 90 In a mid-fifteenth-century inventory, the object is described as “la santa veronique dada per lo honorable mossen Johan Colom ab dues veróniques una de la fas de Jesucrist altre de la verge maria ab moltes reliquies”.The object disappeared in the seventeenth century. Gudiol, “Les Veròniques ii” (n. 3), pp. 75–76. 91 In this year, several relics coming from a portable altar were enclosed “in quadam veronica Domini nostri Iesu Christi et beatae Mariae, quae est argentea et desuper deaurata”. The object is not preserved. Eduard Junyent, Diplomatari i escrits literaris de l’abat i bisbe Oliba, Barcelona 1992, p. 418. 92 Gudiol, “Les Veròniques ii” (n. 3), pp. 74–75; Post, A History (n. 37), vol. xii, p. 681. The original source was summed up in the eighteenth century as follows: “A 16 maig 1496 fol. 77 un devot que volgué quedar ocult doná reliquiari ab Imatge de la Mare de Deu per portarse en las Professons, y se demanaren per posarse reliquias de la Camisa de Jesu Christo, ó cosa de Maria Santíssima”: acg (= Arxiu Capitular de Girona), Sulpici Pontich, Repertori per Alfabètic, manuscript, vol. iii, f. 30v. Berenguer’s identity is stated in Josep Gudiol Ricart, Ars Hispaniae 9: Pintura gótica, Madrid 1955, p. 192, and in Gudiol/Alcolea, Pintura gótica catalana (n. 6), cat. 655, on the basis of an enameled coat of arms, and afterwards in Crispí, “La difusió” (n. 3), pp. 84 and 97. The coat of arms, however, as Post guessed corresponds to his uncle and predecessor, Cardinal Bishop Joan de Margarit i de Pau (1462–1484), which is in addition marked by the red color of the enameled galero. We can suppose that the nephew gave the reliquary on behalf of his uncle. 93 A Veronica of the Virgin had been pawned by Queen Mary of Aragon to Girona cathedral between 1415 and 1429. Crispí, “La verònica” (n. 3), p. 98. 94 The painting was attributed to Master of Canapost by Gudiol Ricart, Ars Hispaniae (n. 92); Post was not sure about it. Joaquim Garriga, “Reliquiari de la Verònica”,in De Flandes (n. 37), pp. 70–75, convincingly assigned it to Joan de Borgonya, rejecting the attribution of the coat of arms to Margarit, but admitting a modification in 1520 that would reconcile the apparently different dating of silver support and painted panel. 95 Francesca Español, “Les imatges marianes. Prototips, rèpliques i devoció”, Lambard, xv (2002–2003), pp. 87–109, sp. p. 94. 96 “[…] et coram domino Episcopo precedente quodam beneficiato ex antiquioribus ad hoc per vicarium electo et nominato, cum pluviali albo, et deferente pro domino Episcopo imaginem facierum Salvatoris et Beate Marie Virginis dictam vulgariter La Veronica, et tunc incipitur processio […]”, acg, ms 146 (consueta 1595), f. 30; Estatutos Capitulares y Consueta, Girona 1954, pp. 97–125. 97 Joan Domenge Mesquida, “Enlluernats per l’argent. Una visita al tresor”, in La Seu de Mallorca, Aina Pascual ed., Palma de Mallorca 1995, pp. 257–272; Francesc Ruiz Quesada, “Reliquiari de la columna”, in Mallorca gòtica (n. 53), pp. 171–174; Sabater, La pintura mallorquina (n. 4), pp. 122–123. 98 Ruiz, “Reliquiari” (n. 97), pp. 173–174. 99 Its presence in the civic procession of the Assumption is documented from 1457. Gabriel Seguí, La consueta de sagristia de 1511 de la Seu de Mallorca, Palma de Mallorca 2015, vol. ii, ns 121, 123, 133, 140, 210, 288, 688, 708, 804, 840, 960, 964, and 1118. Gabriel Llompart, “Cortejos luctuosos y patrióticos en la Mallorca medieval”, Boletín de la Sociedad Arqueológica Luliana, xxxiii, (1968/1972) pp. 314–331, sp. p. 324, includes its presence in the Processó de l’Estandard, celebrated every December 31st to mark the Christian conquest of the island. 100 See n. 57. 101 See n. 90. 102 Arxiu Capitular de Vic, 31/20 (consueta 1657), fols 5–7v. 103 Gudiol, “Les Veròniques ii” (n. 3), p. 71–74. 104 Such as those of Alcover: Gudiol, “Les Veròniques ii” (n. 3), p. 71.

10 a, b / Doublesided reliquary of the Veronica, Girona cathedral, end of the 15th – beginning of the 16th century / Tresor de la Catedral de Girona

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Barcelona, Sant Feliu de Girona or Santa Maria de Manresa among many others; in fact, similar twin sets were produced until the eighteenth century, such as the one in Museu Diocesà i Comarcal de Solsona, which suggests that they became a kind of standard decoration for any high altar105. In Santa Maria del Pi, according to the 1550 sacristy guidelines, the panel with Christ’s face was shown on the altar on the feasts of the Ascension, Trinity and Transfiguration; that of Mary, on those of the Immaculate Conception, Purification and Visitation; with both being shown on Christmas Day. The objects, however, not only coexisted with other images or reliquaries used in a similar way on other specific feasts, but also with the scenes or figures depicted on decorative cloths, particularly altar frontals, which completed the church’s appearance for a particular feast106. The similar, even more luxurious objects documented in Santa Maria del Mar107 were probably employed in the same way, perhaps acting as one more element of the traditional rivalry between these two important Barcelona parish churches. Until shortly before 1705, the Valldemossa diptych was taken out of the sacristy only on the most solemn occasions, when it was put on the chapter house altar. However, the physical condition of the hinges – apparently original – prevented the separate display of the faces of Christ and Mary, which seems to be a rather poor decoration of the altar but fits better in the context of private devotion. Indeed, according to local tradition, the diptych had been part of King Martin’s portable chapel, and had been donated to the Carthusian monastery in 1400 by the king himself108. Although the dating of the panels to around 1445 makes this impossible, a private origin of the object and its subsequent adaptation to the austere Carthusian liturgy is plausible. The “brother” diptych in La Gleva was probably subject to a similar arrangement: the two panels are independent now, but their corresponding edges show signs of the hinges that once joined them together. Unfortunately, we do not know how and when the diptych arrived at this Marian sanctuary founded before 1280 and rebuilt by 1340, nor how it was eventually used there. The sources only record the existence of a now disappeared

little panel of the Passion with two hinged wings; the lack of descriptions prevents any possible identification with our diptych. However, the sanctuary, most popular in Vic surroundings, continuously received offerings and ex-votos from the faithful109, and the diptych could well be one of them, having passed from a private devotional context to a public liturgical one. The incorporation of such objects as permanent, even immovable ornaments in some Catalan late medieval altars can also be attested. In 1478, a set of two Veronicas was recorded among the many additions to the silver high altarpiece of Girona cathedral; they were fixed to each side of the upper level110, and thus coexisted from 1496 with the double-sided reliquary whenever it was put on the altar. Other elements added to the ensemble, like a silver statue of the Virgin with an enameled coat of arms, seem to have been ex-votos which originated in private devotional contexts111. Painted panels, some of them of oriental origin, were also frequently inserted in the permanent scenarios of late medieval Catalan churches, often donated as ex-votos112. Actually, this permanent display of both Veronicas is similar to the – also immovable – presence of them as painted on the Montsó altarpiece, only some thirty years apart in time, in a clear Passion context on either side of a Calvary. It is worth remembering that for most of the single-sided Marian Veronicas of the “first generation” (Barcelona-Valencia, Vic, Tortosa or Huesca), no Christological counterparts are known. Have all of them been lost, or did they never exist? Again, in Vic cathedral, the Veronica of this kind (now in the Museu Episcopal de Vic), one of the first to be produced after the royal parchment, is documented between 1410 and 1443 as having been placed permanently on the high altar, while no similar record of a Christ panel can be found in the inventories113. On the object there is no physical evidence of a foot such as in Tortosa, for example114, but it could have simply been placed against the predella115. Obviously, we can imagine that the panels with Mary could have been combined with others of the Face of Christ, possibly not forming a coherent set, but according to a system similar to that of El Pi: the panels

would have appeared together on the altar only once or twice a year. Perhaps the production of sets of two Veronicas and double-sided panels from the mid-fifteenth century was in part a response to that. But we must not forget that these Marian panels are the most ancient of the series, in fact original productions linked to the direct royal promotion of an image-relic: indeed, the condition of King Martin’s Veronica as a relic in itself would be enough to justify its eventual liturgical autonomy116.

Conclusion Although the literary sources containing the stories of the Mandylion and the Veronica were well known in the Crown of Aragon by 1300, their dissemination did not involve an immediate artistic illustration of the legends or of their corresponding relics. The panel from the St Clare altarpiece in Vic with the Abgar episode is an exception with a very particular background. At the most, in some cases the Face was painted on a cloth which, in a Passion context, would suggest an association to the Veronica cycle. The Roman relic was not strictly reproduced either: the Holy Faces from Lleida, painted around 1330s, and those in the footed panels of the following century share the same generic features, adapted by the different workshops to the stylistic trends and theological needs of the particular moment. In contrast, the Face of the Virgin Mary was reproduced around 1400 according to carefully codified models, due to King Martin’s promotion of a precise image, ultimately coming from Rome. Signs of a royal interest in the Veronica can indeed be found earlier: King James ii had been granted a private showing of the Vatican Veronica in 1297 – together with Charles ii of Anjou117 – and possessed a sort of bifacial icon with Christ and Mary in 1313118; King John el Caçador (1387–1396) wrote to Rome in order to obtain “Veronicas o jaspis”119; and King Martin himself owned other Veronicas on wood or leather, probably of Christ, as well as diptychs in which the Face of Christ 105 Gudiol, “Les Veròniques ii” (n. 3), p. 76; Francesc Miralpeix, “Veròniques”, in Museu Diocesà i Comarcal de Solsona. Catàleg ss. xvi-xx, vol. 1, Solsona 2004, pp. 88–90.

106 apsmp (n. 7), Consueta de Sagristia, passim. The Facies of Christ was adorned “ab sa diadema en creu”, “quatre rags” and “un collar”: it was, then, of the type with neck and tunic. The Veronica of Mary “deboxada de graffi” (see n. 7) was adorned with pearls, gems and silver rays, and had a titulus with the words “monstra te esse matrem”. Both objects were inventoried in 1508. apsmp, Llibre Negre, fols 375–376. 107 Both images had, among many other decorations, silver angels with the Arma Christi; that of Christ had a silver halo with luxurious roxicler enamel; that of the Virgin had enamels, pearls and gems, three tituli with the words “monstra te esse matrem”, “siderum cernite vultum” and the date 1482, and silver sleigh bells. Arxiu Diocesà de Barcelona, Visites Pastorals, vol. 43, f. 230 (year 1596). Here I thank my friend Alberto Velasco. 108 Crispí, “Díptic de les dues Veròniques” (n. 53), pp. 175–177; Sabater, La pintura mallorquina (n. 4), pp. 127–128. 109 Antoni Pladevall, Santa Maria de la Gleva, patrona de la plana de Vic, Barcelona 1988, pp. 28–29, 33–39 and 51–52. On the placing of diptychs on the altar on solemn occasions, and the proximity of private devotional and public liturgical uses (in a Byzantine context), Belting, Das Bild (n. 39), pp. 167 and 171–172. 110 Arxiu Diocesà de Girona, Visites Pastorals, vol. 147, f. 136v (1478): “Item invenit duas imagines veronice depictas existentes in quibusdam postibus bene ornatis existentes in sumitate retrotabuli”; idem, f. 180v (1483); “Item invenit duas imagines videlicet Veronice et Vultus Sancti depictas existentes in quibusdam postibus decenter ornatis, et sint collocati dicti postes in summitate dicti retrotabuli a dextris et a sinistris”. 111 Marc Sureda i Jubany, “Les lieux de la Vierge. Notes de topoliturgie mariale en Catalogne”, in Vierges à l’Enfant médiévales de Catalogne: mises en perspective, Marie P. Subes ed., Perpignan 2014, pp. 39–69, sp. pp. 57–58. 112 Gudiol i Cunill, “Icones i retaulons” (n. 51). 113 In the 1414 inventory: “Item una ymaga de la faç de madona sancta Maria, pintada en una taula, la qual sta al altar maior de mosser sant Pere”. Edited in Rafael Ginebra, “Joies, ornaments i llibres a la catedral de Vic a principis del segle xv (ii): l’inventari de la tresoreria de 1414”, Miscel·lània Litúrgica Catalana, xii (2004) pp. 239–262, p. 260, and quoted in Crispí, “La difusió” (n. 3), pp. 83 and 94. Its presence in the following inventories in similar terms, in Rafael Ginebra, “Joies, ornaments i llibres a la catedral de Vic a principis del segle xv (iii): els inventaris de la tresoreria, 1416–1424”, Miscel·lània Litúrgica Catalana, xiv (2006), pp. 149–294, sp. p. 208; for that of 1443 (acv, 34/10, f. 15), see Gudiol i Cunill, “Icones i retaulons” (n. 51), p. 71, quoted in Crispí, “La difusió” (n. 3), pp. 83 and 94. 114 The back of the panel has been lowered (which proves that there was no painting originally) and the frame of the low edge, where a hole and circular traces can be seen, is unfortunately not original; only the triangular holes at the base of the back side would be the remains of nails fixing the panel to a hypothetical wooden foot perhaps similar to that of Tortosa. A function as a relic container – other than the image in itself – cannot be deduced from the material analysis of the object. 115 A little panel with the Face of Christ can be seen in this position in a miniature contained in the Bohemian Martyrology now in Museu d’Art de Girona; quoted in Crispí, “La Verònica”, (n. 3), p. 96. The miniature inspires two interpretations: first, an echo of the Roman Facies as popularized in Bohemia after Charles iv promoted the relic; second, an assertion of Christ’s real presence in the Eucharist, for the scene represents the last communion of Saint Petronilla. 116 The Vic single Marian Veronica was soon substituted by the double-sided one, given by Canon Jaume Colom. We know that by the end of the fifteenth century the old panel had been replaced over the sacristy door, and later hung on the wall inside the sacristy (Gudiol, “Les Veròniques ii” [n. 3], p. 76). It is tempting to imagine that the impressive Santa Faç painted by Joan Gascó in the beginning of the sixteenth century could have been commissioned as a pendant to the Virgin’s Veronica, although the measures of both objects are not identical. 117 Les registres de Boniface viii, Georges Digard, Maurice Faucon, Antoine Thomas eds, Paris 1907–1939, col. 558, n. 1529; see the contribution of Chiara Di Fruscia in this volume. 118 Duran, “Icons” (n. 51), p. 35, n. 17. 119 Español, “Relicario de la Verónica de la Virgen” (n. 5), p. 149.

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could certainly be seen120. Some of these objects could even have been papal gifts121. But the King’s choice was that of the Marian Veronica. The feast of the Immaculate Conception with which it was immediately associated was a very good target for royal promotion, not only because of the Aragonese traditions, but also because it was by that time a fashionable devotion, even theologically innovative, distinguishing the King of Aragon among other monarchs122. In this sense, the use of the deliberately archaic-like Marian Veronica is in some way analogous to Emperor Charles iv’s promotion of the Vatican Facies123. Moreover, perhaps the presence for twenty years of a Roman “true image” of Christ in Jaén, in the neighboring kingdom of Castile, was an additional factor in suggesting other choices as royal devotions. After this “high point of royal promotion”, which produced a number of single Marian Veronicas, these images appear systematically combined with Faces of Christ, either in sets of two footed Veronicas or in double-sided panels, somehow expanding the trend of devotional diptychs. It was, then, the reliquary condition of the royal Marian Veronica which reinforced that of Christ’s Face, and this resulted in a series of original liturgical objects to display both Faces according to the rank and character of the liturgical feast. This was imitated in some altarpieces like Montsó, where both were permanently integrated in the visual support. On the other hand, the most illustrious objects received additional relics and were involved in solemn processions according to the use of the royal Veronica, thus reflecting remote echoes of its underlying Roman liturgical uses. In fact, its model – the Madonna Avvocata – was that of an image in dialogue with Christ, both in postural and liturgical terms, and its possible condition as papal gift links it to the diptychs in

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which this relationship was evident124. Accordingly, in a wider context, the possible relationship of the presence of both Faces in altars and altarpieces, and the liturgical implications of diptychs or double-sided panels, with a remote Byzantine background125, seems suggestive enough to encourage further study. Concurrently, the presence of “real” relics in Jaén and Alicante, the possible relic-sketches (and even prints, some of them in relief) continually coming from Rome, or the later gilded leather sheets derived from the Jaén relic – and ultimately from the standard Roman outline – did not interfere significantly with the traditional pattern of the Facies in painting, but remained in the field of private devotion and domestic ornament. This panorama changed only in the late fifteenth century with the introduction of Flemish and Italian models and, a bit later and more widely, with the general revolution that gave way to what Belting has called “the Era of Art”, in which some of the ancient and old-fashioned Veronicas were able to survive only due to their reliquary condition and ritual attributions. 120 Gudiol, “Les Veròniques i” (n. 3), pp. 9–11; Sabater, La pintura mallorquina (n. 4), pp. 129–130. The traditions surrounding royal donations of diptychs (Valldemossa, Valldecrist), which are doubtful at best, may have been generated after other papal or royal evergetic gestures and, specially, by the will to grant some royal prestige to the objects, but depended on the real fact that the king possessed such objects. 121 Kessler, “Paradigms” (n. 8), p. 43. 122 Crispí,“La Verònica”(n. 3), pp. 87–88 and passim; for the theological innovation – a subtle shift from Roman Purification to Aragonese Immaculate Conception – see Kessler, “Paradigms” (n. 8), p. 44. 123 Charles iv also possessed a Virgin’s Face drawn on parchment – which generated archaic copies as well – and treated in a special way a soapstone Marian relief thought to have belonged to Charlemagne. Belting, Bild und Kult (n. 24), p. 374. But these Marian objects were apparently not as openly and publically promoted as King Martin’s Veronica. For formal archaism as a demonstration of the image-relic’s authenticity, see idem, pp. 483–496. 124 Belting, Bild und Kult (n. 24), pp. 432–437. 125 Belting, Das Bild (n. 39), pp. 142–167 (always in a Passion context); idem, Bild und Kult (n. 24), pp. 258–278.

summary

Od svatých obrazů k liturgickým nástrojům Modely, předměty a rituály kolem Veraikonů Krista a Panny Marie v Aragonském království (1300–1550)

V Aragonském království byl příběh Veraikonu známý a rozšířený v různých lidových verzích již kolem roku 1300. Přesto je však možné tvrdit, že ikonografie tzv. římského Veraikonu se zde, ve srovnání s jinými částmi Evropy, netěšila v pozdním středověku zvláštní oblibě. Příklady vyobrazení Kristovy tváře, které se nacházejí na zdech či oltářích ze začátku čtrnáctého století, jsou nezřídka součástí vizuálního programu jako narážka na visio beatifica. V jiných případech je Kristova tvář na látce zobrazovaná v kontextu arma Christi, doplňuje Kalvárii nebo je ve výjimečnějších případech součástí legendy o Mandylionu. Žádná z těchto verzí však nenabízí přímý vztah s římskou relikvií. Od roku 1400 podporoval král Martin i. Aragonský projevy zbožnosti k Veraikonu Panny Marie, který sestával ze starodávného relikviáře obsahujícího kresbu obličeje Matky Boží na pergamenu. Tato kresba vycházela z římských, potažmo byzantských modelů. Podobně jako římský Veraikon byl i tento mariánský portrét pokládán za relikvii související s legendou sv. Lukáše. Volbu krále

Martina je možné spojit s tehdejšími teologickými směry a obzvláště se sporným tématem neposkvrněného početí. Podle královského obrazu začala okamžitě vznikat celá řada kopií, které se rychle rozšířily do většiny katedrál a důležitých kostelů na území Aragonského království. Tyto předměty byly samy o sobě považovány za relikvie a často v sobě navíc obsahovaly i relikvie další. Nadto byly kopie doprovázeny obrazem Kristovy tváře, a vznikaly tak buď diptychy, dvojice desek, nebo oboustranné ikony. Na konci patnáctého století a ve století šestnáctém se tyto předměty staly běžnou součástí většiny chrámů na území Aragonského království. Bývaly nošeny v procesích nebo se používaly k výzdobě oltáře v závislosti na liturgických svátcích. Úcta k molt devota Verónica de madona Santa Maria se tedy spojila s úctou ke Kristově tváři a jistým způsobem ji podporovala. Tato Kristova tvář, která se odlišovala od římské relikvie, tak dala vzniknout liturgickému vybavení charakteristickému pro Aragonské království.

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Abstract – Datum Avenioni. The Avignon Papacy and the Custody of the Veronica – Letters and papal bulls written during the Avignon Papacy point out that raised displays of the Host in private to enable its worship (ostensions) were permitted more commonly during that period than in the past, making a common practice of what had been an exception. The ostensions presented in this article were granted by Avignon Pontiffs to public authorities and noble personages traveling to Rome for political purposes or as pilgrims during Jubilees. Canons of Saint Peter’s Basilica exhibited the relic of the Holy Face at the direction of Avignon Pontiffs, thus augmenting their role in managing the relic of Veronica. Keywords Avignon Papacy, canons, Chapter of Saint Peter’s Basilica, Clement vi, Gregory xi, John xxii, private ostensions, Urban v, Veronica

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Chiara Di Fruscia Independent scholar [email protected]

Datum Avenioni The Avignon Papacy and the Custody of the Veronica Chiara Di Fruscia

The circumstances leading to the transfer of both the Pontiff’s and the Curia’s residence to Avignon are known and widely discussed in literature1. Over a period of around seventy years, seven successive Popes resided in the French town of Avignon and the sequence of events in which they played a leading role had a deep impact not only on the history, structure and organization of the Church, but also on its relationships with the laity and political institutions. During the Avignon period it is evident

that Rome experienced a breach in the continuum of its life and history, and also that the activity 1

Although the most complete study on this subject is still the text by Eugenio Dupré Theseider, I papi di Avignone e la questione romana, Florence 1939, there is a multitude of research on the political sequence of events both the Papacy and Italy underwent in that period, by way of example cf. Aspetti culturali della società italiana nel periodo del papato avignonese, Atti del xix Convegno del Centro di Studi sulla spiritualità medievale (Todi, 15–18 ottobre 1978), Todi 1981; Augusto Vasina, “Il papato avignonese e il governo dello stato della Chiesa”, in Le fonctionnement administratif de la papauté d’Avignon, Actes de la table ronde organisée par l’École Française de Rome avec le concours du cnrs, du Conseil général de Vaucluse et de l’Université d’Avignon (Avignon, 23–24 janvier 1988), Rome 1990, pp. 135–150.

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1 / Salvator mundi surrounded by scenes of St Veronica’s life, Book of Hours of Maria de Medici, Flanders, beginning of the 16th century / Oxford, Bodleian Library, ms Douce 112, fol. 1v

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of the Papacy was affected. Contemporary observers, among them Petrarch, considered this interruption to be a negative conjuncture. In his letter to Urban v 2, supporting the concept of the Pope and Curia’s return to Rome, Petrarch alluded to the Song of Songs and evoked the metaphor of the Church as Christ’s bride on earth, the same analogy that the Pontiffs had traditionally adopted to definitively justify their power 3. It is possibly this inclination to recall the mystic marriage between the Pope and his Church – to legitimatize his authority and assert his presence – that gave the Avignon Pontiffs the idea of strengthening the Cult of the Holy Face of Jesus. The Popes themselves enhanced the significance of the symbolism related to the Holy Face; starting from Innocent iii up until the fifteenth century, they associated their image with the term vicarius Christi4, with all the ideological and political implications that this conception entails. Seen from this perspective, the Veronica becomes not just the image of the Son of God, but also of all papal, religious and theocratic power at once. The significance of such a statement is clear: the authority of the Pope is consecrated directly by Christ. It is not only a linguistic evolution, but actually paves the way for a new symbolic setting, in which the figure of the Pontiff acquires a status rich in political, as well as religious, connotations. Additionally, since the Pope is presented as the image of Christ, so the Veronica may be used to support the symbolic parallel between the Roman Bishop’s position and that of the Son of God5. It is in this perspective that the Veronica came to be the symbol of the Pontiff. In fact, the new, authoritative image of papal power passed through several expressions and phases, essentially due to the individual cultural contributions of the different figures who alternately endorsed, innovated and enhanced that image with new, unusual features. The promotion of the cult of the Veronica as a papal image is an integral part of this reasoning: the practice of ostension, the liturgy and the occasions on which the relic was exhibited – or rather, on which it was decided it should be exhibited – should be considered as the expression of a political-religious idea ascribable

to the historical contingencies of that period. The relic simultaneously became the symbol of pontifical, religious and theocratic power. This is the purpose that the relic acquired in the struggles against the heretics led by Innocent iii and Honorius iii, and it was with this aim that Boniface viii exhibited it during his Jubilee celebrations, leading to the affirmation, again figurative, of the analogy between the Pontiff and the Holy Face under Nicholas iii, who was depicted by Charles of Anjou as “The Veronica”6. The malicious epithet, as in this case the reference to “The Veronica” is ironic and has a strongly negative connotation, refers to Nicholas iii’s conviction that his image was the figure of Christ and Christ was the Church. The perfect correlation between the figure of the Pontiff and the veil bearing the Holy Face has been widely demonstrated by the use that the Avignon Popes made of the relic. The absence of the Vicar of Christ from Rome was compensated for by the presence of the image that most symbolized him. During these years, the number of private ostensions seems to have increased considerably indeed, even if, as is very likely, such a perception is due to the increased amount of preserved documentary evidence. It is not definitively known whether the extent of proof derives from an actual increase in the number of cases, or whether the written communications were more frequent and better conserved, as a result of the distance between the papal residence and Rome. Both hypotheses are compelling and the real correlation between the occurrences and their certifications would be difficult to corroborate. Our evidence is mainly based on the letters and papal bulls to which the Popes resorted in order to authorize, from Avignon or other sites, viewing the Veronica. These concessions were bestowed especially on private citizens, public authorities and aristocrats. Hence private ostensions were allowed more frequently than in the past, as what had previously been an exception became more commonplace. However, this did not constitute grounds for neglecting the traditional public processions. By contrast with those of the fifteenth century 7, the chronicle sources

are unfortunately somewhat silent about life in fourteenth-century Rome, and consequently we lack a consistent and significant number of elements which would enable us to understand the events of this period. More reports would help complete the information extracted from the documents and make it possible to contextualize them in light of the accounts of that time. 2 “Et siquid forte notitie defuerit scito quoniam, te absente, abest requies, pax exulat, bella adsunt et civilia et externa, iacet domus, labant menia, templa ruunt, sacra pereunt, calcantur leges, iustitia vim patitur, luget atque ululat plebs infelix tuumque nomen altis vocibus invocat [...]”, Petrarca Rerum senilium, lib. vii, ep. 1. Cf. Pétrarque, Lettres de la vieillesse, tome ii, Livres iv–vi, Rerum Senilium, Libri iv–vii, Ugo Dotti, Pierre Laurens, Elvira Nota eds, F. Castelli et al. trans., Paris 2003, p. 319, l. 338–342. 3 Michele Maccarrone suggested an important conjunction between the Innocentian doctrine on marriage and the fully perceived necessity of papal primacy; he assumed that the latter derived directly from the former, indeed; cf. Michele Maccarrone, “Sacramentalità e indissolubilità del matrimonio nella dottrina di Innocenzo iii”, in Nuovi studi su Innocenzo iii, Roberto Lambertini ed., Rome 1995, pp. 47–110. 4 This practice had its most comprehensive expression during the thirteenth century. With respect to this subject, the fundamental works are still those by Michele Maccarrone, followed by several, equally important, studies: cf. Michele Maccarrone, Vicarius Christi. Storia del titolo papale, Rome 1952; Idem, “Sedes Apostolica – Vicarius Petri, la perpetuità del primato di Pietro nella sede e nel vescovo di Roma (secoli iii–viii)”, in Romana Ecclesia Cathedra Petri, Raffaello Volpini, Alessandro Galluzzi eds, Rome 1991, pp. 1–101; Paravicini Bagliani, Le chiavi e la Tiara. Immagini e simboli del papato medievale, Rome 2005, in particular chapter ii: “Vicario di Cristo”, pp. 43–55. 5 Cf. Chiara Di Fruscia, La Veronica romana. Immaginario e realtà dalla Roma di Innocenzo iii al sacco del 1527, PhD thesis (Università del Salento, coordinator: Prof. H. Houben, tutor: Prof. M. Miglio), Lecce 2010, ch. iii, pp. 73–90. 6 The episode that took place some years before the Avignon Papacy, during the fierce conflict between Charles of Anjou and Nicholas iii, shows how widespread the identification of the Pope with The Veronica was in the culture of that period. The papal election of Giovanni Gaetano Orsini was profoundly to the detriment of Charles of Anjou. In the aftermath of the election of Nicholas iii, the Angevin consequently openly manifested his aversion to William de Bray, who was one of the cardinal’s electors of Giovanni Gaetano. Charles wrote a rather harsh, libelous sort of pamphlet, in which he asked Cardinal de Bray how he could have voted for Giovanni Gaetano Orsini, a man indignum, who many used to call “The Veronica”, cf. Friedrich Baethgen, “Ein Pamphlet Karls i. von Anjou zur Wahl Papst Nikolaus iii”, Sitzungsberichte, vii (1960), pp. 3–25; Serena Romano, La “O” di Giotto, Milan 2008, p. 51 and p. 58, n. 86; Serena Romano, “Cristo, l’antico e Niccolò iii”, Römisches Jahrbuch der Bibliotheca Hertziana, xxxiv (2001–2002), pp. 42–67. This document, which is as peculiar as it is obscure, shows how the papal actions were perceived. By exalting the relic of the Holy Face, the Pope could in fact benefit from a condition of personal propaganda and glorification of his figure. The Pope’s desire to be identified with Christ was so evident that he deserved the appellation “The Veronica”. 7 Chiara Di Fruscia, Massimo Miglio, “Percezione e trasformazione di San Pietro nel Quattrocento”, in La basilica di San Pietro. Fortuna e immagine, Giovanni Morello ed., Rome 2012, pp. 123–135; Chiara Di Fruscia, “Roma come Gerusalemme. Reliquie e memorie di Cristo nell’Urbe”, Come a Gerusalemme. Evocazioni, riproduzioni, imitazioni dei luoghi santi tra Medioevo ed Età Moderna, Anna Benvenuti, Pierantonio Piatti eds, Florence 2013, pp. 611–646.

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The first document in our possession bears the signature of John xxii. In his 1319 papal bull, the Pope addresses the Bishop of Viterbo, Angelo Tignosi, on the occasion of the beginning of the process of canonization of Saint Thomas Aquinas. In 1319, John xxii writes to Angelo Tignosi: “ut reparet basilicam sancti Petri [...] in qua Vultus Redemptoris nostri imaginem, corpus aetherei ianitoris et innumerabilium martyrum aliorumque sanctorum reliquias divina clementia collocavit8”.

The pope does not intend to allow an ostension, but is nonetheless interested in reaffirming the presence of the Veronica and other holy relics in the Vatican Basilica. Although in Avignon, John xxii does not neglect to recall the importance of Saint Peter’s Basilica, the sacred shrine that shelters the most important relics of Christianity. It is significant that the Pope does not make any explicit reference to Saint Peter’s body, relegating it to aliorumque sanctorum reliquias, whereas he highlights the presence of the Veronica, thereby implicitly conferring more dignity on this relic than the other vestiges in Rome9. On the other hand, what was fundamental to Roman life and to the renaissance of the city was the Jubilee year of 1350, strongly desired by the Roman people. Delegations of ambassadors, including the committee of the “Thirteen Good Men”, pleaded to Clement vi to celebrate the event only fifty years after Boniface viii’s Jubilee10. Since he could not fulfil Roman expectations on the question of his transfer to Rome, the Pope gladly accepted the request for the Jubilee celebrations. At last Rome would resume its role at the center of the faith and the crowd of pilgrims would be a new vital lifeblood flowing through the now Collectionis bullarum sacrosanctae basilicae Vaticanae, i, A. Marinetti, F. L. Dionisi, G. Cenni eds, Rome 1747, p. 256; Giacomo Grimaldi, Descrizione della Basilica antica di San Pietro in Vaticano. Codice Barberiniano Latino 2733, Reto Niggi ed., Vatican City 1972, p. 109. 9 The kernel of this statement is not surprising, considering that Nicholas iv (1288–1292) had already declared, in two different documents, that he estimated “The Veronica” to be the most sacred relic in the Vatican, more sacred even than Saint Peter’s body. The documents are traceable back to 1289 and 1290, cf. Sible De Blaauw, Cultus et decor. Liturgia e architettura nella Roma tardoantica e Medievale, ii, Vatican City 1994, pp. 748–751. 10 Le suppliche di Clemente vi, Tullia Gasparrini Leporace ed., Rome 1948. 8

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2 / Matteo Giovannetti, The Holy Face of Christ, fresco, Avignon, Palace of the Popes, Saint-Martial Chapel, keystone, 1344–1346

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deserted streets and lonely Basilicas11. And so it came to pass. Although the Pope was not present, the pilgrims assembled in the streets of Rome once again and the exhibition of the Veronica was reinstated as a crucial part of the Roman pilgrimage, in line with the scheme previously created by Boniface viii. Nevertheless, the number of private ostensions that Clement vi allowed during the whole Jubilee Year remains unusual. In the litterae sent from Avignon to the Vatican there are instructions for the Veronica to be shown to people of different ranks and various origins. From July to the end of December, no less than twelve private ostensions took place, conceded by Clement vi, a marked increase compared to his predecessors. The beneficiaries were both secular individuals – counts (Ugoni, domino Baucii, comiti Avellini12), viscounts (nobili viro Reginaldo de Pontibus, vicecomiti Carlatesii13) and some milites (Girardo and Guilelmo de Borbonio14, but also Bertrando de Turre and Beraldo domino Marcorio15) – and members of ecclesiastical orders, clerics (archidiacono Agathensi, clerico camerae16) and Archbishops (Ioanni, archiepiscopo Rotomagensi17). It is noteworthy that many of the pilgrims who had the privilege of experiencing a private ostension were women: nobili mulieri comitissae Insulensi, nobili mulieri Philippae de Lentrico, dominae de Limolio, nobili mulieri Ioannae, dominae de Sorgeriis18. During the 1350 Jubilee both men and women travelled to Rome and, as we can read in his letters, their pilgrimage was the only reason that Clement vi adduces to explain his concession of private ostensions: “Romam devotionis gratia proficiscenti”, “peregrinanti ad Urbem”19. We still cannot determine the actual criteria and motivations that permitted only certain individuals to view the relic at close quarters. However, in the letters of Clement vi, we find a concession in favor of a certain “Stephano, episcopo Elnensi, consanguineo suo”20 and, on this occasion, the reason seems quite obvious. The people to whom Clement vi addressed his letters, those who would undertake to fulfil the papal will, were mainly the Canons of Saint Peter’s Basilica who had taken care of the relic, as well as its consecrated altar, over a long period

of time and would continue to do so over the following centuries. We find an example of this in a significant document, filed in the Inventarium mobilium bonorum et reliquiarum sacristie, et librorum bibliothece in the years 1454, 1455, 1489. It is a privilegium oblationum Sudarii quomodo sint canonicorum21: the Canons were the ones who collected the offerings made to the altar of the Holy Face22. The altar was, thus, one of the ministeria, that is to say it was one of the places administered by the Canons themselves 23, which is also why they were interested in the development of the cult of the relic 24. Thanks to this situation, the Canons could benefit from the offerings and, at the same time, manage the profits derived from the pilgrims’ generosity. During the 1350 Jubilee, for instance, Sacratissimum Domini Vultum was offered a crystal and silver frame, which not only embellished the liturgical items on the altar, but was also used, from that moment on, to house the relic during ostensions25. Hence, viewing the Veronica remained a key moment of the journey to Rome, as witnessed by the pilgrims’ badges accompanying the wayfarers on their return home, which, indeed, portrayed the Veronica. The production of these signa turned out to be such a rich source of income, that as early as the thirteenth century, it became necessary to regulate the market. Within the collection containing the basilica principis apostolorum de Urbe, there is also a folder containing twelve parchments where we find the inscription: “istud est inventarium continens in se omnia et singula bona et mobilia sacrosancte basilice principis apostolorum de Urbe” 26. In the list, we read: “Item, privilegium senatoris Urbis concessum basilice predicte de peregrinis, quod nullus possit vendere seu emere in platea Sancti Petri sine licentia canonicorum”. It is a true copy dating back to May 1362, which the Canons commissioned with the aim of reaffirming their rights, in light of the privileges granted by the Roman Senate in 1224 and in 124427. This prohibition affected the selling of the pilgrim badges of the Veronica that travelers used to bring back home as proof of their journey. Fifteenth-century chronicles suggest that the Canons, then, played an essential role in the custody of the relic on the one hand and in the management of the income

derived from it on the other 28. Their prestige increased since they could approach the pannum linteum and they were the only ones to share this privilege with the Pope. However, these hypotheses can only be corroborated through a more in-depth study of the documentary resources contained in the Archivio del Capitolo. The Chapter of Saint Peter’s Basilica became, therefore, more and more important in the safeguarding, conservation and exhibition of the Holy Face. The precise moment when these prerogatives were granted has still not been determined. Nevertheless, it is known that during the Avignon Papacy, the Canons had already been assigned this responsibility by the Pope, not least due to his absence from Rome, and it is conceivable that this was the exact moment when the Chapter fully and completely assumed the mission of managing the custody of the relic. However, what emerges clearly is that not only was the relic of the Veronica extremely important during the Jubilee Years, but also that its exhibition was one of the crucial moments of a pilgrimage. Travelers could and would not leave Rome without experiencing the privilege of enjoying the beatific vision of the Holy Face, as was the case for Niccolò d’Este in 136629. The Pope at that time was Urban v. This Pope tried to restore his authority and return the Papacy to Rome. As Italy was undergoing difficulties at the time, simultaneously being menaced by Visconti’s attacks and the alliances against Milan, Albornoz undertook to re-establish peace and reinforce papal authority, including by contacting members of the House of Este. Albornoz approached Niccolò, who had been the sole ruler of the government of Ferrara since 1361. For his campaign against Visconti, the Cardinal gained the support of Ferrara after assigning the lands of Nonantola, Bazzano and Ponzano to its lord30. The ostension to Niccolò d’Este took place during the period between the first campaign in Italy and the arrival of Urban v in Rome. The document testifying to this event is a papal bull that bears both the chronological date 19 February 136631 and the topical stamp Avenioni. In fact, the Pope was still in the French town and, on 19 May of the same year, Niccolò d’Este left

to meet Urban v in person and persuade him of the importance of returning to Rome. Therefore, before his departure, the Pope granted Niccolò the privilege of a private ostension of the Veronica. Once again, the papal bull was addressed to “Dilectis filiis, capitulo basilicae principis apostolorum de Urbe”, to whom the Pope “mandat ostendi Veronicam Nicolao, marchioni Estensi in civitate Ferrariensi pro 11 Cf. Dupré Theseider, I papi di Avignone (n. 1), p. 88. 12 Clement vi, lettres closes, patentes et curiales se rapportant a la France, Eugène Déprez, Jean Glenisson, Guillaume Mollat eds, Paris 1959, iii/5, p. 95, n. 4569, also in Grimaldi, Descrizione (n. 8) p. 109. 13 Clement vi, lettres (n. 12), p. 143, n. 4795, also in Grimaldi, Descrizione (n. 8), p. 110. 14 Clement vi, lettres (n. 12), p. 144, n. 4799, also in Grimaldi, Descrizione (n. 8), p. 109. 15 Clement vi, lettres (n. 12), p. 139, n. 4778, also in Grimaldi, Descrizione (n. 8), p. 110. 16 Clement vi, lettres (n. 12), p. 121, n. 4683, also in Grimaldi, Descrizione (n. 8), p. 109. It is Petrus Berail (1342–1354), in Conradus Eubel, Hierarchia Catholica Medii Aevi, i, Monasterii 1913, p. 76. 17 Clement vi, lettres (n. 12), p. 151, n. 4835, also in Grimaldi, Descrizione (n. 8), p. 110. It is Joannes de Marigy (1347–1351), in Eubel, Hierarchia (n. 16), p. 132. 18 Clement vi, lettres (n. 12), p. 126, n. 4709; p. 140, n. 4785; p. 148, n. 4816, also in Grimaldi, Descrizione (n. 8), pp. 109–110. 19 Clement vi, lettres (n. 12), p. 126, n. 4709; p. 129, n. 4718, also in Grimaldi, Descrizione (n. 8), p. 109. 20 Clement vi, lettres (n. 12), p. 129, n. 4718, also in Grimaldi, Descrizione (n. 8), p. 109; the italic is mine. Stephanus Maletii (D’Omale), abbot of the monastery of Casaedei (1350–1356), in Eubel, Hierarchia (n. 16), p. 239. 21 Luigi Schiaparelli, “Le carte antiche dell’archivio Capitolare di S. Pietro in Vaticano”, in Archivio della Società Romana di Storia Patria, xxiv (1901), pp. 393–496, sp. pp. 418–426. 22 Within the documents that Giacomo Grimaldi mentions with regard to “The Veronica”, we find further confirmation of the privilege that the Canons had been given: “Ex instrumento publico [...] inter alia haec habentur: ‘in primis oblationes quae fiunt ante cappellam seu in cappella Sudarii tempore ostensionis eiusdem pertineant ad canonicos dumtaxat, quia ipsi in ostensione eiusdem exhibent ministerium personale’ [...]”, cf. Grimaldi, Descrizione (n. 8), p. 111. 23 De Blaauw, Cultus et decor (n. 9), pp. 677–751. 24 Within the texts of the obituaries, it is possible to find two bequests, traceable back to the fifteenth century, to the altar of “The Veronica”. The first gift was from Nuzio Gibelli, who bestowed some of his lands as a legacy in order to obtain the celebration of Mass in his honour, cf. Necrologi e libri affini della provincia romana i, Pietro Egidi ed., Rome 1908, pp. 248–249; the second donation was from a certain Niccolò Taddeo di Napoli, who offered a new missal: Ibidem, pp. 276–277. 25 This information is reported in the Liber anniversariorum of the Vatican Basilica and the date of the donation is May 19. Cf. Ibidem, pp. 210–211, also in Grimaldi, Descrizione (n. 8), p. 110. 26 Schiaparelli, “Le carte antiche” (n. 21). 27 The document is published in Codice diplomatico del Senato romano dal 1144 al 1347, Franco Bartoloni ed., Rome 1948, pp. 177–180, doc. 108. For further information, cf. Isa Lori Sanfilippo, La Roma dei romani. Arti, mestieri e professioni nella Roma del Trecento, Rome 2001, p. 179 note 84. 28 Cf. Di Fruscia/Miglio, “Percezione e trasformazione” (n. 7). 29 Cf. A. Menniti Ippolito, “Niccolò d’Este”, in Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani, xliii, Rome 1993, pp. 393–396. 30 Cf. Eugenio Dupré Theseider, Il cardinale Egidio de Albornoz fondatore dello Stato della Chiesa, Fano 1959. 31 Cf. Collectionis bullarum sacrosanctae basilicae Vaticanae, ii, A. Marinetti, F. L. Dionisi, G. Cenni eds, Rome 1750, p. 4; also in Grimaldi, Descrizione (n. 8), p. 110.

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Romana ecclesia vicario32”. So far, nothing seems out of the ordinary, but the Pope clarifies the reason for the ostension later on in the text: Niccolò “limina apostolorum visitaturo, stante quod idem marchio ad diem solitae ostensionis praefatae Veronicae in Urbe immorari non posset33”. Niccolò was therefore in Rome in 1366, a few months before leaving for Avignon and, since he could not stay in the Eternal City for the usual procession of the Veronica, the Pope made an exception and allowed him to view the relic privately, which indicates the relationship between the two figures. Only one year later, in 1367, the Pope set out for Rome, possibly also thanks to the intercession and the persuasive action of Niccolò d’Este. Now a new league was formed against Visconti: the ecclesiastical army together with the armed forces of the House of Este, the Carraresi and Queen Joanna of Naples. However, 1367 was also the year of the death of Cardinal Albornoz. There was nothing left for Urban v to do but proceed to Rome, though without the support of the man who had paved the way for his return. Back in Rome, 1368 was the year when the Pope tried to restore not only the Roman monuments and Basilicas, but also papal authority and the Curia’s power. In the spring of the same year, Emperor Charles iv arrived in Rome to be crowned directly by the Pope. In fact, the accession of the Emperor coincided with a further disappointment for Urban v: the newly crowned Charles iv decided to leave Italy, abandoning the Pope to his destiny, whereas the Pontiff had been relying on the Emperor’s military support to reinforce his position. At the end of the summer, Urban v reacted by promulgating a document in favor of Charles’s daughter, Catherine “marchionissae Brandeburgensi, Caroli, Romanorum imperatoris semper augusti natae34”. Once again, as had previously been the case with Boniface viii – in 1297 with Charles of Anjou and James ii of Aragon35 – and with Clement vi, the ostensions of the relic acquired for Urban v a political-institutional significance, since they were used to connote the importance of events and figures deeply involved in the public issues of the Papacy. This is confirmed by reading the document – the last one relating to private

ostensions – in which Urban v granted permission for the exhibition of the relic of the Veronica outside the traditional public occasions. It was July 18, 1370. The document comes from Montefiascone, where the Pontiff sought refuge after the defection of Charles iv. From here, the Pope wrote eidem capitulo in order to exhibit the Veronica “[...] congruo tempore venerabili fratri Ioanni episcopo Vaciensi, ac dilectis filiis nobilibus viris Nicolao de Zeth, militi regalis curiae Hungariae iudici, et magistro Cato, praeposito ecclesiae Demesiensi Vesprimiensis diocesis decretorum doctori, ambasciatoribus Ludovici regis Hungariae illustris ad praesentiam dicti pontificis destinatis, et devotionis causa ad Urbem se conferre volentibus36”.

Louis i of Hungary had been married to Charles iv’s daughter, Margaret. In November 1370, after prolonged and extensive troubles with Venice and Queen Joanna of Naples, he was on the verge of receiving the Kingdom of Poland, which was later inherited by his daughter Mary and Sigismund of Luxemburg. The latter was himself a spectator – on 21 May 1433 – at an important private ostension in the presence of Eugene iv37. In August 1370, although he was by then about to leave, Urban v wrote to his Vicar in Rome, Venerabili viro Iacobo, episcopo Aretino38 and tried to give instructions to constantly renew the cult of the Veronica with public ostensions during the entire liturgical year. By reading these documents, we can deduce that the pilgrimages of figures such as kings, emperors, their representatives and political exponents of various ranks, were actually almost always related to political events. This is true to such an extent that it is difficult, or indeed impossible, to discern beyond doubt which were genuine pilgrimages39. Furthermore, the papers written by Urban v prove the great importance given by the Pope to the Holy Face, not solely because he was deeply devoted to many Roman relics, but above all on account of the symbolic relevance of “The Veronica” in the acceptance of papal authority. We conclude the review of these documents with two papal bulls bearing the signature of Gregory xi who, before returning to Rome, conceded two private ostensions to Geraldo, abbati monasterii Maioris, monasterii prope Turonis,

apostolicae sedis nuncio40 and nobili viro Arnaldo Rigaldo, militi Sancti Papuli diocesis. The latter paper dates from 1373 and specifies that the ostension was to take place “clausis ianuis basilicae”41, which implies that this privilege was reserved exclusively for the beneficiaries of the document. It seems possible therefore to detect a change in the papal ideology relating to the relic, which dates from the beginning of the Avignon Papacy. Public events gradually decreased, due to the absence of the Pope, making way for a celebration of the cult which became more and more elitist and circumscribed to the physical and liturgical space of Saint Peter’s. When the Papacy moved to Avignon, it actually appears that the great public events, meant as manifestations of propaganda and exaltation of the role of the Pontiff, declined, whereas they were one of the distinguishing features of the thirteenth century, as well as the early fourteenth century, and came into being again during the fifteenth century. On the other hand, this period saw the development and consolidation of the phenomenon – already a feature in the twelfth century and possibly the most interesting peculiarity of the theme of the relic – of the 32 I Collectionis bullarum (n. 31), p. 4; also in Grimaldi, Descrizione (n. 8), p. 110. Niccolò had become vicar apostolic immediately after the death of his brother Aldobrandino in 1361, after having urged Pope Innocent vi to publish the papal bulls. During the same year, he had also obtained the investiture from the Emperor Charles v, cf. Antonio Menniti Ippolito, “Niccolò d’Este” (n. 29), p. 393. 33 Collectionis bullarum (n. 31), p. 4; also in Grimaldi, Descrizione (n. 8), p. 110. 34 Cf. Collectionis bullarum (n. 31), p. 6; also in Grimaldi, Descrizione (n. 8), p. 110. It is renowned that Charles iv was particularly devoted to “The Veronica” and, since he could not remove the original, he asked to be allowed to make some copies of the relic. Cf. Gerhard Wolf, “Pinta della nostra effigie. La Veronica come richiamo dei romei”, in Romei e Giubilei: il pellegrinaggio medievale a San Pietro (350–1350), Mario D’Onofrio ed., Milan 1999, pp. 211–218, sp. p. 217. Catherine was the second surviving daughter of Emperor Charles iv and his first wife Blanche of Valois; she married the scion of the House of Habsburg, the Duke of Austria Rudolf iv, and then secondly married Otto v the Bavarian, Margrave of Brandenburg. Cf. Jörg K. Hoensch, Die Luxemburger: Eine spätmittelalterliche Dynastie gesamteuropäischer Bedetung 1308–1347, Stuttgart/Berlin/ Cologne 2000. 35 Di Fruscia, La Veronica romana (n. 5), pp. 86–90. 36 Collectionis bullarum (n. 31), p. 16; also in Grimaldi, Descrizione (n. 8), p. 110. 37 Di Fruscia/Miglio, “Percezione e trasformazione” (n. 7). 38 Collectionis bullarum (n. 31), p. 16; also in Grimaldi, Descrizione (n. 8), p. 110. 39 Giulia Barone, “Il pellegrinaggio degli imperatori a Roma”,in Romei e Giubilei (n. 34), pp. 89– 95, sp. p. 89. 40 Archivio Vaticano, Reg. Vat. 263, f. cc. r., also in Grimaldi, Descrizione (n. 8), p. 111. The document is dated 1370. 41 Archivio Vaticano, Reg. Vat. 270, f. ccxxi, also in Grimaldi, Descrizione (n. 8), p. 110.

3 / Roman school, Christ enthroned, fresco, Rome, Sancta Sanctorum Chapel, east wall above the altar, 1277–1280

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concession of private ostensions, many of which still require an in-depth study of their beneficiaries and context. What is certain is that during the entire fourteenth century, the Veronica was a prerogative held by a minority: a homage paid to visiting legates and political figures deserving the beatific vision of the Holy Face, those who had stood out for their political support of the Papacy, by various means and on many occasions. In this perspective, the permission to view the relic is a sort of recognition, which stands for the crucial worth of the relic itself, for both the Papacy and the whole of Christianity. It becomes an exclusive treasure of the Pope, who, thanks to the leading role assumed by the Chapter and the Canons, regulates its cult and turns it into an ideological instrument of extraordinary political value.

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summary Datum Avenioni Avignonský pontifikát a opatrovnictví Veraikonu

Počínaje papežem Inocencem iii. a dále během patnáctého století obohacovali papežové symbolický význam Kristovy Svaté Tváře tím, že přijímali titul vicarius Christi. Takové uvažování s sebou neslo celou řadu ideových i politických důsledků, a proto nemůžeme považovat Veraikon pouze za obraz samotného Krista, ale za výraz zároveň papežské, náboženské a teokratické moci. Způsob, kterým avignonští papežové používali roušku se Svatou Tváří, ukazuje na úzké spojení mezi postavou papeže a Veroničinou rouškou. Přítomnost obrazu, který nejlépe reprezentuje papeže, vynahrazuje absenci Kristova vikáře v Římě. Důkazy, o které se autorka článku opírá, sestávají převážně z dopisů a papežských bul, které prostřednictvím vatikánské kapituly povolily několik vystavení Veraikonu v Římě. Během avignonského pontifikátu měli kult Veraikonu na starosti kanovníci, kteří již více než sto let pečovali o Veroničin oltář a o vše spojené s jeho uctíváním. Během čtrnáctého století však jejich úloha získala na důležitosti, a to díky přímému dialogu s papežem, který dokumenty, jež se týkaly vystavování relikvie, adresoval výhradně jim. Rozšířilo se také soukromé vystavování – praxe pocházející z dvanáctého století a možná nejzajímavější fenomén spojený s Veraikonem. Ve čtrnáctém století totiž papežové povolovali soukromé vystavování lidem, kteří jistým význačným způsobem podporovali papeže. Pohled na roušku se Svatou Tváří Krista tedy představoval určitý druh odměny a tento fenomén ukazuje, jak neobyčejně vysoko si jí papežové i celé křesťanstvo cenili.

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IV.

The Spread of the Veronica Cult

Abstract – ‘Où il y a une Veronique atachiée dedens’: Images of the Veronica in Religious Manuscripts, with Special Attention for the Dukes of Burgundy and their Family – Manuscripts to be used for lay devotion sometimes contain small images of the Vera Icon, or the Veronica, the name often given to the images of the cloth bearing the imprint of Christ’s face. Veronica painters principally worked from Rome where the relic was kept and shown; but painted images of the Vera Icon were also produced elsewhere to meet the demands of devotees who did not have the means or desire to undertake a long journey to the Eternal City. Here, I will identify some Roman souvenirs based on their formal and stylistic similarities and their dispersion. This identification allows for an analysis of the materials that these Veronica painters used, namely parchment and leather, as well as their iconography. The Roman souvenirs in manuscripts, sometimes alongside Veronicas produced elsewhere, also raise questions on the relevance of a Roman provenance for those who inserted them into prayer books. Philip the Good added several images of the Veronica to a book of hours and prayer book called the Grandes Heures which he is known to have used on a regular basis. Not only did he use the Roman Veronicas and locally produced Veronicas interchangeably and alongside each other, he also ordered different copies of the Roman Veronica and he seems to have downturned the link with Rome with every copy. For the Duke, the Veronica modelled after a souvenir from Rome that had been in his family for decades did not only provide a devotional link with Rome, across geographic boundaries, but was first and foremost an image that tied him firmly to the religious activities of forefathers in power, across the dynasty. Keywords Rome, pilgrimage, relics, ostension, badges, leather, manuscripts

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Hanneke van Asperen Radboud University [email protected]

‘Où il y a une Veronique atachiée dedens’ Images of the Veronica in Religious Manuscripts, with Special Attention for the Dukes of Burgundy and their Family Hanneke van Asperen

Manuscripts to be used for lay devotion sometimes contain small images of the Vera Icon, or the Veronica, the name often given to the images of the cloth bearing the imprint of Christ’s face. The images were added after the manuscript’s production, probably by the owner of the book. Sometimes, the images were glued to the parchment, at other times they were sewn onto the page at various locations throughout the codex where, occasionally, they are still found in situ, although often they have been removed. Veronica painters principally worked from Rome where the relic was kept and shown, but painted images of the Vera Icon were also produced elsewhere to meet the demands of devotees who did not have the

means or desire to undertake a long journey to the Eternal City. This observation invites a discussion on the provenance of these images. Here, I will identify some Roman souvenirs based on their formal and stylistic similarities and their dispersion which allows for an analysis of the materials that these Veronica painters used. The presence of these Roman souvenirs in manuscripts, sometimes alongside Veronicas produced elsewhere, also raises questions on the relevance of a Roman provenance for those who inserted them into prayer books. To address this issue, I will focus on the dukes of Burgundy who seem to have had a preference for these images and regularly added them to their manuscripts.

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Metal, Parchment and Leather

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1 /  Flyleaf with a picture of the Veronica and impressions of several badges in a book of hours and prayer book in Latin and French, possibly Bordeaux, c. 1485 / Carpentras, Bibliothèque Inguimbertine, ms 59

A letter of 1460 demonstrates the complexity associated with the provenance of images of the Veronica. A woman from Florence called Allesandra Macinghi writes to her son in Bruges in 1460 that she has received the pictures (“carte”), or, rather, painted canvases (“panni dipinti”). In another letter she specifies the two pictures: One of these depicts the three Magi presenting their gifts to Christ, and the other the Holy Face “che e una divota figura e bella”1. Apparently, these images were transported to Rome from Bruges. It may be interesting to note that Macinghi planned to perform a pilgrimage to Rome in April of the jubilee year 1450, but never went there 2. If anything, these words show that one did not have to visit Rome to obtain an image of the Veronica. Small painted Veronica images attached to books of hours are not necessarily souvenirs from Rome. The attachment of these Veronicas among pilgrim badges creates the illusion that these pictures are pilgrim souvenirs too, but a closer look at the collection of objects suggests differently. The badges surrounding the Veronica images may have been bought at different cult sites, but are usually from the area around where the owners of the manuscript lived, suggesting that they probably had not travelled far to obtain them. The book of hours of Antoine Bourdin dated 1485 [Fig. 1], for example, contains a small Veronica that was once surrounded by various badges from Le Puy (the Virgin) and La Sainte-Baume (St Mary Magdalene) based on the clear impressions that these objects left in the blank parchment3. For the owner living in Provence, these famous cult sites in the south of France were obvious destinations. In another book of hours of around 1465–1475, this time from Holland, the Veronica was placed next to a badge of St Cunera who was venerated in Rhenen (east of the Low Countries)4. The (probably Norman) owner of a third book of hours for use in Bayeux combined his Vera Icon with a badge of St Maturin of Larchant (near Paris) 5. This manuscript was produced around 1414 and augmented in the fourth decade of the fifteenth century. In a book of hours, produced in Leuven around 1450, belonging to a woman called Margareta van den Hecke

from Brussels there is a painted Veronica (with the crossed keys) next to a badge of the Virgin of Halle (in the duchy of Brabant)6. Recently a book of hours was offered for sale with Les Enluminures 7. Many of its miniatures were removed, but genealogical notes attest to a use in or around Angers where the manuscript was also produced, probably in the third quarter of the fifteenth century. In this book of hours, a small Veronica is combined with metal badges of the Virgin of Cléry (Notre-Dame-de-Cléry), St Mathurin (Larchant) and St Maurice (Angers). Many of these Holy Faces are extremely varied stylistically which suggests different manufacturers. Placed among badges the Veronicas are treated as pilgrims’ souvenirs, but the local and regional provenance of the metal souvenirs suggests that the Veronicas are likely local products too. Some of these manuscript owners who attached the badges might have travelled to Rome to obtain their Veronica (or received them from a family member or friend who had gone to Rome), but most of these were more likely purchased in the same area as the badges and some may have been bought in the same sites as the metal mementos that they ended up with. The ever-growing indulgences connected with prayer in front of the Veronica increased the popularity of the image. People who had never been to Rome desired the opportunity to obtain the large indulgences and the beneficial influences connected with the image which probably provided further stimulus for a local production8. Images of the Veronicas were produced in different places for people to buy and attach to manuscripts, but they were sold to pilgrims in Rome too. Different types of souvenirs were on offer in the papal city. Some cast metal badges of the Veronica can be securely attributed to Rome because they imitate the pewter souvenirs of Sts Peter and Paul sold at St Peter’s from the twelfth century as a papal bull issued by Pope Innocent iii in 1200 attests9. They show the face on a rectangular badge with an inscription along its edge. These cast badges of the Veronica are few compared to the many finds of metal souvenirs depicting the apostles, only three documented so far as opposed to dozens of Peter and Paul

badges10. More frequent are the metal souvenirs combining the Veronica and the apostles11. Because of a mold for casting badges that was probably found in Rome (Campo Santo Teutonica, now lost) these may be attributed to St Peter’s as well12. Other souvenirs of the Veronica are convincingly attributed to Rome because of their early date, stylistic affinities and wide geographic dispersal from Germany to Rome and the United Kingdom to Poland [Fig. 2] 13. 1

2 3

4

5 6 7

8 9

10

11 12

13

Florence, Archivio di Stato, Strozziana, lettere 21–22. Alessandra Macinghi negli Strozzi, Lettere di una Gentildonna Fiorentina del Secolo xvi ai Figliuoli Esuli, Cesare Guasti ed., Florence  1877, pp. 224, 230 –231. Florence, A.S., Strozziana, lettera 4. Ibidem, p. 60. Denis Bruna, “Témoins de Dévotions dans les Livres d’Heures à la Fin du Moyen Age”, Revue Mabillon, new ser. ix/70 (1998), pp. 127–161, sp.  pp.  142–143, no. c; Hanneke van Asperen, Pelgrimstekens op Perkament: Originele en Nageschilderde Bedevaartssouvenirs in Religieuze Boeken (ca 1450 – ca 1530), Nijmegen 2009, p. 319, no. i 37. Utrecht, Museum Catharijneconvent, ms st cc h1; Hendrik Jan E. van Beuningen, Jos Koldeweij, Heilig en Profaan: 1000 Laatmiddeleeuwse Insignes uit de Collectie H.J. E. van Beuningen, Cothen 1993, p. 64; van Asperen, Pelgrimstekens op Perkament (n. 3), pp. 360 –361, n. i 85. London, Christie’s, 24 November, 2007, lot 10; van Asperen, Pelgrimstekens (n. 3), p. 346, no. i 68. Cologne, Venator & Hanstein, 25 March, 2000, lot 572; van Asperen, Pelgrimstekens (n. 3), pp. 344 –345, no. i 66. Les Enluminures, tm 922; Available from [http://www.textmanuscripts.com/medieval/book-of-hours-use-of-angers-96384, last accessed on 28. 07. 2017]. Kathryn M. Rudy, Rubrics, Images and Indulgences in Late Medieval Netherlandish Manuscripts, Leiden 2017, pp. 60 – 66. Collectio Bullarum, breviorum aliorumque diplomatum Sacrosanctae Basilicae Vaticanae, 3 vols, Rome 1747–1752, vol. i, p. 82; Luigi Schiaparelli, “Le carte antiche dell’archivio capitolare di San Pietro in Vaticano”, Archivio della Reale Società Romana di Storia Patria, xxiv–xxv (1901–1902), pp. 273 –354, 393 – 496. Also Marco Leo Imperiale, “‘Signa Apostolorum Petri et Pauli’: Note Sulla Produzione delle ‘Quadrangulae’ di Pellegrinaggio a Roma”, in vi Congresso Nazionale di Archeologia Medievale, Fabio Redi, Alfonso Forgione eds, Florence 2012, pp. 698 –703. Kunera database, Radboud Universiteit Nijmegen; Available from, [www.kunera,.nl, last accessed on 10. 07. 2017], nos 01043 (found in Paris), 03952 (Helsingborg) and 08570 (unknown). For comparison with finds of Peter and Paul badges, browse: Saints > Peter and Paul, Roma (82). Kunera (n. 10), browse: Christ > Vera Icon, Peter and Paul, Roma (15). Ibidem, no. 07499. Cf. Hartmut Kühne, “Italienische Pilgerzeichen des Mittelalters - eine Problemanzeige”, Römische Quartalschrift für Christliche Altertumskunde und Kirchengeschichte, cx (2015), pp. 14 –28, sp. p. 25; Carina Brumme, “Mittelalterliche Zeugen der Wallfahrt in die Ewige Stadt – die Römische Pilgerzeichen”, in Rom sehen und sterben: Perspektiven auf die Ewige Stadt. Um 1500 –2011, catalogue of the exhibition, (Erfurt Kunsthalle, 8 May – 17 July 2011), Susanne Knorr, Ulrike Pennewitz, Kai Uwe Schierz eds, Erfurt 2011, pp. 49 –55, sp. pp. 50 –51. Kunera (n. 10), e.g. nos 04227– 04230 (unknown), 05888 and 05898 (both found in Bremen), 06703 (cast on a bell in Lübeck of the last decades of the fourteenth century), 07496 (unknown, probably Rome), 07518 (King’s Lynn), 11440 (cast on a bell in Nideggen-Berg dated 1401), 11503 (found in Rome), 16279 (Gdansk), 16819 (Sluis) and 16820 (Dordrecht). Cf. Romei e Giubilei: Il Pelegrinaggio medieval a San Pietro, Mario D’Onofrio ed., catalogue of the exhibition, (Roma, Palazzo Venezia, 29 October 1999 – 26 February 2000), Milano 1999, pp. 342–344.

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Despite the evidence of a mass production of According to Gerhard Wolf, the first painted different types of metal souvenirs the painted ima­ images of the Veronica that were produced in ges seem to have formed the majority of Veronica Rome at the end of the thirteenth century showed souvenirs sold to pilgrims at St Peter’s because – “a schematic isolated face of Christ (usually withunlike the metal souvenirs of the Veronica – they out a nimbus) represented on a cloth or simply appear so prominently in frescos, panel paintings painted on white paper”18. Established around and miniatures of the fourteenth and fifteenth the end of the thirteenth century, the iconography centuries (e.g. [Fig. 3]). Makers of these images – was widely distributed after the Holy Year of 1300 called pictores imaginariorum or simply imaginarii and the next one of 1350. Saints such as Roch and – and sellers of these are mentioned in the accounts Jude visited Rome and are often depicted with books of St Peter’s from the end of the fourteenth souvenirs on their hat or pelerine to indicate that century offering their merchandise on a prominent they had visited Rome and looked upon the relic site in front of the basilica where pilgrims would go of the Veronica. Their souvenirs show the image before entering the church14. These images had to of Christ’s face against a white background as debe hand painted in a period before the invention of scribed by Wolf. the woodblock print. This technique was probably Because paper, introduced in Europe in the motivated by the relic itself because a painted black twelfth century, was used on a large scale only face against a flexible background approaches the in the late fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, it 15 essence of the sudarium, i.e. a textile relic . The seems likely that Veronicas were painted mostmany references to and depictions of the Holy Face ly on parchment. Parchment remained the most on cloth suggest that sellers of metal badges may common writing material during the fourteenth have used the eyelets of isolated Veronicas, such as and fifteenth centuries and parchment-makers in case of Figure 2, to attach the cast metal badges were among the artisans and tradesmen of every to a piece of cloth first so that it would resemble town, also of Rome 19. During the second half of the relic more closely. Using the provided eyelets the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, output of the stitches accentuated the cross of the nimbus manuscripts increased enormously in Italy as one behind Christ's head. As may be expected, traces of the most important centers of manuscript proof a separate background of a perishable material, duction20. Parchment leaves for manuscripts had whether this was a piece of fabric, parchment, or to be prepared, folded and trimmed, which meant part of a pelerine, hat or bag, have rarely survived16. that scraps that could be used in the production of What did the painted Roman souvenirs look small images were left after cutting. Furthermore, like and how can we distinguish Roman souve- parchment was more durable than paper and less nirs from painted Veronicas produced elsewhere? likely to tear when attached to a hat or a pelerine. Iconographical elements of the papal arms, or the Statesman and humanist Pier Paolo Vergerio the apostles Sts Peter and Paul, certainly refer to the city Elder (1370 –1444) writes disapprovingly in a letwhere the Veronica was kept, but they are hardly ter dated February 1398 to an unknown recipient proof of provenance. Formal elements such as that the Veronica painters would dismantle mancrossed keys, papal tiaras or the apostles do appear uscripts to provide the parchment to paint on21. on pictures that were probably not manufactured Manuscripts and monuments carry the memory in Rome17. Not necessarily souvenirs from the Eter- of Antiquity, Vergerio writes, but people destroy nal City, these images brought the Roman relic and ancient buildings to convert their stones (“marmor all its associations within spiritual reach of devo- et vivum lapidem”) into lime and painters destroy tees elsewhere. The addition of papal arms and the old manuscripts for their parchment. Significantly, apostles Peter and Paul, both buried in the papal lime was used in the production of parchment city and venerated there, intensified the associa- because the animal hides had to be submerged tion with Rome and with pilgrimage which made in a lime paste to remove the hair, flesh and fat22. Rome and its relics accessible to those who did not Parchment, either as scraps or as leaves from old have the means or opportunity to travel physically. manuscripts, was a readily available residual

2 /  Badge of the Veronica, pewter, found in Sluis (Netherlands), Rome, 1325–1375 / Private collection, Netherlands 3 / Andrea Bonaiuti, pilgrim (detail), fresco of the Militant and Triumphant Church, Firenze, Santa Maria Novella, Capella degli Spagnoli, 1365–1367

material which the painters would have eagerly used in order to produce cheap images. The yellow color of some of the depicted Veronicas possibly refers to a parchment background, for example the Vera Icon on the hat of the pilgrim in Andrea Bonaiuti’s fresco in the Capella degli Spagnoli (1365–1367) of Santa Maria Novella in Florence [Fig. 3]. For the same reasons as parchment, Veronica painters may have used leather for the production of their images. Leather is durable and does not tear easily, so this material must have been perfect for images sewn to clothing or bags where they would be subjected to wear and tear. Pier Paolo Vergerio probably does not mention leather when he refers to Veronica painters because the use of leather did not require damaging of antiquities and therefore did not offend him, although he may have been thinking of tanning when he mentions lime. The first stages of leather production where the hides had to be immersed in a lime bath equaled the manufacture of parchment23. The main difference is that skins were not stretched to create a more elastic material. 14 Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, Archivio di Capitolo di San Pietro, Censuali, vol. i, fol. 15 ff. Pio Pecchiai,“Banchi e Botteghe Dinanzi alla Basilica Vaticana nei Secoli xiv, xv e xvi”, Archivi d’Italia e Rassegna Internazionale degli Archivi, xviii (1951), pp. 81–123, sp. pp. 91–93.

On St Peter’s square, cf. Christof Thoenes, “Studien zur Geschichte des Petersplatzes”, Zeitschrift für Kunstgeschichte, xxvi/2 (1963), pp. 97–145. 15 Ewa Kuryluk, Veronica and Her Cloth: History, Symbolism, and Structure of a ‘True’ Image, Cambridge, ma 1991. 16 Exceptions are for example three badges of the Virgin of ’s-Hertogenbosch gathered on one piece of leather or the shell on remnants of a pelerine found in a grave in Leuven. Cf. Rob M. van Heeringen, Jos Koldeweij, Annette A. G. Gaalman, Heiligen uit de Modder: in Zeeland gevonden pelgrimstekens, 2nd ed., Zutphen 1988, pp. 79 – 80; Leven te Leuven in de Late Middeleeuwen, catalogue of the exhibition, (Leuven, Stedelijk Museum vander Kelen Mertens, 19 September – 6 December 1998), Lutgarde Bessemans et al. eds, Leuven 1998, p. 390. 17 A pen drawing in a sixteenth-century prayer book, in the same hand as the drawing of David below, was probably produced in – or in the immediate surroundings of – the monastery where the book was written, around 1470. Ursula Weekes, Early Engravers and their Public: The Master of the Berlin Passion and Manuscripts from Convents in the Rhine-Maas Region, London 2004, pp. 167–185. 18 Gerhard Wolf, “From Mandylion to Veronica: The Holy Face and the Paradox of Representation”, in The Holy Face and the Paradox of Representation, (Papers from a Colloquium held at the Bibliotheca Hertziana, Rome and the Villa Spelman, Florence), Herbert Kessler, Gerhard Wolf eds, Bologna 1998, pp. 153 –179, sp. p. 173. 19 Ronald Reed, Ancient Skins, Parchment and Leathers, London/New York 1972, pp. 115 –116; Richard W. Clement,“Medieval and Renaissance book production”, Library Faculty & Staff Publications, Paper 10 (1997), available from [http://digitalcommons.usu.edu/lib_pubs/10, last accessed on 28. 07. 2017]. 20 Carla Bozzolo, Dominique Coq, Ezio Ornato, “La production du livre en quelques pays d’Europe occidentale aux xive et xve siècles”, Scrittura e Civiltà, viii (1984), pp. 129 –159, sp. pp. 135 –136. 21 Pier Paolo Vergerio, Epistolario di Pier Paolo Vergerio, vol. i, Leonardo Smith ed., Roma 1934, p. 216. 22 Reed, Ancient Skins (n. 19), p. 148; Michael L. Ryder, “Parchment: its History, Manufacture and Composition”, Journal of the Society of Archivists, ii/9 (1964), pp. 391–399. 23 Ricardo Córdoba de la Llave, “Late Medieval Italian Recipes for Leather Tanning”,in Craft Treatises and Handbooks: The Dissemination of Technical Knowledge in the Middle Ages, Ricardo Córdoba ed., Turnhout 2013, pp. 271–297; Reed, Ancient Skins (n. 19), p. 52.

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Leather would have been an equally cheap and accessible material, especially in the form of discarded objects that were locally produced or imported24. During the late Middle Ages, soft leather was used for many products such as bags, book bindings, shoes, belts, clothing, gloves, etc. Besides waste products, Veronica painters may have used lower-quality parts of the skin that were left, although the absence of waste material on archaeologically excavated tanning sites suggest that most parts of the tanned leather – including the lower-quality sections of the skin – were used25. The material of these Veronicas, whether this was parchment or leather – both made of something that was once skin – may have had symbolic connotations. The human interaction with the animal hide suggests an identification of the human figure with the finished product 26. The material transforms a depiction of the face into something that looks like a face and also has the properties of skin. Furthermore, the extreme scraping, stretching and soaking of the animal hide during the production process evoke associations with the tortured flesh, and therefore with the Passion. Veronica paintings on leather and parchment might have had metaphorical implications of wounds and sacrifice that are beyond the scope of this essay, but would be worth further investigation. Besides its practical advantages, leather likely had symbolic meaning for a pilgrim when stitching the Veronica onto the surface of hat, bag or pelerine made of the same material27. Because clothing assumed the identity of its wearer, the image of the face would have become part of the pilgrim’s identity.

Showing the Relic, Unveiling the Face Two full-page images of the Veronica painted on leather were inserted in two different manuscripts, one in the Heures de Bruxelles dated 1409 [Fig. 4] and the other in a psalter with a Ghent calendar dated 1240, both in the Bibliothèque Royale de Belgique. Bernard Bousmanne suggested the image in the Heures de Bruxelles was probably inserted by “un membre de la maison Bourgogne”, because it was in the possession of the Burgundian family

uninterruptedly until the end of the fifteenth century 28. Jean de Berry donated the manuscript to a duke of Burgundy, most likely John the Fearless, before it came in the possession of his son Philip the Good who kept it in his residence in Dijon29. The image of the Veronica on page 8 was pasted into a quire that also includes prominent diptych miniatures of the Duke of Berry kneeling in front of the Madonna (pp. 10 –11). Cut on the edges the grisaille miniatures were probably not intended for this manuscript although they were likely planned to be part of the manuscript from the outset 30. The Veronica image is relatively large (267/269 x 167/170 mm) and fits the rest of the manuscript perfectly. The picture has white lines on the sides indicating the outer edges of the image which suggests that its size was not reduced to fit the codex. Arguably, the size of the diptych miniatures and of the entire manuscript may have been geared to the Veronica which would give the 24 Daniele Lombardi, “Scarpe, pelli e cuoio della Riviera Ligure nella Roma tardomedievale: nuovi spunti di ricerca”, Intemelion, xiii (2007), pp. 61– 81. 25 Anton Ervynck, “Everything but the Leather: The Search for Tanneries in Flemish Archaeology”, in Leather Tanneries: the Archaeological Evidence, Roy Thomson, Quita Mould eds, London 2011, pp. 103 –115, sp. p. 112. 26 E.g. Eric Jager, “The Book of the Heart: Reading and Writing the Medieval Subject”, Speculum, lxxi/1 (1996), pp. 1–26, sp. pp. 13 –17; Clifford Davidson, Festivals and Plays in Late Medieval Britain, Aldershot 2007, p. 178; Hanneke van Asperen, “‘As If They Had Physically Visited the Holy Places’: Two Sixteenth-Century Manuscripts Guide a Mental Journey Through Jerusalem (Nijmegen university library, Mss 205 and 233)”, in The Imagined and Real Jerusalem in Art and Architecture, Jeroen Goudeau, Mariëtte Verhoeven, Wouter Weijers eds, Leiden 2014, pp. 190 –214, sp. pp. 204 –207. 27 Meaningful in this context of textile and identity are the remarks by Kathryn Rudy, “Introduction: Miraculous Textiles in Exempla and Images from the Low Countries”, in Weaving, Veiling, and Dressing: Textiles and their Metaphors in the Late Middle Ages, Kathryn M. Rudy, Barbara Baert eds, Turnhout 2007, pp. 1–36. 28 Bernard Bousmanne, Céline Hoorebeeck, Alain Arnould, La librairie des ducs de Bourgogne: Manuscrits conservés à la Bibliothèque Royale, i : Textes liturgiques, ascétiques, théologiques, philosophiques et moraux, Turnhout 2000, p. 286; Bernard Bousmanne, Pierre Cockshaw, Gerhard Schmidt, Das Brüsseler Stundenbuch / Heures de Bruxelles, Lucerne 1996, pp. 97–200, sp. pp. 185 –186,. 29 Bousmanne/Hoorebeeck/Arnould, La Librairie (n. 28), p.  284; Bousmanne/Cockshaw/Schmidt, Das Brüsseler Stundenbuch (n. 28), pp. 180 –181; Patrick M. de Winter, “A Book of Hours of Queen Isabella La Católica”, The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art, lxvii (1981), pp. 342– 427, sp. p. 59. According to some, the Duke of Berry donated the book to Philip the Bold. Joachim Plotzek, Gabriele Bartz, Bodo Brinkmann, Ars Vivendi, Ars Moriendi: Die Handschriftensammlung Renate König, Munich 2001, p. 21; Fréderic Lyna,“Un Livre de Prières Inconnu de Philippe le Hardi (Bruxelles, Ms. 11035 –37)” in Mélanges Hulin de Loo, Brussels 1931 pp. 249 –259, sp. p. 253. 30 Gerhard Schmidt, “Der Schmuck der Handschrift”, in Bousmanne/ Cockshaw/Schmidt, Das Brüsseler Stundenbuch (n. 28), pp. 69 – 76, sp. p. 109.

4 /  Painted picture of the Veronica, oil on leather, 1425–1450, Heures de Bruxelles of Jean de Berry, before 1401–1403 / Bruxelles, Bibliothèque Royale de Belgique, ms 11 060, fol. 6v

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5 /  Associate of the Maximilian Master, illusionistic border of badges and a Veronica picture, Bruges and probably Ghent, c. 1490 –1498 / Naples, Bibliotheca Nazionale, ms i.b. 51, fol. 38r

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image a terminus ante quem of 1409. If the size of the manuscript was indeed tuned to the Veronica, this would give the image an essential status among the different parts of the volume and its prominent location has been given careful thought. It certainly was a suitable addition to a book of hours. Every time the owner opened a book to read the prayers, the Veronica would be revealed and the owner was blessed with the beneficial influence of gazing upon Christ’s face. The large indulgences that went with praying before the image were at the book owner’s fingertips and made available with the turn of a page. Although each figure is indicated with a few lines, the image shows much detail: Christ’s face is painted on a white cloth that is held up by St Veronica. She is flanked by Sts Peter and Paul whose presence refers to Rome where their bodies were buried and venerated. The way that St Veronica presents the veil resembles images of the ostension of the relic to pilgrims in Rome as depicted on woodcuts in different editions of the Indulgentiae ecclesiarum Urbis Romae for example 31.

Veronica takes the place of the priest holding the Veronica, Sts Peter and Paul that of the prelates on either side holding their respective attributes of key and sword. Significantly, the viewer takes the place of the pilgrim. The attention focuses on Christ’s countenance, which is large beyond proportion: the image of the sudarium with the Holy Face covers almost the entire surface of the picture. Most of the facial features are difficult to discern, but eyes, nose and mouth indicated with white and red paint stand out against the black skin. The veil serves as a white backdrop for the black face as relics and reliquaries would be displayed against a piece of cloth to make them more clearly visible to the masses. As a cloth of honor, the white veil underlines the sanctity of this vision. Looking at the image more closely, it becomes clear that Veronica holding the veil with the bodiless face of Christ is also bodiless. Only her face and hands are depicted. Her feet are not visible below the veil. Moreover, the veil covering her head and the veil with the impression of Christ’s

face are one. The saint not only shows the relic of the veil to the pilgrims, she practically wears the relic, or to put it even more pointedly, she is the relic. Saint and face have merged completely, meaning that Veronica is the empty canvas on which Christ impressed the image of his face. This iconography may point to the anagram Vera Icon / Veronica. Metaphorically, Veronica is an image of Christ who chose to repay her kindness with “a token of his love”. In response to her compassion, he not only impressed his face upon the veil, but also imprinted an image of himself onto her soul. In her love for Christ she has become his likeness. Although they look simple on the surface the meaning of the images are complex. The Veronica is a picture of the relic and its ostension in Rome as the pilgrim would have witnessed it. At the same time, the Veronica is an image that should inspire true devotion and compassion after St Veronica’s example. Most prominently, the picture is a vision of God. The face of Christ is not imprinted upon the cloth, it floats in front of it. The face does not fold with the cloth and it is larger, protruding over the lower edge of the cloth. Veronica does not just show a two-dimensional relic, she reveals the face of Christ who is physically present. The illuminators of the La Flora Hours seem to elaborate on this metaphor, coupling a small Veronica with a depiction of the mocking of Christ [Fig. 5]. In the miniature Christ is blindfolded. He is unable to see, nor can the viewer meet his gaze. The relevant biblical text reads: “And they blindfolded him and smote his face” (Lk 22, 64). The Latin Vulgate uses the word “velare” meaning “to veil” which literatim connects this moment with Veronica’s veil. The small image painted in the margin points forward to the moment on the via dolorosa where St Veronica offers Christ an act of kindness and counterbalances the moment of torture in the miniature. Moreover, the small image in the margin reverses this moment where Christ’s face is hidden from view when St Veronica pulls away the veil and reveals Christ’s face to the onlooker. This act of veiling and revealing gains prominence in a book that would unveil its contents each time an owner would pick it up and start to read. A worn image of the Veronica, also on leather, is part of a psalter with a Ghent calendar; the

image is part of a separate quire (1–8) in front of the manuscript32. The Veronica is glued to a stub against the spine as are all the other leaves in this quire. The figures were somewhat spoiled when the image was cut at the sides to fit the size of the psalter (228 x 168 mm), clearly suggesting that it functioned separately from the codex before it was inserted. For more strength the leather leaf, with its image on the verso of folio 8, was glued to the verso of the previous folio, but folios 7 and 8 have been undone. The next quire (9–20), immediately following the image of the Veronica starts with the Psalm 1 of which the first two words “Beatus vir” are missing. These elements suggest that the different parts of the psalter have been re-arranged and it remains unclear when this was done exactly, possibly in the fourteenth century. In addition to the leather background and its size (before it was cut), the image shares many formal characteristics with the full-page miniature of Veronica in the Brussels Hours [Fig. 4]. St Veronica, Sts Peter and Paul and the face of Christ are depicted in the same way. Because of these similarities Millard Meiss concluded: “The Veronica painted on leather and attached to page 8 of the manuscript [Brussels 11 060 – 61] is incontestable proof of Burgundian ownership, for two other Burgundian manuscripts of the early fifteenth century show the same peculiar addition”, referring to the Ghent Psalter and a book of hours called the Grandes Heures that once belonged to the dukes of Burgundy, first to Philip the Bold (1342, r. 1364–1404) and then to Philip the Good (1396, r. 1419–1467). The Grandes Heures contains several images of the Veronica33. Although Meiss may have meant a small image of Veronica ([Fig. 6]:

6 / Four pictures of the Veronica pasted into the Grandes Heures of the Dukes of Burgundy, Latin and French, 1376–1378 with additions and alterations in 14th and 15th centuries / Bruxelles, Bibliothèque Royale de Belgique, ms 11035–37, fol. 96r

31 For example, Indulgentiae ecclesiarum urbis Romae [n.p., 1475]. Image on Washington, dc, Library of Congress, available from [https:// www.loc.gov/item/48043474/, last accessed 19. 07. 2017]. On the manuscripts and printed editions of the Indulgentiae, cf. Nine R. Miedema, Rompilgerführer in Spätmittelalter und Früher Neuzeit: Die ‘Indulgentiae ecclesiarum urbis Romae’, Tübingen 2003. 32 Bruxelles, Bibliothèque Royale de Belgique, ms 5163 – 64. Cf. Camille Gaspar and Fréderic Lyna, Les Principaux Manuscrits à Peintures de la Bibliothèque Royale de Belgique, vol. i, Brussels 1984, pp. 196 –199, n. 84 and vol. ii, p. 39; J. van den Gheyn, Catalogue des Manuscrits de la Bibliothèque Royale de Belgique, Brussels 1901, pp. 378 –379, n. 597. 33 Millard Meiss, French Painting in the Time of Jean de Berry: The Late Fourteenth Century and the Patronage of the Duke, London 1967, p. 201; Millard Meiss, Colin Eisler, “A New French Primitive”, The Burlington Magazine, cii (1960), pp. 233 –240, sp. p. 239.

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upper left), he was probably referring to another Veronica in the same manuscript that is related to the one in the Heures de Bruxelles in iconography and size [Fig. 7]. There is no doubt the members of the Burgundian family had a devotional preference for (images of) the Veronica, but the Ghent Psalter gives no clues to its former owners and there is no clear indication that it was part of the library of the Burgundian dukes. The full-page images in the Heures de Bruxelles and the Ghent Psalter seem to share provenance. The similarities between the images in the Ghent Psalter and the Brussels Hours suggest they are related or, at least, share a common model. The solution to the similarities might not be that these single-leaf images were both commissioned by the Burgundians, but that they were produced on the same site, separate from the manuscripts they ended up in. The city of Rome where the relic of Veronica’s veil was kept and where painted souvenirs of the Veronica were evidently sold to pilgrims must be considered as the common place of origin. The irregular edges of the Veronica in the Brussels Hours indicate careless or hasty cutting in line with mass production. The single leaves that only survived because they were attached to books and never taken out may have travelled northwards from Rome. Probably many more of these ima­ ges circulated, but were lost because they disintegrated if they were not kept safe. Both parchment and leather are degradable. On the rare occasions that leather is preserved in waterlogged deposits for example, its contact with its environment has usually affected any painted decoration. Also, those images in manuscripts were often taken out because they had become too worn and lost their meaning to subsequent owners.

Towards a Chronology

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Other images of the Holy Face, closely related but smaller than the two miniatures in the Ghent Psalter and the Heures de Bruxelles, can also be found in religious manuscripts, for example in the before-mentioned Grandes Heures [Fig. 6]. The Veronica in the upper left corner shows an identical black face painted against the background of a white cloth held by a bodiless St Veronica

whose white veil merges with the relic. It has the same white lines along the edges as the image in the image in the Brussels Hours [Fig. 4], possibly drawn to separate the different Veronicas that were painted on the same leaf before it was cut. Some Veronicas, almost identical to the one in the Grandes Heures, have been tentatively attributed to Rome in the past, as for example some of those found under the choir stalls of the Cistercian Convent of Wienhausen [Fig. 8] 34. Again, these show a similar black face with undistinguished facial features on a white cloth painted on a piece of leather. Christ’s eyes, eyebrows, bottom of the nose and mouth are indicated with simple black lines, the white of the eyes and bridge of the nose are emphasized with white paint and the lips with red. St Veronica’s veil and the relic with the impression of Christ’s face merge seamlessly. Although it is almost certain that the nuns of Wienhausen used these images, the question remains as to where they were produced. Scholars have suggested that the Veronicas found under the stalls were produced in Wienhausen, either for pilgrims visiting the Holy Blood relic at the convent or for the nuns’ own use 35. According to Jeffrey Hamburger, the nuns made them: “it appears that they were made by and for the nuns, to serve in their own devotions”36. However, these small Veronicas have been found far beyond Wienhausen and this is not consistent with a limited production within the convent, solely for the use of the nuns there. An almost identical oblong obscured image of a bodiless Veronica was pasted into a breviary that was owned by priest and city scribe Johann Hubenstricker (d. 1482) in Fritzlar 37. In addition, these images circulated in Flanders where they were depicted in the margins of late Flemish devotional manuscripts that can be dated c. 1500 [Fig. 5], and a noble pilgrim is depicted with a similar Veronica on a painting of St James the Great, dating from the end of the fifteenth century, probably from Holland38. The local, possibly regional, attraction of the Holy Blood cult of Wienhausen does not sufficiently explain the circulation of these images in such a wide area. Horst Appuhn and Christian von Heusinger suggested that the images of St Veronica wrapped in the veil also found under the stalls

7 /  Miniature of St Veronica, c. 1450, in the Grandes Heures of the dukes of Burgundy, Latin and French, 1376 –1378 with additions and alterations in 14th and 15th centuries / Bruxelles, Bibliothèque Royale de Belgique, ms 11 035 –37, fol. 98r

at Wienhausen “had been sewn to the pilgrim’s clothing as a medallion”39. The striking similarities among these painted pictures of the Holy Face and their complex iconography suggest a provenance from one production site, and the large geographical dissemination of the image suggests a mass production. Because of its enormous popularity with pilgrims from all over the Christian world, 34 Horst Appuhn, Christian von Heusinger, “Der Fund kleiner Andachtsbilder des 13. bis 17. Jahrhunderts in Kloster Wienhausen”, Niederdeutsche Beiträge zur Kunstgeschichte, iv (1965), pp. 157–238, sp. pp. 199 –200. 35 Bruna, Témoins de Dévotions (n. 3), p. 131; Hendrik Jan van Beuningen, Adrianus M. Koldeweij, Dory Kicken, Heilig en Profaan 2: 1200 Laatmiddeleeuwse Insignes uit Openbare en Particuliere Collecties, Langbroek 2001, pp. 60 – 61, 323 –326. 36 Jeffrey Hamburger thinks that they were produced for use within the convent. Jeffrey F. Hamburger, The Visual and the Visionary: Art and

8 / Picture of the Veronica from Rome, leather, found under the choirstalls of Kloster Wienhausen, 1490 –1500 / Kloster Wienhausen, wie Kc 063

Female Spirituality in Late Medieval Germany, New York 1998, p. 323; Barbara Baert agrees with Hamburger and interprets the image within the frame of female religious: “The Gaze of Christ is Dark: a ‘Black Hole’ within the Contours of an Abstract Woman, of the Feminine”; Barbara Baert, “The Gendered Visage: Facets of the Vera Icon”, Jaarboek Koninklijk Museum voor Schone Kunsten (2000), pp. 10 – 43, sp. p. 21. 37 Fritzlar, Dombibliothek, ms 72, flyleaf iv. Gerhard List, Die Handschriften der Dombibliothek Fritzlar, Wiesbaden 1984, pp. 127–129. 38 Formerly in the Innes collection, auctioned 1935. Cf. Wolfgang Schöne, “Albert van Ouwater: ein Beitrag zur Geschichte der Holländischen Malerei des xv. Jahrhunderts”, Jahrbuch der Preussischen Kunstsammlungen, lxiii (1942), pp. 1– 42, sp. p. 19; Depictions of the Veronicas can be found in Flemish margins in the Biblioteca Nazionale in Naples (ms i.b. 51; [Fig. 5]), Cleveland Museum of Art (Leonard J. Hanna Jr Fund 1963.256) and Bodleian Library in Oxford (ms Douce 311). Cf. van Asperen, Pelgrimstekens (n. 3), pp. 195 –199 (Naples and Cleveland) and 200 –203 (Oxford). On Cleveland, cf. also De Winter, “A Book of Hours” (n. 29), pp. 342– 427. 39 “war als Medaillon wohl an einer Pilgerkleidung angenäht”. Appuhn/ von Heusinger, “Der Fund kleiner Andachtsbilder” (n. 34), p. 201. Appuhn suggested in Kloster Wienhausen, iv: Der Fund vom Nonnenchor (Hamburg 1973, pp. 18 –20) that the images were produced for the pilgrims of the Holy Blood of Wienhausen.

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9 /  Painted picture of the Veronica (Rome), oil on leather, sewn into the Psalter-Hours of Ferdinand  i of Austria, Latin and French, c. 1300 and 1310 –1320 / Wien, Österreichische Nationalbibliothek, ms Series nova 2596, fol. 371r

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and the known mass production of painted Veronicas there, Rome would be the logical provenance. The two large images of the Veronica in the Heures de Bruxelles and the Ghent Psalter seem to predate the smaller pictures. The Heures de Bruxelles is a late fourteenth-century manuscript with many fifteenth-century additions by the then owner. The full-page image of the Veronica may have been part of the Heures de Bruxelles before 1409 if it was part of the codex from the outset [Fig. 4]. The Veronica must have been inserted before 1450 because it served as a model for a miniature of St Veronica in the Grandes Heures [Fig. 7]. Philip the Good, who ordered the rebinding and embellishment of this book of hours in 1451, was probably the commissioner of this miniature at that time40. The Veronica miniature precedes the Office of the Dead with its colophon explaining that it was translated in Brussels in 1451, probably by Philip’s secretary Jean Miélot (d. 1472). Because

the Veronica in the Heures the Bruxelles provided the model, this would mean that the original must date earlier than 1450, as must the closely related image in the Ghent Psalter. Members of the Burgundian family were already in the habit of adding Veronicas to their religious codices before 1424. The books of Margaret of Bavaria (d. 1423), widow of Duke John the Fearless, were inventoried in 1424. The list of manuscripts mentions “Unes Petites Heures de Nostre Dame, où il y a une Veronique atachiée dedens, à deux fermailz dargent dorez, armoiez des armes de Bourgoingne” [A small book of hours with a Veronica attached within, with two clasps of gilt silver decorated with the arms of Burgundy]. This manuscript has been identified as the aforementioned Grandes Heures that had belonged to Philip the Bold and later to Philip the Good, for the Grandes Heures contains several Veronicas41. Claudine Lemaire stated however: “L’argument que s’y trouve une ‘Véronique’

attachée est insuffisant”42. Indeed, the Petites Heures of Margaret was probably not the same as the book called “les grans Heures” in the inventory of Philip the Good a few years earlier (1420). The prayer book in Brussels which measures 225 x 178 mm, and the part in Cambridge measuring 253 mm in height, are unlikely to have been labeled “small”. More important, the Grandes Heures were already in the possession of Philip the Good in 1420, when Margaret’s manuscripts were inventoried in 1424. The description in Margaret’s inventory points to another manuscript that apparently contained a Veronica too. The picture of Christ’s face must have been a striking part of Margaret’s book for it to be named explicitly. Presumably, it was inserted at the beginning where it could be noticed easily as the Veronica in the Heures de Bruxelles and the Ghent Psalter. On the basis of these arguments, the large images of the Veronica in the Heures the Bruxelles and the Ghent Psalter may be dated in the first decades of the fifteenth century. The smaller images of the Veronica, also painted on leather and with a closely related iconography, seem to date from the second half of that century, because they appear in paintings and miniatures that can be securely dated in the 1480s. Of course, this is not a terminus post quem; these small Veronicas may have been produced before that date. The search for other Veronicas on leather leads to a second, related, but slightly different group of images: one leather image of the Veronica was sewn as osculatory in a missal written in 1399 for a Benedictine monastery in Mondsee and Ferdinand i of Austria (1503–1564) attached another in his Psalter-Hours [Fig. 9] 43. After two manuscripts (a psalter and a book of hours) were bound together, the then owner, probably Ferdinand himself, attached two images to the manuscript44. He sewed a metal badge with a depiction of the circumcision on the front flyleaf and using the same type of thread, he attached the Veronica on leather to the back. Because of the established legend of the woman Veronica who gave Christ the cloth to wipe his face on his way to Calvary, the painted image denotes the Passion and is often depicted among the Arma Christi. As opposed to the Veronica which points to the Passion and the end of Christ’s life, the circular metal badge carries a scene from Christ’s youth.

As an important sacrificial moment where Jesus’s blood flowed for the first time, the circumcision points forward to Christ’s sacrifice on the cross. The material of this Veronica, made of something that was once skin, may have inspired Ferdinand to place it opposite an image of the circumcision where Christ’s skin was cut and his blood flowed for the first time, pointing forward to the Passion. Additionally, the act of sewing the leather image may have evoked the mental image of piercing Christ’s skin bringing his physical pain into prominence, although it is almost impossible to know the mental associations that went with these acts45. Christ’s face is painted directly upon the dark leather; St Veronica and the white veil are absent [Fig. 9]. Still, the images with and without the veil resemble each other closely in the way Christ is portrayed (compare Figs 6 and 8). Christ’s face, not more than a black shape with concisely denoted facial features, makes up the major part of the picture. Hair and face have the same dark color and fade into one another without a noticeable divide. Here too, black lines indicate the lines of the eyebrows, eyes, bottom of the nose and mouth. Only the lips, nose and eyes are clearly registered against the skin of the black, elongated face. White paint is used to indicate the white of the eyes and a long white vertical line and a short 40 Anne H. van Buren, “Dreux Jehan and the Grandes Heures of Philip the Bold” in Als Ich Can: Liber Amicorum in Memory of Professor Dr. Maurits Smeyers, Maurits Smeyers et al. eds, Paris 2002, pp. 1377–1414, sp. pp. 1382, 1388. 41 Lyna,“Un Livre de Prière”(n. 29), pp. 249 –259; Jos Koldeweij,“Lijfelijke en Geestelijke Pelgrimage: Materiële Souvenirs van Spirituele Pelgrimage” in Geen Povere Schoonheid: Laat-Middeleeuwse Kunst in Verband met de Moderne Devotie, Kees Veelenturf ed., Nijmegen 2000, pp. 222–252, sp. p. 246; Kurt Köster,“Kollektionen metallener Wallfahrtsdevotionalien und kleiner Andachtsbilder, eingenäht in spätmittelalterliche Gebetbuch-Handschriften”, in Erlesenes aus der Welt des Buches: Gedanken, Betrachtungen, Forschungen, Bertram Haller ed., Wiesbaden 1979, pp. 77–130, sp. p. 95; De Winter,“A Book of Hours” (n. 29), pp. 527–537. 42 Bousmanne/Hoorebeeck/Arnould, La Librairie (n. 28), p. 271. 43 Vienna, Österreichische Nationalbibliothek, ms Series Nova 2596, fol. 371r and 1828, fol. 10v. On Ferdinand’s Psalter-Hours, cf. Köster, “Kollektionen” (n. 41), p. 107, no. F; On the missal in Vienna, cf. Franz Unterkircher, Die datierten Handschriften der Österreichischen Nationalbibliothek bis zum Jahre 1400, Wien 1969, p. 44; and Hamburger, The Visual (n. 36), p. 330. 44 Dagmar Thoss, Die illuminierten Handschriften und Inkunabeln der Österreichische Nationalbibliothek, 1: Französische Schule, vol. i, Wien 1974, pp. 126 –131. 45 Kathryn M. Rudy, “Sewing the Body of Christ: Eucharist wafer souvenirs stitched into fifteenth-century manuscripts, primarily in the Netherlands”, Journal of the Historians of Netherlandish Art, viii (2016) 1, pp. 1– 47, sp. p. 16; Available from [doi: 10.5092/ jhna.2016.8.1.1].

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horizontal one the long nose. For the lips, red paint is used. The nimbus is not indicated as opposed to other images on parchment that are likely not from Rome, as the one in the Bourdin Hours [Fig. 1]. The countenance shows more stylistic parallels with the image of the Veronica on the pilgrim’s hat in Bonaiuti’s fresco [Fig. 3]. Christ has a pointed beard and the hair falls straight down along the two sides of the face, also ending in pointed tresses which are curling outwards a little. Kurt Köster noted that the Veronica in Ferdinand’s Psalter-Hours was “vielleicht [ein] Andenken an eine Rom-Wallfahrt?”46. Jeffrey Hamburger suggested the leather image in the missal from Mondsee was “probably of Roman origin” too47. Another Veronica on leather was attached to the Grandes Heures ([Fig. 6], lower right) which might be a souvenir of Rome also. Although it is difficult to date these images and impossible to know when they were attached to their manuscripts, it is safe to say that Philip the Good must have added his image before his death in 1467, Ferdinand his before his demise in 1564. Because the Grandes Heures contains both a Roman image with St Veronica and an image without the saint it seems these were on offer alongside each other for pilgrims to choose from. 10 / Jean le Tavernier, half-page miniature of the Veronica, grisaille, in the Hours of Philip the Good, 1450–1460 / Den Haag, National Library of the Netherlands, ms 76 f 2, fol. 246r

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Across the Dynasty Besides the four small images of the Veronica [Fig. 6], the Grandes Heures contains a fifth image of the Veronica with many of the iconographical elements of an image from Rome [Fig. 7]. It was not painted on leather, but on parchment. As in the images of the Veronica in the Heures de Bruxelles [Fig. 4] and the Ghent Psalter, the cloth with the depiction of the face has a prominent position; it takes up almost half of the picture surface, whereas only the head and shoulders of St Veronica rise above the veil. To her left and right are Sts Peter and Paul with their typical attributes and facial features. With its blank and unruled verso, it was probably produced as a single leaf. While the iconographic features point to Rome, the miniature’s style points to a Flemish origin. Veronica’s oriental-looking, carefully draped turban is comparable to Flemish versions of Turkish headgear as for example the one worn

by St Veronica in a miniature of the influential Master of Guillebert de Mets (c. 1410–1445) of the same date48. Furthermore, the image is much more detailed than the other Veronicas described so far, for example in the elaborate patterns that decorate the nimbus and the background. Faces are expressive. Also, Christ’s face, although it is still black and obscure, has more depth, because subtle color differences are used to indicate the roundness of the nose and the grooves along the corners of the mouth. Although St Veronica’s body is largely hidden from view from the shoulders down, she is not bodiless. This image clearly has a different origin than the Roman Veronicas. Nevertheless, the pictorial elements are identical to the large Veronica in the Brussels Hours [Fig. 4]. The face of Christ is disproportionately large compared to Veronica covering almost three quarters of the picture surface. Sts Peter and Paul on the other hand are small. They are positioned behind the veil as if they stand behind a parapet as the prelates that flanked the priest during the ostension. The similarities indicate that Philip the Good ordered not just an image of the Veronica, but a “copy” of the single leaf in the Heures de Bruxelles that was in his possession at the time the Grandes Heures were augmented. The illuminator imitated the formal composition and some details such as the geometric decoration of the nimbus, but adapted the style to Flemish taste. This was not uncommon practice: the image of the Virgin of the Apocalypse of c. 1415, by the Master of the Breviary of John the Fearless, also of religious significance to Philip the Good, may also have been a deliberate imitation of a miniature in another manuscript 49. Someone has scratched the paint from the surface of the Veronica in an act of devotion rather than an attack of iconoclasm. The devotee aimed for the skin of Christ’s face clearly avoiding the eyes which would have been the first target for any iconoclast. The regard for Christ’s eyes becomes significant in the context of the Last Judgement that was often equaled to Christ’s gaze. If Christ was to deny mercy he would avert his eyes. In the Book of Jesus Sirach, also known as Ecclesiasticus – not to be confused with Ecclesiastes – the devotee is duly warned: “Remember the wrath that shall be at the last day, and the time of repaying when he

shall turn away his face” (Sir 18, 24). Salvation was inherent in Christ’s gaze which made the image of Christ’s face even more significant and his eyes the most important feature. Philip the Good is known to have used the Grandes Heures frequently. In the commission to Dreux Jehan to divide the manuscript in two it is described as the “Grandes heures quotidienne”50. The inclusion of the miniatures in a religious manuscript that the Duke took up on a daily basis makes them valuable witnesses to the Duke’s devotional acts. Perhaps Philip had the miniatures copied because they had a cult value. Darkening of the lower part of the page, and even scratch marks on the face itself, indicate that the manuscript owner felt compelled to touch the image repeatedly51. The Roman reference may have been an important reason for Philip to have the image copied. Just as, or perhaps more, important for the inclusion of the Veronica was probably its role as an outstanding part of a religious manuscript belonging to an illustrious forefather. It seems that the Duke consciously inserted references in the Grandes Heures to different treasured volumes that had been in his family’s possession for a long time. Philip’s love of the image becomes even more apparent when we include a second copy in an­ other book of hours, filled with miniatures in the grisaille technique [Fig. 10]. Jean le Tavernier (d. 1462) who produced most of the grisailles used the Veronica in the Grandes Heures as a model. Here, Sts Peter and Paul have been left out. The veil with the impression has been reduced in size in favor of St Veronica. Although the face of Christ is still relatively large when compared to St Veronica, the proportions of the relic seem 46 Köster, “Kollektionen” (n. 41), p. 107. 47 Hamburger, The Visual (n. 36), p. 330. 48 Los Angeles, J. Paul Getty Museum, ms 2, fol. 13v. On the Master of Guillebert de Mets, cf. Maximiliaan Martens, “The master of Guillebert de Mets: an illuminator between Paris and Ghent?”, in Als Ich Can (n. 40), pp. 921–939; Gregory T. Clark, “The Master of Guillebert de Mets, Philip the Good and the Breviary of John the Fearless”, Quaerendo, xxxviii (2008), pp. 279 –298. 49 Gaspar/Lyna, Les Principaux Manuscrits (n. 32), p. 422. On the significance of the image and the impressions of badges surrounding the miniature, see Hanneke van Asperen, “A Pilgrim’s Additions: Traces of Pilgrimage in the Belles Heures of Jean de Berry”, Quaerendo, xxxviii (2008), pp. 175 –194, sp. pp. 182–186. 50 Bousmanne/Hoorebeeck/Arnould, La Librairie (n. 28), p. 271. 51 Kathryn M. Rudy, Postcards on Parchment: The Social Lives of Medieval Books, New Haven/London 2015, pp. 176 –184, sp. p. 183.

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more attuned to the size of the saint. As Anne Korteweg has convincingly argued before, the size of the book of hours with grisailles indicates that the Duke tried to emulate the Grandes Heures that had belonged to ruling members of his dynasty52. The copied image stressed the devotional links between the generations and Philip’s dynastic loyalties played an important role when he chose to include this miniature of the Veronica in several of his religious manuscripts. Within the context of the religious manuscript, the Roman provenance of a Veronica seems to have lost relevance to the Duke. With each copy, the connection with Rome is downturned. The same becomes clear from the four smaller Veronicas in the Grandes Heures when the Duke coupled the Roman images with a picture of the Veronica that do not share this provenance ([Fig. 6]: upper right and lower left). The four pictures were probably attached for reasons of intensification. Each time after the devotee had read the words of the prayer Salve Sancta Facies on the preceding pages, he could gaze upon the images of the Veronica. Perhaps the owner hoped their range increased their effectiveness. The repetition brings to mind a leaf with eight uncut images of the Veronica with the dark face found in the convent of Wienhausen. The leaf was considered to be “unfinished” and therefore an indication that it must have been produced by the nuns themselves, but more recent research has indicated that the leaf with the repetition of the Holy Face was probably used in its entirety: the repetition intensified the devotion53. Clearly, parchment and leather images of the Veronica in different sizes, painted in Rome and sold as souvenirs there, circulated from the early fourteenth century until at least c. 1500 when they were still being copied in the margins of Flemish religious manuscripts. Iconographically and formally related to one another, there seems to have been models that the Veronica painters in Rome conformed to and that changed little over time. The larger images probably predated the smaller, simplified ones. The iconography was condensed, but still show the same features that make them easily recognizable with the long black face, the hair and beard falling down in three tresses. Images with 248

and without St Veronica probably existed alongside each other. Although these pictures must have been produced in large quantities and over a long period of time, they scarcely survive, simply because they were fragile. If they were not attached to the pages of a manuscript and left there, they would eventually disintegrate and vanish. Besides these Roman souvenirs other images of the Veronica, usually on parchment, found their way into manuscripts. Both leather and parchment images were produced in Rome, but only those that are connected through a certain style, iconography and material can be attributed with any degree of plausibility to the Eternal City. Most Veronicas found in books were probably local products that were also painted in large quantities to meet the wishes of people who did not have the means or time to undertake the journey to Rome. Significantly, the Roman connection of the souvenirs seems to have been increasingly negligible to subsequent book owners. To put it more accurately, every painted image of the Veronica was associated with Rome which meant that every Veronica could take the place of a Roman souvenir. This made a Roman provenance less relevant to the next book owner. Every Veronica, Roman or not, painted on leather or on parchment, pointed forward to the final judgement which would be inherent in Christ’s gaze. For Philip the Good, the dynastic links seem to have been more important than the Roman connection that was downturned with each copy. The cloth relic that was a reproduction of Christ’s face itself implicitly legitimized duplication, and the image gave rise to new ones ascribed with similar beneficial characteristics and even personal meaning, as the miniatures ordered by Philip the Good indicate. For the Duke, the Veronica modelled after a souvenir from Rome that had been in his family for decades did not only provide a devotional link with Rome, across geographic boundaries, but was first and foremost an image that tied him firmly to the religious activities of forefathers in power, across the dynasty. 52 Anne S. Korteweg,“The Book of Hours of Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy, in The Hague and its Later Adaptation”, in Als Ich Can (n. 40), pp. 757–771, sp. p. 758. 53 Koldeweij, “Lijfelijke” (n. 41), pp. 222–252.

summary

“Où il y a une Veronique atachiée dedens” Obrazy Veraikonu v církevních rukopisech se zvláštní pozorností věnovanou burgundským vévodům a jejich rodině

Některé rukopisy určené k  potřebám laiků obsahují drobné obrázky Veraikonu, tedy vyobrazení látky s otiskem Kristovy tváře, které do již hotových manuskriptů přidávali pravděpodobně samotní vlastníci knih. Malíři Veraikonů pracovali převážně v Římě, kde byla relikvie uchována a vystavována, ale tato zobrazení se vyráběla i na jiných místech, a to pro uspokojení poptávky věřících, kteří se nemohli či nechtěli vydat na dlouhou cestu do Věčného města. Veraikony můžeme nalézt i na poutnických odznacích, což vytváří dojem, že plnily rovněž funkci poutnických suvenýrů. Bližší pohled na sbírku těchto předmětů však naznačuje něco jiného. Odznaky s Veraikony mohly být zakoupeny na různých posvátných místech, avšak velmi často v oblastech, kde žili majitelé rukopisů s vyobrazením Veraikonu, což předpokládá, že pro jejich získání lidé nemuseli urazit dlouhou cestu. Autorka článku se věnuje několika římským suvenýrům, které identifikuje na základě formál­ ních a stylových podobností a jejich rozšíření. Jedná se o dva celostránkové obrázky (Brusel, Bibliothèque Royale de Belgique, ms  11060– 61 a 5863–64) a několik menších vyobrazení, která pravděpodobně vznikla v Římě. Ta můžeme rozdělit do dvou skupin. V první skupině drží roušku sv. Veronika (Fritzlar, Dombibliothek, ms  72; nalezeno v cisterciáckém klášteře ve Wienhausenu; Brusel, Bibliothèque Royale de Belgique, ms 11 035–37); na obrazech spadajících do druhé skupiny pak světici nenalezneme (Vídeň, Österreichische Nationalbibliothek, ms 1828 a Series Nova 2596, Brusel, Bibliothèque Royale de Belgique, ms 11035–37). Toto určení nám umožňuje analyzovat ma­ teriály, které malíři daných Veraikonů používali, a totiž pergamen a kůži. Také jejich ikonografie

si zasluhuje podrobnější zkoumání: zobrazují totiž relikvii tak, jak byla ukazována poutníkům v Římě. Sv. Veronika je na nich navíc zobrazena jako Kristův obraz – spíše, než aby pouze ukazovala dvourozměrnou relikvii, odhaluje sv. Veronika Kristovu tvář, která je fyzicky přítomná. Římské suvenýry vyskytující se v  rukopisech společně s Veraikony vyrobenými na jiných místech také nastolují otázku, nakolik byl pro ty, kteří obrázky do svých modlitebních knih vkládali, jejich římský původ důležitý. Každé zobrazení Veraikonu bylo spojováno s římskou relikvií, což také znamenalo, že každý Veraikon mohl být nazýván římským suvenýrem. Samotná podstata relikvie, která vznikla otištěním Kristovy tváře na látku, implicitně ospravedlňovala vytváření kopií. Z původního obrazu tak byly vytvářeny obrazy nové, kterým se připisovaly obdobné blahodárné vlastnosti, a které pro jednotlivé věřící měly často osobní význam. Zdá se, že ve chvíli, kdy se poutník vrátil z pouti a předmět se přesunul z jeho oděvu na pergamen rukopisu, ztratil římský původ obrazu pro další vlastníky svoji důležitost. Filip iii. Dobrý přidal několik obrázků Veraikonů do modlitební knížky zvané Grandes Heures, kterou, jak je známo, pravidelně používal. Nejen, že kladl bez rozdílu vedle sebe jak římské, tak lokální Veraikony, ale nechal také vytvořit několik kopií římského Veraikonu. S každou další kopií tak v podstatě docházelo k oslabení provázanosti s Věčným městem. Pro Filipa iii. Dobrého tedy představoval Veraikon vytvořený podle římského suvenýru nejen zbožné pouto k Římu překračující zeměpisné hranice, ale především obraz, který jej pevně poutal s náboženskými úkony celé dynastie jeho vládnoucích předchůdců. 249

Abstract – The Veronica of Boniface of Verona – In the second half of the thirteenth century, Boniface of Verona wrote a poem in hexameters, the Veronica, describing the story of the holy cloth with the face of Christ. He dedicated his work to Cardinal Guillaume de Braye. The text is transmitted by a single fifteenth-century manuscript (Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France, ms Lat. 8229). To compose his poem, which is divided into two books, Boniface of Verona draws on different traditions: the cloth preserved in Saint Peter’s Basilica is identified with the Holy Face of Edessa, brought to Rome by Saint Veronica, who is considered not the pious woman of Calvary, but the wife of Abgar, King of Edessa. Boniface of Verona is, therefore, an important witness to the various circulating versions of the history of the Roman Veronica. This contribution, which is the first step towards the complete critical edition of Boniface of Saint Verona’s Veronica, offers an overview of this unknown testimony of the worship of the relic in Rome during the thirteenth century, under the sway of the papal curia. Keywords Boniface of Verona, thirteenth-century poetry, Pope Gregory ix , Cardinal Guillaume de Braye, Abgar legend, Veronica Marco Petoletti Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Milano [email protected]

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Angelo Piacentini Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Brescia [email protected]

The Veronica of Boniface of Verona Marco Petoletti & Angelo Piacentini

Part i In the thirteenth century, in the shadow of the papal curia, scientists, poets, writers, and translators found fertile ground. At that time, the court of Rome became a breeding ground for the natural sciences and medicine, although poetry also fascinated popes and cardinals alike1. This is the century of Boniface of Verona2. Exiled from his town as a result of the purges ordered by the tyrant, Ezzelino da Romano, he served Rudolf of Hapsburg, King of the Romans. He finished his career in Perugia, where in 1293, commissioned by the local municipality, he produced a poem in hexameters to praise and celebrate the Umbrian city which had welcomed him. This was the Eulistea, an extended poem for which he received the princely sum of 25 gold florins3. Some of his works

in praise of the powerful, which are mentioned in the inventories of medieval libraries, have been lost. Before he wrote his major work in Perugia, *

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The first part is by Marco Petoletti; the second one by Angelo Piacentini. Agostino Paravicini Bagliani, Medicina e scienze della natura alla corte dei papi nel Duecento, Spoleto 1991; Thomas Haye, Päpste und Poeten. Die mittelalterliche Kurie als Objekt und Förderer panegyrischer Dichtung, Berlin/New York 2009; Marco Petoletti, Un poeta alla corte dei papi. Bonaiuto da Casentino e Bonifacio viii, texts translated by Angelo Piacentini, Rome 2016, pp. 11–30. Girolamo Arnaldi, “Bonifacio Veronese”, in Dizionario biografico degli Italiani, xii, Rome 1970, pp. 191–192; Petoletti, Un poeta (n. 1), pp. 22–24, with bibliography. Francesco Bonaini, Ariodante Fabretti, Filippo Luigi Polidori, “Cronache e storie inedite della città di Perugia dal mcl al mdlxiii seguite da inediti documenti tratti dagli archivi di Perugia, di Firenze e di Siena”, Archivio Storico Italiano, xvi (1859), pp. xii–xix and 3–52; Anna Imelde Galletti, “Considerazioni per una interpretazione dell’Eulistea”, Archivio Storico Italiano, cxxviii (1970), pp. 305–334; Paul Gerhard Schmidt, “L’epica latina nel secolo xiii. Notizie su Bonifacio da Verona e la sua Eulistea”, in Aspetti della letteratura latina nel secolo xiii, Claudio Leonardi, Giovanni Orlandi eds, Spoleto 1986, pp. 221–227.

1 / Veronica showing the Holy Shroud in front of the emperor, Lombardy (Milan), xiv century / Milano, Biblioteca Ambrosiana, l 58 sup., fol. 67r

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Boniface attended the papal curia. To Cardinal Ottaviano Ubaldini, elected in 1245, he dedicated a short poem about the Virgin and Saint Anne, the Annayde, preserved in a magnificent thirteenth-century manuscript (Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France, ms Lat. 8114), where at the end he proudly declares that the force of his argument would have silenced the poets of the past 4. To another cardinal, the Franciscan William de Braye, who died in 1282 and was buried in the church of Saint Domenico in Orvieto along with a magnificent monument sculpted by Arnolfo di Cambio, he addressed a longer poem, the Veronica, in two books. The text is preserved in only one manuscript of Roman origin (Paris, bnf, ms Lat. 8229), copied at the end of the fifteenth century in an ungainly cursive humanistic script5. It is a pity that the original has not been preserved given that, as stated at the beginning of the book, the poem was to be accompanied by a picture of Veronica (Et hic debet esse figura Veronice, [Here must be the portrait of Veronica]), as in the case of Boniface’s text of the Annayde, illustrated with several illuminations. Cardinal William de Braye was entrusted with the task of presenting the text to Gregory x, who was consecrated Pope in 1272 and died in 1276. The Veronica, which can be dated precisely enough, was written in the years of the pontificate of Gregory x. The narrative set out in the two books concerns the origin and the arrival in Rome of the holy cloth (as well as the cult surrounding it, which was already widespread) in the second half of the thirteenth century, when Boniface composed his verses. To reconstruct the story, the poet draws on apocryphal sources, which are bent to his needs in order to build an effective narrative. The Veronica issues from a mixture of different traditions. According to the written records found by Boniface, the relic preserved in Saint Peter’s Basilica is identified with the Holy Face of Edessa, brought to Rome by Veronica, not the pious woman of Calvary, but rather a queen, the wife of Abgar, King of Edessa. The poem is thus a valuable record of the different versions which circulated concerning the history of the Roman Veronica. Boniface’s work is based on a source where the Holy Roman sweat-cloth is already identified with the mandylion of Edessa.

This version of the legend of Abgar of Edessa was not particularly successful, as it was transmitted by a small number of manuscripts, among which is fundamental the one from Paris (bnf, ms Lat. 2688), written and illustrated in central Italy, perhaps in Rome, in the second half of the thirteenth century while Boniface was writing his poem6. It is a wonderful book, where the parchment folios shine with exceptional illuminations. This version of the Abgar legend, published by Ernst von Dobschütz with the title Eine lateinisch-armenische Fassung der Abgarlegende, dates from the thirteenth century, not too distant in time from the production of the oldest manuscript which contains it, and geographically set in Rome7. At the end of the text, the anonymous author recalls the countless miracles wrought by the Roman Veronica, of which he was an eyewitness, and says: “The Veronica, then moved to Rome, is placed in the oratory of the Holy Mother of God inside the basilica of the prince of the apostles”8. In this text, we can find already the connection between the Holy Face sent by Jesus to Abgar and the Veronica of Saint Peter’s Basilica, kept in the oratory commissioned by Pope John vii in the eighth century in honor of the Virgin, and decorated with splendid mosaics9. Moreover, this oratory, according to other sources, was linked to the cult of Veronica. Indeed, Benedict of St Andrea on Soratte in his Chronicon (second half of the tenth century) speaks of a beautiful chapel (precisely that of John vii) in Saint Peter’s, ubi dicitur a Veronice10. This tradition is confirmed by other sources from the twelfth century: Peter of Manlius, who described the Vatican Basilica11; Peter the Deacon of Monte Cassino in his Jerusalem itinerary12; and Benedetto Canon of St Peter13. The philological comparison testifies that Boniface of Verona was consulting this particular version of the Abgar legend in writing the first book of his poem. This consideration is especially important when one takes into account that the Paris manuscript (bnf, ms Lat. 2688), as mentioned, was written in the same period, perhaps in Rome, where our poet was active14. The first book, which includes 484 hexameters, develops the story of the King of Edessa Abgar who, having fallen ill during the war against the Persians, wanted to enlist the help of Jesus, whose

miracles he was familiar with. The short summary at the beginning of the poem condenses the story into eight verses: “The way that leads to heaven, the majesty of the divine face and the miracles, expressed by my poor song, remember me, Virgin, in accompanying my verses: the kingdom of Armenia that has shone throughout the world, the beautiful queen of Edessa who fled from their land, Jerusalem which cruelly fell, through their own mistakes, Rome which vigorously went to avenge

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the passion and death of Christ”15.

Because of the disease which afflicts him, Abgar decides to send his ambassador, Ananias, to Rome to ask the Senate of Rome for help against his enemies16. During the journey, before arriving in Rome, Ananias has the opportunity to listen to the miracles of Jesus in Lucca. It is a simple acknowledgement, but in the poetry of Boniface the history of the Roman Veronica is linked to that of another miraculous image, the carved Holy Face of Lucca:

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“As he passed by the walls of beautiful Lucca and longed to hear about Jesus, and his renown, he stopped and noted down everything scrupulously, and considered it almost a portent worked by the power of divine virtue”17.

Once back in Edessa, Ananias realizes that the illness of his king has worsened. Boniface, lover of scientific digressions, indulges himself idly with descriptions of the devastating effects that the plague had on the sovereign’s body. In an urgent appeal Ananias convinces Abgar to resort to Jesus, mighty prophet, “that with only his word is able to cure illnesses, to restore sight to the blind, to heal the lame and raise the dead”18. At 4

Clelia Maria Piastra, “Nota sull’Annayde di Bonifacio Veronese”, Aevum, xxviii (1954), pp. 505–521. On the Paris, bnf, ms Lat. 8114: François Avril, Marie-Thérèse Gousset, Claudia Rabel, Manuscrits enluminés d’origine italienne. 2. xiiie siècle, Paris 1984, p. 130. 5 Clelia Maria Piastra, “Nota sulla Veronica di Bonifacio Veronese”, Aevum, xxxiii (1959), pp. 356–381, with partial edition. On Paris, bnf, ms Lat. 8229: Marco Petoletti, “Pro onestis et castissimis moribus. La commedia Isis di Francesco Ariosto”, in Comico e tragico nel teatro umanistico, Stefano Pittaluga, Paolo Viti eds, Genoa 2016, pp. 127–137, sp. pp. 130–131. 6 Avril/Gousset/Rabel, Manuscrits enluminés (n. 4), pp. 133–135; Isa Ragusa, “The Iconography of the Abgar Cycle in Paris ms. Lat. 2688”, Miniatura, ii (1989), pp. 35–51; Alessandro Tomei, “Il ms. lat. 2688 della Bibliothèque Nationale de France: la Veronica a Roma”, in Medioevo. Immagine e racconto, Atti del convegno internazionale di studi (Parma, 27–30 settembre 2000), Arturo Carlo Quintavalle ed., Milan 2003, pp. 398–406. 7 Ernst von Dobschütz, Christusbilder. Untersuchungen zur christlichen Legende, ii, Leipzig 1899, pp. 141**–156**. 8 Ibidem, p. 152**: “Qui [vultus] postmodum Romam delatus in sancta dei genitricis ac intacte virginis Marie oratorio intra basilicam principis apostolorum extitit collocatus, ut mater in filio et in matre filius mutuo consortio refulgeret”.

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Antonella Ballardini, “Un oratorio per la Theotokos: Giovanni vii (705–707) committente a San Pietro”, in Medioevo. I committenti, Atti del convegno internazionale di studi (Parma, 21–26 settembre 2010), Arturo Carlo Quintavalle ed., Milan/Parma 2011, pp. 94–116; Antonella Ballardini, Paola Pogliani, “A reconstruction of the oratory of John vii (705–707)”, in Old St. Peter’s, Rome, Rosamond McKitterick, John Osborne, Carol M. Richardson, Joanna Story eds, Cambridge 2013, pp. 190–213. Il Chronicon di Benedetto monaco di S. Andrea del Soratte, Giuseppe Zucchetti ed., Rome 1920 (Fonti per la Storia d’Italia, 55), p. 41: “Iohannes preerat papa, qui, inter multa operum inlustrium, fecit oratorium Sancte Dei genitricis, opere pulcerrimo, intra ecclesia Beati Petri, ubi dicitur a Veronice”. Codice topografico della Città di Roma, iii, Roberto Valentini, Giuseppe Zucchetti eds, Rome 1946 (Fonti per la Storia d’Italia, 90), p. 411: “ante quod oratorium est etiam sudarium Christi, quod vocatur Veronica”. On Peter of Manlius: Marco Petoletti, “Ut patenter omnibus innotescat. Il trattato di Nicola Maniacutia (sec. xii) sull’immagine acheropita del Laterano”, in Auctor et Auctoritas in Latinis Medii Aevi Litteris. Author and Authorship in Medieval Latin Literature. Proceedings of the vith Congress of International Medieval Latin Commitee (Benevento/Naples, November 9–13, 2010), Edoardo D’Angelo, Jan Ziolkowski eds, Florence 2014, pp. 847–863, p. 851. Petri Diaconi Liber de locis sanctis, Robert Weber ed., in Itineraria et alia geographica, (ccsl, 175), Turnhout 1965, p. 96: “Sudarium vero, cum quo Christus faciem suam extersit, que ab aliis Veronyca dicitur, tempore Tyberii Cesaris Rome delatum est”. Codice topografico (n. 11), p. 210: “postea vadit ad sudarium Christi quod vocatur Veronica”. Dobschütz, Christusbilder, ii (n. 7), p. 142**, used another manuscript in his edition (Florence, Biblioteca Laurenziana, ms Plut. 15 dext. 12, c. xiv), which belonged to the famous Franciscan friar Tedaldo della Casa (Francesco Mattesini, “La biblioteca francescana di S. Croce e fra Tedaldo della Casa”, Studi francescani, lvii [1960], pp. 254–316; Giancarlo Casnati, “Della Casa, Tedaldo”, in Dizionario biografico degli Italiani, xxxvi, Rome 1988, pp. 723–725). Veronica, i, vv. 1–8: “Celestes aditus et divi numina vultus / miraque sub gracili memora miracula cantu / alma meis assueta modis procedere Virgo, / quo regnum Armenie toto perfulserit orbi, / quid regina placens Edese diffugerit ortu / quove fero ruerit Ierosolima casu, / errores imitata suos, quo Roma vigore / flagitio Christi mortique accesserit ultrix”. Hereafter I use my provisional edition of the text. Ibidem, vv. 60–67: “Rex erat Armeniis quondam dominator in oris / Abgarus. Hic Casme genitus dictusque thoparca: / triginta ipsius regni vergentibus annis, / tempore quo Cesar Tiberi qui nomina tradit / regnabat terris pelagoque et finibus orbis, / iam deno octavo Phebo redeunte sub eius / imperio, proh, quanta viris discrimina parta / et fatis obiecta suis!”. The source of these verses is the apocryphal text on Veronica in the form transmitted by Paris, bnf, ms Lat. 2688 (Dobschütz, Christusbilder, ii [n. 7], p. 143**): “Abgarus rex civitatis Edesse, Casme filius, regni ipsius anno xxx, imperii Tiberii Cesaris anno xviiii [xviii Paris, bnf, ms Lat. 2688] misit Romam legatos”. Veronica, i, vv. 86–93: “Qui dum transiret nitide per menia Luce / prodigus ‹ac› audire Iesum, quem fama canebat, / sistit et omne notat quasi mo‹n›strum celitus actum / divinumque tenet. Sed postquam tanta notavit, / expedit accessum Romam sua votaque complet / ac redit in patriam, donis a Cesare missis / Casmedi, letusque subit iam tecta toparche / Cesareumque offert munus…”. The last words of v. 86 come from Lucan, Bellum civile, 1, 586: “Arruns incoluit desertae moenia Lucae”, a poet widely copied in the Middle Ages. On the Holy Face of Lucca see the essay by Raffaele Savigni in this book with further bibliography. Veronica, i, vv. 133–152: “Unde Ananias vehementi turbine dixit: / Ha rex! Quidne queror? Pro te medicina peribit / aut per te periit, pro te phisicalia cessant, / pro te cura vacat nec spes nec causa salutis. / En ubi robur inest, pater o fortissime quondam / Armenie gentis, species et forma sereni / vultus, illa tui regum solertia summa / ac agilis virtus? Memoro, cum missus ad Urbem / Romanam fuerim, quod apud Bethel ecce propheta / unus erat vidique illum, miracula scripsi / que faciebat ibi, signavi hec margine carte. / Hic verbo tantum langores undique curat / et morbos, cecos inluminat atque caducos / sanat et infectos et suscitat ipse cadaver. / Huic Iesus est nomen, qui Christus dicitur. Hic est / quem coluere Magi, cum stella apparuit orbi, / quos dudum tecto memini vidisse sub isto, / cum thus et mirram ferrent aurumque vicissim / illi, quem Christum verum credidisse feruntur, / quem totiens vidisse optas…”.

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this point Ananias is charged with a new mission to meet Jesus and try to secretly obtain a portrait with the help of a painter. It is noteworthy that in many apocryphal stories it is Ananias himself who is described as a painter. In Bethany Ananias does indeed meet the Savior, but the artist he has brought with him is unable to portray Jesus, whose appearance is changing: “He looks like a young man, then an old man, then a child. And so the hand of the painter is defeated, unable to understand what appearance he has”19. Finally, thanks to the mediation of the apostles Philip and Andrew, Ananias manages to have the letter delivered that Abgar had addressed to Jesus. This text, recovered in the archives of Edessa and translated into Greek, had already been reported by Eusebius of Caesarea in his Church History and had wide circulation in the subsequent development of the story whose protagonist is the mandylion of Edessa20. Boniface puts into hexameters both the letter in which Abgar begs the Savior to heal him and go to Edessa, and Jesus’ answer, praising the king for having believed in him without seeing him directly and, although refusing the invitation because it was the time of his passion, death and resurrection, he promises to send one of his disciples to proclaim the true faith. At this point the poet accurately describes the miraculous origin of the Veronica, the holy blissful face that “the crowds from distant regions seek and will seek devoutly”21. After dictating a letter of reply, Jesus asked to bring a white cloth embroidered with a purple edging22. The textile was delivered and, when it was placed near the face of Christ, drenched in sweat, it miraculously captured the image of the face of Jesus. The Veronica, identified with the Holy Face of Edessa, is thus not a painting, but the impressed image of the authentic face of the Savior, just as Peter the Deacon had suggested in the twelfth century23. The miraculous cloth was then delivered, along with the letter of reply, to Ananias, to be taken to his king24. After various adventures the holy veil is brought to Edessa by Ananias, but because of the war, Abgar’s ambassador decides to hide the relic in a well. Only when it became known that the king was alive, was the Veronica recovered and  Abgar healed.

Part ii The second book opens with Abgar’s impressive and touching lament for the death of Christ25. The painful news echoes around the world. The king of Edessa is upset: he collapses to the ground beating his breast and scratching his face26. He would have preferred his own death, rather than to know of the death of Christ27. He addresses his lament to the Savior: “Why you, oh Christ, Father, Creator of the world, Factor of the mankind? What have you done, oh cruel Fate? The natural order should have been overturned; Christ should have been spared death”28. Abgar recalls his letter written to Jesus, which had urged him to flee from the Jews and reach his realm in Armenia: the king had palaces and mansions to host him; he would have given everything he had29. For days and days, Abgar cannot find peace. Heartbroken, he continues to evoke the ominous and bitter day, when the Empire, the whole world, the deaf, the blind, the leper, every sick-man, when they all lost Christ30. But it happened that Abgar receives news, that one of Jesus’ disciples, Judas Thaddeus, is a guest at the great house of Tobias, son of another man with the same name31. Abgar knows that Thaddeus is telling episodes of the Passion of Christ32. The king pronounces these words: “The one who will cure completely our illness and our wounds has come; I remember what is written in the letter of Christ”33. Hence Tobias is immediately summoned before the king, who says he wants to meet Thaddeus34. After returning home, Tobias, obedient, reports Abgar’s wish to Thaddeus: “O holy man of God, I ask you to come before the king. I don’t know what he wants, but he is a faithful to Christ. He has the Holy Face with him; he prays to Christ and honors him”35. Then Thaddeus replies to Tobias: “This is what I came for. I have to see the king”36. You can see that also in this case Boniface bases his lines adhering almost literally to his version of Abgar legend transmitted in the manuscript of Paris37. Together, they go to the royal palace, run through the rooms and arrive in the presence of Abgar seated on a throne38. Upon seeing them, the king gets up and turns in prayer to Thaddeus39. The crowd of onlookers are astonished:

the distinguished and powerful men of the city, the elders of Edessa murmur to each other, because they do not understand why their king worships this stranger40. Abgar has realized that Thaddeus is the messenger that Christ had told him about in his letter: only the king has recognized Thaddeus for the splendor that shines from his face41. Faithful to Christ, Abgar, the Toparch, promises to be the relentless avenger of his death: soon he writes a letter to the Emperor in Rome telling he would lead his army and his people to perpetrate the revenge42. This is the crucial theme of Vindicta Salvatoris, which Boniface finds in his version of the Abgar legend43. This is the reason for the connection, cleverly exploited by Boniface, with the other two apocryphal works used in the second book, the Cura Tiberii and the Vindicta Salvatoris. Relieved of his funereal attire, Abgar now also casts off his broken and sorrowful countenance and, smiling, he embraces Thaddeus44. Abgar is baptized and, once washed in the sacred font, totally cured of leprosy45.The total and definitive healing is a direct result of the baptism. At that point Boniface describes the conversion of the people of Edessa who, following Abgar’s baptism, are baptized in droves46. Finally Boniface mentions Veronica, the wife of Abgar: she has 19 Veronica, i, vv. 164–170: “Clamque autem cupiens complere edicto toparche, / conducto pictore studet comprehendere formam / ipsius et faciem. Facies variatur at illi: / nunc iuvenis, nunc ille senis puerique figuram / insinuat. Sic ipsa manus pictoris hebescit / inscia quam teneat formam. Miratus in ipsa / effigie cessat”. The source of this passage is the apocryphal text edited by Dobschütz, Christusbilder, ii [n. 7], pp. 144**–145**): “Cum ipsis peritissimum pictorem transmittens, qui eius venerandam effigiem si ad eum venire nollet auro et electissimis coloribus designaret. […] Sed hec pluries temptante pictore minime potuit ducere ad effectum. Primo enim triginta annorum ut tunc erat apparuit, postmodum grandeve etatis ac deinde pueri duodeni ostendit aspectum. Mirantur nuntii insoliti visione miraculi, periti pictoris manus ebescit, sensus deficit et quod possint facere iam ignorant non valentes illo die eum amplius intueri”. 20 Eusebius Werke. 2. Die Kirchengeschichte, Edward Schwartz, Theodor Mommsen eds, i, Leipzig 1903 (Die Griechischen Christlichen Schrifteller der ersten drei Jahrhunderte, 9.1), pp. 87–89. 21 Veronica, i, vv. 249–250: “quem peregre querunt et querent undique turbe, / undique devote sanctum vultumque beatum”. 22 Ibidem, vv. 228–238 : “Ut fatus talia, pannum / exposcit qui sicut olor candore nitescens, / in pallore auri positus, giramine comptus / margineos circa fines, similatus ut ostrum, / traditur Ananie, quasi flos pulcherrimus instar / lactis habens medio niveaque albedine splendens. / Postquam illum accepit manibus, speculatus in ipso, / protrahit in vultum, rore ac sudore fluentem. / Imprimitur pannus facie retinetque figuram / effigiemque suam, similisque resultat imago / illa eadem que forma fuit spectante cohorte”. Cf. Dobschütz, Christusbilder, ii (n. 7), p. 146**: “Ihesu vero in domo Gamalielis prefati existente, occulte prelibati nuntii ad ipsius imperium detulerunt pannum mundissimum niveo candore nitentem. In quo statim ut salvator noster in suis operibus mirabiliter faciem suam tersit eius

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25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37

38 39 40 41

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effigies effigiata remansit. Quam omnis populus videns adorantes Ihesum laudes deo reddiderunt”. See n. 11. Veronica, i, vv. 329–340 : “Sed denique vultum, / que‹m› iam totus habet Veronica nomine mundus, / quem ve vocant alii sudarium, et agmina clamant / Urbis, idem crebro solent utrumque vocare, / collectum strictumque simul totumque plicatum / dat Iesus ecce Thome, qui dictus Didimus, ipsum / tradat ut Ananie facieque stupescat in illa / ac regi ferat Armenie speretque salutem / ex illo visu viso, dum nuntius illuc, / nuntius ille Dei divinus apostolus ibit / instructurus eum fidei vestigia sancte / culturamque sacram, vitam huic animamque daturus.” Cf. Dobschütz, Christusbilder, ii (n. 7), pp. 146**–147**: “Ac ipsa diligenter beati Thome apostoli manibus complicata et in mundissimo gausape involuta Ananie tradita est et sociis suis una cum epistola superius prenotata”. Veronica, ii, v. 1: “Interea Christi sonuerunt funera mundo”. Herafter I use my provisional edition of the text of the poem. Ibidem, vv. 2–3: “Sternitur unde ‹˘ ˉ› telluri et pectora tundit / dilaniatque genas”. Ibidem, vv. 3–4: “Vite spiramina mallet / inpendisse neci Christum quam morte teneri”. Ibidem, vv. 5–6: “… atque refert: ‘Quid Christe pater, quid conditor orbis, / humani factor generis? Quid et impia Parca?’”. Ibidem, vv. 8–11: “Heu dudum scripsi, mirabilis Heros, / ut tu Iudeos fugeres et regna subires: / hec mea tecta, lares ac horrea queque tenebam, / obtuleram, michi quidquid erat, satis illud…”. Ibidem, vv. 20–22: “… quam male te perdit Cesares machina rerum / te surdus, cecus, leprosus et eger ubique / illa dies sceleris, numero delenda dierum”. Ibidem, vv. 27–29: “Talia dum memorat, memoratis sepe diebus, / ecce sub ingenti comperuit ede Tobie, / alterius nati qui nomine stabat eodem”. Ibidem, vv. 30–32: “Ipse Tadeus ibi crucifixi singula narrans / interitum penasque Iesu. Sed rex, ubi novit / illic esse virum recitantem talia…”. Ibidem, vv. 32–34: “… dixit: / ‘Venit qui morbos curabit et ulcera nostri / plenius, ut memori memorat michi pagina Christi’”. Ibidem, vv. 35–36: “Mox regi accessit iussus tum presto Tobias / et parens rediit…”. Ibidem, vv. 36–40: “… sic et fert inde Thadeo: / ‘O vir sancte Dei, te queso accedere regi. / Quid velit ignoro. Christum tamen ille veretur / ac Domini vultum secum tenet atque perorat / et longe metuit’ sic dixit”. Ibidem, vv. 40–42: “At inde Thadeus: / ‘Missus ad hoc veni regemque videre necesse. / Ire libet’”. Cf. Dobschütz, Christusbilder, ii (n. 7), pp. 150**–151**: “Thadeus apostolus, infra cuius predicationis sortem Edessa civitas erat, prevenit ad civitatem predictam, manens apud Thobiam, filium Thobie. Quod, ut audivit de eo rex Abgarus et nuntiatum est ei quod venisset apostolus Jhesu secundum quod ei scripserat, vocavit ad se Thobiam, apud quem manebat apostolus Dei, et ait ad eum: ‘Audivi quod quidam vir potens venit et manet in domo tua. Adduc eum ad me’. Cumque redisset Thobias dixit Thadeo: ‘Abgarus thoparca dixit michi, ut te ad eum perducam, ut cures eum’. Et Thadeus: ‘Veniam’ inquid ‘quoniam maxime propter ipsum missus sum’”. Ibidem, vv. 42–44: “… tenduntque ambo scanduntque per aulas / regales regemque adeunt solioque sedentem / aspiciunt…”. Ibidem, vv. 44–45: “… rex ipse, videns, assurgit et orat / sollemnem Christi famulum”. Ibidem, vv. 45–48: “… turmeque stupescunt / astantesque urbis, proceres, comitesque potentes / et quod adorasset processas exulis huius / rex caute inquirunt et secum murmura mittunt”. Ibidem, vv. 53–54: “Viderat autem / splendoris signum facie fulsisse Thadei.” Boniface enriched with some details the meager narrative of the source: cf. Dobschütz, Christusbilder, ii (n. 7), p. 151**: “Postera vero die cum ingressus fuisset Thadeus ad regem presentibus primatibus suis, statim in ingressu visum est Abgaro nescio quid splendoris in vultu Apostoli”. Ibidem, vv. 55–59: “Illius adventus hora rex inde thoparca / ultoremque necis Christi se voverat acrem, / copia siqua sibi gentisque exercitus esset, / et mortis tanti casum iam scripserat Urbi / imperioque eius vindictam utcumque reposcens”. Cf. Dobschütz, Christusbilder, ii (n. 7), p. 151**: “Tunc rex ad eum: ‘usque adeo’ inquid ‘credidi in ipsum, ut et Iudeos, qui crucifixerunt eum, velim, sit tanta michi adesset exercitus copia, trucidare et Romani regni auctoritas minime impediret’. Scripserat enim idem rex Tyberio super vindictam mortis Domini facienda, sicut Armenica scriptura testatur”. Veronica, ii, vv. 60–61: “Lugubres tandem vestes vultumque dolentem / ponit et exilarans amplecitur ecce Thadeum”. Ibidem, vv. 62–63: “Baptizatur eo sacro quoque fonte lavatus, / redditur humane totaliter inde saluti”. Ibidem, v. 64: “Ac acies quecunque alie baptismata sumunt”.

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embraced faith in Christ and gives her name to Christ’s sweat cloth47. However, Abgar and Veronica would still produce wicked descendants: after the death of his father, the eldest son takes the throne, rejects the Christian faith and became a worshiper of idols48. The apostate son commits no end of crimes: he builds statues, worships idols, marble effigies, and false oracles49. He seeks to subvert every law, changing the kingdom and converting the people to the ancient faith of the pagan gods50. He believes in heroes that populate the Tartar, in monstrous dogs like Cerberus, in the weeping souls of Hades51. He listens to soothsayers (mathematici), he consults necromancers, he annihilates the mystery of Jesus and abhors the Holy Face52. He arranges the cruel murder of Attevus, the bishop appointed in Edessa by the Apostle Thaddeus53. He forces his younger brother to worship simulacra and idols54 and with these words turns to his mother Veronica: “If you will not make sacrifices to the statues and not turn away from your god, and from your Holy Face, you will be condemned to execution and end up like Attevus”55. The mother, unable to make her degenerate son repent, flees from her own home and goes to Jerusalem56. The exiled Veronica, stranger in that land, searches for the places of Christ’s Passion and his tomb57. The widow cries for Christ’s wounds and blood, wails at the land that killed him and waits for his death to be avenged58. This is the return of the Vindicta Salvatoris topic; from now on, this apocryphal element will be Boniface’s main source. Meanwhile the Fame runs in the world, and the story of Christ’s death on the Cross had reached the desolate sands of Libya, reigned over by Titus, also affected by leprosy59. By chance, the Judean Nathan, son of Nau, had also fortuitously arrived in Libya60. Titus asks Nathan if he knows a cure for his leprosy. Nathan’s answer is peremptorily negative: “No one but God himself, or he who was slain by the Jews, can cure you”. Titus melts into tears and meditates on avenging the death of Christ61. As soon as he thinks of revenge in his heart, the leprosy disappears62. He immediately recovers his health and handsome appearance. Astonished at the sight of this miracle, he believes in Jesus63. He then prays: “You who are all-powerful, allow

me to avenge your death”64. Titus calls for his brother, Vespasianus, to come to his rescue from Rome65. From the banks of the Tiber, Vespasianus arrives on the battlefield with his army of 5,000 men and reaches Titus. The brothers come face-toface, they look each other in the eye and embrace. Vespasianus is amazed to see Titus healed, clear of any stain. Titus explains the reason for the war, which is to subvert the kingdom of the Jews and avenge the death perpetrated on Christ, the true prophet. Vespasianus also converts: he is healed of leprosy, and prepares for war, ready to die for Christ. The Roman fleet sets sail for Jerusalem. For seven years Jerusalem is under siege. The Judean king Archelaus dies by his own sword66. Boniface lingers on the description of the starving people without skimping on the gruesome details. Hunger forces Jews to feed on unclean animals, earth and even human flesh67. A mother uses a sword on her infant son to eat him, but then commits suicide out of guilt68. Many Jews kills themselves out of desperation. Titus and Vespasianus enter Jerusalem triumphantly. The revenge is completed: the judges Anna and Caiphas are horribly stoned to death69; Pontius Pilate is imprisoned in Damascus70. The walls of the city are set on fire and burned to the ground, the temple and the synagogue looted and destroyed71. Boniface’s copious narrative vein enriches the bare narration of the Vindicta Salvatoris with many details. Then the character of Velosianus, ambassador of Tiberius, appears: Velosianus is an attested variant for Volusianus of the Vindicta Salvatoris. The Roman ambassador learns that the Queen of Armenia, named Veronica, chased off by her son, has a veil impressed with the face of Christ. It was thanks to this veil that the King of Edessa was healed72. On behalf of the Emperor Tiberius, Velosianus promises to divide the empire with whoever could cure him of his leprosy73. Word gets around74; Velosianus looks for the woman. In the presence of the governor, Veronica is asked to deliver the Holy Face she keeps hidden. The woman denies possession of it and pretends not to know anything75. Then Velosianus overcome with anger, orders for her to be put in chained threatens to have her tortured76. Fearing these

torments, and inspired by divine light, the woman confesses to having the face of Christ77. She gives it up, but asks to continue contemplating it: “O Velosianus, I will follow the Holy Face wherever destiny may take it!”78. As soon as he gets the face of Christ, Velosianus boards his ship79. But Veronica does not give up: she jumps into the water; walking on the water as if on land she reaches the bow of the ship80. (This miraculous detail is not present in the Vindicta Salvatoris narration.) Veronica utters the following words: “The face of the Lord will not set sail without me! It will not enter the city without me! This ship will not set sail. Take me on board, oh sailors, take me on board, so I can pray to the face that is dear to me, and that I have kept for so long time!”81. The captain and the sailors applaud at the sight of such a great miracle, and ask forgiveness82. The crew opens the hatches of the ship, and Veronica comes on board83. She is seated, as a queen, on the most noble throne of the ship84. The sails are hoisted, and they are immediately swollen with a favorable wind. The ship sets sail joyfully: the sailors magnify the glory of God and reach the mouth of the Tiber85. Sailing up the river the ship reaches Rome and discharges86. On arrival in the city, they rush to the imperial palace87. The 47 Veronica, ii, vv. 65–67: “Uxor et eius ibi Veronica lege sub illa / vernat, qua Christi sudaria nomine gaudent / usque hodie semperque suo simul omine current”. 48 Ibidem, vv. 68–72: “At sobolem tulerant, sobolem rex ipse nephandam, / que legem renuit mores cultusque paternos, / que post regna patris, post tempora longa peracta, / post necis occursum, post testamenta suprema / et post exequias divina lege recedit”. 49 Ibidem, vv. 86–87: “Suscitat omne nephas, sic sculptile fecit et orat / idola, marmoreos vultus, oracula surda…”. 50 Ibidem, vv. 91– 93: “Legem subvertere curat / et regnum mutare fide populosque fideles / gentili de more facit quecumque vetusta”. 51 Ibidem, vv. 94–95: “Tartareos colit ecce duces dominosque silentum / Cerbereosque canes, manes flentesque cohortes”. 52 Ibidem, vv. 96–99: “Artibus aereis vacat auguriisque sub ipsis / atque matematicis nicromantica concitat ore, / misterium deletque Iesu vultumque verendum / horret…”. 53 Ibidem, vv. 100–101: “Ceditur Attevus, presul venerabilis urbis, / quem quondam instituit divinus Apostolus illic”. 54 Ibidem, v. 102: “… ac simulacra iubet fratrem hic orare minorem”. 55 Ibidem, vv. 103–107: “… et matri dixisse sue perhibetur honeste: / ‘Aut tu sacrifices statue vel dote recedes / ipsa tua divoque tuo vultuque patenti, / aut tu procumbes iaculis et morte iacebis, / qua iacet Attevus!’”. Cf. Dobschütz, Christusbilder, ii (n. 7), p. 152**: “… matri sue dixisse sic fertur: ‘Aut diis meis genua flectens ipsos adorans aut cum deo tuo, quem die noctuque implores, accepta rerum tuarum debita portione, perge quo placet. Alioquin omnis pietatis humanitate remota turpissime mortis supplicio te faciam interire’”. 56 Veronica, ii, vv. 107–110: “Sed postquam hec talia sensit, / non natum revocare valens erroribus actis, / exul ab ede sua, vultu contempta recedit / Ierusalemque venit.” Cf. Dobschütz, Christusbilder, ii (n. 7), p. 152**: “Que cum obstinati filii animum videret non posse a nequitie proposito aliqua ratione reducere ad tramitem veritatis, ad Ierosolimorum partes, venera-

bilem Dei vultum secum deferens, spretis regno et filiis, properavit”. 57 Veronica, ii, vv. 110–111: “… velut hospes et advena querit / passus ubi Christus, quis sit locus ille sepulchri”. 58 Ibidem, vv. 112–114: “… compatitur plagasque suas plangitque cruorem, / improperat terre quod ultio fiat / illius et celeris mundo vindicta resurgat”. 59 Ibidem, vv. 115–117: “Iam pennata diu ruerat sevissima fama / in partes ubi Titus erat, regnator arene / famosus lybice …”. 60 Ibidem, vv. 119–120: “… Nau genitus narraverat illi, / quem casu Boreas, illuc ad littora perflans, / impulerat …”. 61 Ibidem, vv. 132–135: “Titus et ut novit quod non foret amplius alter, / qui sanasset eum, qui nec sibi cura fuisset, / ni foret ipse Deus, vel quem Iudea peremit, / ingemuit statuitque ulcisci funera tanti …”. 62 Ibidem, vv. 136–137: “… et, cum vindictam prescisset corde sub alto, / seva verecundo discessit lumine lepra”. 63 Ibidem, vv. 140–143: “Hic ubi tanta videt Christi miracula morte / efficitur stupidus quicunque se talia cernens / moxque Iesum credit crucifixum, Virgine natum / atque fuisse Dei genitum…”. 64 Ibidem, vv. 143–147: “… sic supplice voce / orat eum atque animo: ‘Tu iam permitte, Marie / nate, michi, qui cuncta potes … ulcisci rursus tua funera praesta’”. 65 Ibidem, v. 148: “Sic ait et fratri succursum poscit ab Urbe”. 66 Ibidem, vv. 193–196: “Rex Iudeorum tunc Archelaus iniquo / se ductus motu, gladium per viscera mittit, / evomit ac animam rutilo cum sanguine diram / noctigenis umbrisque Orci commendat et illam”. 67 Ibidem, vv. 200–202: “Hinc urbs vexatur septemque obsessa per annos / languet et ipsa fame queritur terramque remordet, / vescitur immundis, humana est carne potita”. 68 Ibidem, vv. 203–206: “In natum gladio mater desevit acuto / inciditque armos et decoquit usaque pastu / exuriens: sic tanta urget, convertit et enses / in se seque ferit, ledit, prosternit et ipsam”. 69 Ibidem, vv. 266–267: “… comprenduntque duces Anna Cayphamque revolvunt / in mortem horrendam lapidatos atque relinquunt”. 70 Ibidem, v. 268: “Inde damasceno Pilatum carcere claudunt …”. 71 Ibidem, vv. 275–277: “Funduntur muri, sternuntur menia celsa / diripiturque aurum pretiosaque tota supellex / et templi speciosa cadunt sinagocaque cedunt”. 72 Ibidem, vv. 302–306: “‘… Armenia venit nato regina repulsa, / cui nomen sonuit Veronica. Dicta tenere / hec Christi vultumque vere impressamque figuram, / restituit sanumque dedit medicamine tali’”. 73 Ibidem, vv. 307–311: “‘Regnum pro Cesare iussus / spondeo, cesareum rursus diademaque pendam / perpetuo sibi quidquid habet dum vulnere lepre / liberet et sanum modo gentibus Urbis et orbis / reddat’ ait”. 74 Ibidem, v. 311: “Totam tendit sic preco per urbem”. 75 Ibidem, vv. 312–314: “Hec coram stat preside tradere iussa / celatum vultum Domini. Negat inscia facti / remque ipsam simulat”. 76 Ibidem, vv. 315–316: “Rex autem, concitus ira, / supplicio tradi iubet hanc et fune ligari”.Cf. Vindicta Salvatoris, in Evangelia apocrypha, Constantinus Tischendorf ed., Leipzig 1853, p. 458: “… ei omnes qui ibidem errant: ‘Mulier nomine Veronica est, quae habet vultum Domini in domo sua’. Et statim iussit eam ante potentiam suam adduci. Et dixit ad eam: ‘Tu habes vultum Domini in domo tua?’. At illa negavit. Tunc Velosianus iussit eam mitti in tormentis, donec vultum Domini insinuaret”. 77 Veronica, ii, vv. 317–319: “Hec ubi se cernit tormentis, anxia vultum / explicat atque duci lacrimis mandantibus alto / lumine designat”. 78 Ibidem, vv. 322–328: “… mentemque suam vocemque resolvit: ‘Spem michi trade meam vultum sanctumque videre / da michi…Velosiane, sequar quo vultum fata lacessent’ rettulerat”. 79 Ibidem, vv. 328–329: “Vultum iam Velosianus habebat: / scandebat ratem”. 80 Ibidem, vv. 329–330: “Mulier tamen ausa per undas / intrat, ut in solidam super ambulat equora terram”. 81 Ibidem, vv. 333–338: “Non sine me Domini vultus de littore cedet! / Non urbem intrabit sine me! Non ista carina / perficiet cursum, nec ventus flaverit aptus! / Tollite me sursum! Me sursum tollite, naute, / ut faciem, quam sepe fui consueta videre, / orem, quam longo servavi tempore mecum”. 82 Ibidem, vv. 339–340: “Applaudit princeps, applaudunt undique naute, / talibus inspectis miris, veniamque reposcunt”. 83 Ibidem, v. 341: “Hostia panduntur navis mulierque subintrat …”. 84 Ibidem, v. 343: “… nobiliore loco tamquam regina locatur.” 85 Veronica, ii, vv. 349–352: “… conducunt somnos, cenas et prandia sumunt; / interdum prestantque iocos solatia ducunt / magnificantque Dei, quo Tybridis undas / attigunt portusque intrant …”. 86 Ibidem, vv. 352–354: “Mox inde magister / dirigit in terram proram: sic quisque repente / prosilit”. 87 Ibidem, v. 356: “descenduntque omnes et leti ad menia pergunt”.

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emperor Tiberius welcomes them88; he is eager to know of the many miracles of Christ89. The faithful Velosianus recounts the life of Christ, his death on the Cross, the Resurrection, the disciples who preach to the world, the story of Abgar the King of Edessa, a Gentile converted to the faith in Christ90. He hands him the cloth imprinted with the Holy Face of Christ, the vera salus91. Tiberius the emperor worships it, and is immediately healed of leprosy and baptized92. After many adventures, the story reaches the finishing line93. Boniface closes the poem by celebrating the dedicatee, Cardinal William of Braye, and asking that he may submit his Veronica to Pope Gregory x: so illustrious fame of this work may traverse the centuries94. 88 Veronica, ii, vv. 357–358: “Adventum iam Cesar habet, quem littora primum / significata tulit”. 89 Ibidem, v. 366: “… cui Cesar: Christi nobis miracula narra”. 90 Ibidem, vv. 431–433: “… rex ille toparcha / Gentilis fuerat, sed Christi credidit actis / et credendus erat”. 91 Ibidem, vv. 344–345: “… ut Christo prestanda fides populisque tenenda / vultus enim Domini mecum, Veronica, mecum, in quo vera salus …”. 92 Ibidem, vv. 346–349: “… et poplite flexo / oravit Cesar, lacrimans ac oscula prestans, / et pacem timidus linquens, fit sanus et ante / baptismum recipitque novo, mundatus ...”. 93 Ibidem, v. 354: “Venimus ad metam”. 94 Ibidem, vv. 438–442: “… et tu qui nostros currus, Guillelme, tulisti, / inclite cardo Dei, spes una et sola poete, / huc una venias, et ad ipsa novissima mundi / secula percurres: fuerit Veronica celo / nomine scripta tuo cum venustate perenni”.

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summary

Veronica Bonifáce z Verony

Ve druhé polovině třináctého století napsal Bonifác z Verony báseň v hexametrech s názvem Veronica, v  níž popsal příběh posvátné roušky s otiskem Kristovy tváře. Své dílo věnoval kardinálu Williamu de Braye. Text se dochoval v jediném rukopise z patnáctého století (Paris, bnf, ms lat. 8229). Pro sestavení básně, rozdělené do dvou knih, čerpal Bonifác z Verony z různých tradic a je tedy důležitým svědkem existence různých verzí příběhu o římském Veraikonu. Vyprávění zahrnuje také původ posvátné roušky a její dopravení do Říma. Látku uchovávanou v bazilice svatého Petra označuje Bonifác za Svatou Tvář z Edessy, kterou do Říma přinesla Veronika, žena edesského krále Abgara. Bonifác opírá svůj text o písemný pramen, podle nějž je římská

rouška již považována za mandylion z Edessy. Tato zvláštní verze legendy o králi Abgarovi se nachází jen v několika rukopisech, včetně významného manuskriptu (Paris, bnf, ms lat. 2688), který byl napsán a ilustrován v druhé polovině třináctého století – tedy v době, kdy Bonifác psal svou báseň. Jedná se o nádhernou knihu s výjimečnými kresbami, které ilustrují celý Veroničin příběh. Dalšími zdroji, na kterých Bonifác staví, jsou apokryfní texty Cura sanitatis Tiberii a především Vindicta Salvatoris. Článek Marca Petolettiho a Angela Piacentiniho zkoumá dosud nepříliš známé svědectví o úctě vůči Veroničině roušce v Římě během třináctého století a představuje tak první krok ke kompletní kritické edici básně Veronica Bonifáce z Verony.

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Abstract – The Iconography of the Veronica in the Region of Lombardy: 13th–14th Centuries A significant number of thirteenth- and fourteenth-century representations of the Veronica have emerged in the Lombardy area. Three appear in frescoes in as many churches; two, in manuscripts. All five images seem to be consistent within the ecclesiastic diocese of Milan. Moreover, Saint Veronica is always shown holding the revered veil. The fresco in the church of Saint Veronica in the town of Santa Maria Hoè, dated between the third-last and the penultimate decade of the thirteenth century, is one of the most ancient depictions of this iconography. Most of the images cited here are devotional; only the miniatures might be considered more narrative than devotional. One stands out in particular: the depictions in a Psalter, Hymnarium and Martyrologium of Saint Veronica handing the veil to two presbyters. This miniature might be considered a unicum in iconography as well, in that there is nothing like it in either the visual arts or the hagiography of Saint Veronica and the venerated veil. Keywords Veronica, Christ’s face, Saint Veronica, Santa Veronica in Santa Maria Hoè (Lecco), San Giovanni in Conca (Milan), San Vincenzao in Galliano (Como), Ambrosian Psalter, Hymnarium and Martyrologium, Evangelica Historia, Tiberius, Volusianus, Giacomo Grimaldi Stefano Candiani Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore [email protected]

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The Iconography of the Veronica in the Region of Lombardy 13th–14th Centuries Stefano Candiani

The spread of the iconography of the Veronica – the venerated veil with Christ’s face – in the Lombardy region during the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries does not seem to have been studied specifically in the past. This initial research focuses especially on an area within the current boundaries of Lombardy. In view of the fluidity of the region’s boundaries, both from a cultural and political point of view during the Middle Ages, the research has been extended to also include neighboring areas. As a starting point, it might be interesting to begin with a representation of Christ’s face located in a small church dedicated to Saint Veronica in Santa Maria Hoè, in the Province of Lecco, which in the Middle Ages was situated within the boundaries of Missaglia Pieve1. For centuries, this tiny *

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I would like to thank Prof. Marco Rossi and Prof. Marco Petoletti. Many thanks go also to Prof. Herbert L. Kessler. I express my gratitude also to prof. Marco Bona Castellotti, prof. Amanda Clare Murphy and Mrs. Raffaella Zardoni. About Missaglia Pieve: Gualberto Vigotti, La diocesi di Milano alla fine del secolo xiii. Chiese cittadine e pievi forensi nel “Liber sanctorum” di Goffredo da Bussero, Rome 1974, pp. 257–262. It might be interesting also to recall a small and somewhat enigmatic object: a flat, pointed oval, metal seal-

matrix, often ignored by scholars [Fig. 1]. This was part of Giuseppe Cellini’s private collection and was first presented in the Vatican City during a 1985 exhibition. From the Gothic legend along the border, it is possible to decipher that the seal-matrix belonged to Federicus de Mandello, archpriest of Monza. The exhibition catalogue dated the seal-matrix to around the thirteenth or fourteenth century; information about the archpriest, which continues to be lacking despite research, would provide a more accurate date. Below a Gothic aedicule, the field of the seal-matrix represents a man’s face with a halo, perhaps with closed eyes, and with very long hair and a peculiar long beard divided into three parts. The identification with Christ’s face, as stated in the exhibition catalogue, is not certain. It could be based on the fact that the matrix-seal is probably emblematic: the coat of arms probably plays on the owner’s name, as might the resemblance between the words Mandylion and Mandello. However, it is difficult to exclude the possibility that the man’s face could be identified with John the Baptist’s severed head, in view of the fact that Monza Cathedral is consecrated to this saint. However, if the matrix-seal actually does contain a depiction of Christ’s face, it would be a very early and rare representation of Christ’s face with closed eyes. For the seal-matrix see Il sigillo nella storia della civiltà attraverso i documenti dell’Archivio Segreto Vaticano, catalogue of the exhibition, (Vatican, Scuola Vaticana di Paleografia e Diplomatica, 1985), A. Martini ed., Vatican 1985, p. 64. Giuseppe, called Pico, Cellini (1906–2000), was a famous Italian art restorer. Concerning his life, see Antonio Giuliano, “Pico (Giuseppe) Cellini (1906–2000)”, Pontificia Accademia Romana di Archeologia. Rendiconti, lxxiii (2000/2001), p. 333. To my knowledge there is no scholarly evidence of Cellini’s private collection’s present state. In the Giuseppe Cellini archive, now located in the library of the Università degli studi di Roma Tre (Biblioteca delle Arti – Sezione Storia dell’Arte “Luigi Grassi”) there does not seem to be any further information about this object. I would like to thank Mr Carlo Spadafora of the Biblioteca delle Arti – Sezione Storia dell’Arte “Luigi Grassi” for his advice and also Dott.ssa Valentina Rovere for her help in the research. Finally, thanks also go to prof. Stefania Buganza for her advice.

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1 / Mandylion (?), metal seal-matrix, c.  13th–14th century / Private collection 2 / Saint Veronica holding the veil with the Face of Christ, Santa Maria Hoè (Lecco), Santa Veronica Church, northern wall, end of the 13th century

one-room church (around 75 x 45 m), belonged to the Capitani (Capitanei) from Hoè family. Very little is known about this family. They were imperial vavasors – that is, in Latin, Capitanei – who were first documented in 1088 in a document of King Conrad, as being linked to the nobility from the northern part of the Milanese area, and owners of a castle towering over the village. During the fourteenth century, the Capitani from Hoè family, or part of it, moved to Monza where on February 13, 1350 a lay member – Minolus de Hoee dictus de Capitaneis – is registered among the list of merchants of Monza, contained in the Statuta comunitatis mercatorum Modoetie (Milano, Archivio della Camera di Commercio, Cassaforte, fol. 29v)2. Moreover, the Capitani from Hoè family were also included in a list of noble families, the Matricula nobilium, first produced in 1377, which provided clerics to the Major Chapter of Milan Cathedral3. The church was probably part of the castle and must have existed before the end of the thirteenth century 4. On the northern wall, a fresco has survived representing Saint Veronica holding the veil with the face of Christ [Fig. 2] 5. Depicted from the neck upwards and enclosed in a cruciform nimbus, Christ’s face is larger than the saint’s. The gaze is frontal and hieratic. The long brown hair is brightened by an almost metal-like golden luminism, which also brightens Saint Veronica’s hair, while the beard, which is quite short, is slightly parted. The figure of the female saint is frontal, standing beneath a simple round arch, crowned with a series of battlements. The hieratic appearance of the woman is softened by the detailed rendering of her clothes, especially the grand cloak, with red on the outside and green inside. Her hands hold a wide white cloth bearing the effigy. The presence of clearly visible architectural elements may have two meanings: the first, which is the most probable, is that they relate to the nearby Capitani Castle – thus confirming the citadel-related nature of the chapel; the second is that they have something to do with the city of Rome, the place where Saint Veronica went, according to both the Vindicta Salvatoris and the Cura sanitatis Tiberii, 2

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Statuta comunitatis mercatorum Modoetie: le regole del commercio internazionale nella Monza del Trecento, Marco Rizzi ed., Missaglia 2010, pp. 97, 168, 213, 235. Elisabetta Filippini incorrectly transcribed Hoee/

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Hoe (pp. 97, 106, 107, 168 fol. 29v, 179 fol. 35r, 180 fol. 35v), which was interpreted as Hoc. Moreover, she thought that the family came from Cremona, but in the manuscript, it was not written that the members of the Capitanei from Hoè family came from Cremona. About the Matricula nobilium see Giorgio Giulini, Memorie spettanti alla storia, al governo ed alla descrizione della città e campagna di Milano ne’ secoli bassi, Milan 1854–1857, vol. iv, p. 645; Carlo Castiglioni, “Gli ordinari della Metropolitana attraverso i secoli”, Memorie storiche della diocesi di Milano, i (1954), pp. 11–56, sp. pp. 13–15; Enrico Cattaneo, “Ottone Visconti arcivescovo di Milano”, in Contributi dell’Istituto di Storia medioevale. Raccolta di studi in memoria di Giovanni Soranzo, Milan 1968, vol. i, pp. 129–165, sp. pp. 160–162. During the Middle Ages, the Milan Cathedral Chapter was composed of two chapters. The Ordo Maior (Major Order), subsequently also known as the Capitolo Maggiore (Major Chapter), was made up of twelve presbyters belonging to the most eminent families of the city who, together with the bishop, attended to ecclesiastic government and liturgical services in the two cathedrals: during winter in the church of Santa Maria Maggiore, and during the summer in the church of Santa Tecla. The Ordo Minor (Minor Order) was composed of many presbyters led by a primicerius. Their duty was to attend liturgical services in the summer cathedral at times when the Major Order celebrated services in the winter church and vice versa and to devote themselves to pastoral charge in the churches of the city. See Angelo Majo, “Capitolo Metropolitano”, in Il Duomo di Milano. Dizionario storico, artistico e religioso, Giulia Benati, Anna Maria Roda eds, Milan 2001, pp. 148–151. About the Capitani family and their castle with the Saint Veronica chapel see Die Urkunden der deutschen Könige und Kaiser. Die Urkunden Heinrichs iv., Dietrich von Gladiss, Alfred Gawlik eds, Weimar 1953, vol. vi/i, pp. 671–672; I placiti del Regnum Italiae, Cesare Maranesi ed., Rome 1960, vol. iii/ii, pp. 398–399; Vittorio Urbano Crivelli Visconti, La nobiltà lombarda, Bologna 1972, pp. 8, 10; Alberto Cappellini, Santa Maria Hoè, Santa Maria Hoè 1991; Hagen Keller, Signori e vassalli nell’Italia delle città (secoli ix–xii), Torino 1995, p. 41 n. 161, p. 85 n. 58, p. 357; Angelo Borghi, Sacralizzazioni: strutture della memoria. Prima recensione delle architetture di interesse storico e artistico della provincia di Lecco, Lecco 1999, vol. i, pp. 124–125; Santa Maria dell’Acqua. Alle radici di una comunità, Virginio Longoni ed., Santa Maria Hoè 2009, pp. 21–25; Giovanna Virgilio, Angelo Borghi, Arte e Territorio. Restituzioni 2006–2011, Lecco 2013, vol. ii, p. 270; Ambrogio Filippi, I Visconti di Milano nei secoli xi e xii. Indagini tra le fonti, Trento 2014, pp. 85–86, 129, 143, 191, 86 n. 17. All other efforts to discover more information about the Capitani family were in vain. I would like to thank Prof. Alfredo Lucioni, Prof. Guido Cariboni for sharing with me their knowledge about this particular topic. I have also to thank Mrs. Mariarosa Frigerio, of the “U. Pozzoli” Public Library in Lecco for her bibliographical advice. The fresco covered a previous fresco decoration, which is still just visible. The fresco was first restored in the middle of the twentieth century, when it emerged after centuries of having been covered by new painting and a new wall surface. The fresco was restored most recently between 1981 and 1982 by Giacomo Luzzana, under the supervision of the Soprintendenza per il Patrimonio Storico, Artistico e Demoetnoantropologico di Milano, in line with documents in the Santa Maria Addolorata Parish Archive located in the town of Santa Maria Hoè; see also Oleg Zastrow, Affreschi romanici nella provincia di Como, Lecco 1983, p. 246. The fresco seems not to be referred to in medieval and modern documents, probably because it was covered over. Indeed, among the orders given by the Archbishop Charles Borromeo on 19 August 1571 (Milano, Archivio diocesano, Archivio spirituale, sezione x, Pieve di Missaglia, document number 32, fol. 1r), there was a command to paint the walls of the church. On this subject, see also Cappellini, Santa Maria Hoè (n. 4), p. 22. A photograph of the fresco before the last restoration is reproduced in Alberto Cappellini, Santa Maria Hoè, Santa Maria Hoè 1964, s. n.; Piergiuseppe Agostoni, “La Parrocchiale di S. Maria Hoè (Como)”, Arte cristiana, lvii (1969), pp. 33–36. I would like to thank Father Paolo Brambilla for letting me visit the Saint Veronica chapel and for allowing me to read the documents in the Beata Vergine Addolorata in Santa Maria Hoè Parish Archive. I would also like to thank Prof. Emanuele Ghelfi for his advice.

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3 / Saint Veronica holding the Veil with the Face of Christ, San Giovanni in Conca Church (Milan), beginning of the 14th century / Milan, Sforza Castle, Museo d’Arte Antica

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carrying the image of Christ with her 6. Stylistically of remarkable quality, the fresco is, in Miklós Boskovits’ opinion, to be placed chronologically between the third-last and the penultimate decade of the thirteenth century. Indeed, it is stylistically close to the anonymous Italian Gothic artist known as Maestro di Angera, after the fresco decoration of Angera Castle (Province of Varese, Lombardy), who seems to have worked during the final decades of the thirteenth and the beginning of the fourteenth centuries7. As far as we know, the image would be among the earliest remaining examples in the Lombardy area (and, for that matter, in Italy) of Saint Veronica holding the cloth bearing Christ’s effigy 8. This sort of image, indeed, first appears towards the end of the thirteenth century9. The claim that the Hoè fresco is one of the earliest representations of Saint Veronica holding the Veronica relic is also supported by the fact that, “copying and transforming the model of representation of the Mandylion” – as Gerhard Wolf has said –, part of the neck is still visible, while in more recent representations the face is simply isolated on the cloth10. Furthermore, it is possible to claim the fresco in Hoè as one of the most ancient depictions of this iconography, because it pre-dates the well-known statue in the church of Notre-Dame d’Écouis (Department of Ecure, Normandy). The statue has been dated to the second decade of the fourteenth century (probably between 1311 and 1315), and is the work of an anonymous Gothic artist. The two Veronicas seem to differ in a detail of no minor importance: Christ’s facial features. In contrast to Hoè, the French statue shows Christ with his eyes closed and the outline of his face faintly visible11. Moreover, within the boundaries of the Santa Maria Hoè municipality, there is a second church also dedicated to Saint Veronica. The contemporaneous building was under the patronage of the Capitani family and was not far from another castle also belonging to the family. Following considerable renovations and alterations over the centuries, the church does not contain any medieval images12. Therefore, it is very likely that the unusual dedication of both churches to Saint Veronica, and the interior decorations which were the unavoidable consequence of such a choice, were completely dependent on the will of the Capitani family. The

rarity of the dedication to Saint Veronica can be appreciated from what is written in the Liber notitiae sanctorum Mediolani 13. The manuscript, probably written towards the end of the thirteenth century, contains a meticulous list of all the churches and altars in the diocese of Milan, linked to their worship14. According to the Liber notitiae sanctorum Mediolani, indeed, there were only two churches dedicated to Saint Veronica in the diocese of Milan, both, cited above, in the current municipality of Santa Maria Hoè 15. A further image from the first decades of the fourteenth century depicting the Veronica held by Saint Veronica is to be found in a detached fresco, now at the Museo d’Arte Antica inside the Sforza Castle, in Milan (inv. no. 60; [Fig. 3]). This wall painting was part of the erstwhile Milanese Church of San Giovanni in Conca, and was located on the right of the staircase leading to the crypt. From the beginning of the fourteenth century, the building gradually turned into a palatine chapel of the Visconti family. Under Bernabò Visconti (1323–1385; Lord of Milan from 1354) and his wife Beatrice Regina della Scala (married in 1350), the church was then completely incorporated into the structures of their palace16. For this reason, we might suppose that a member of the Visconti family had commissioned the fresco in the church of San Giovanni in Conca; but this claim needs further evidence. The fresco is badly damaged and a large portion of its surface is missing. A white veil with Christ’s face is visible, held by a female saint wearing a green dress and a red cloak originally closed with a fastener. The woman stands out for the gracious nobility of her face, whose features are sweet and peaceful. Unfortunately, Christ’s face is not preserved in its entirety; only the long blond hair, and the cruciform nimbus with a reddish contour remain. Recent research seems to converge on placing the fresco around the first decades of the fourteenth century. It is quite likely that its author was an artist from Lombardy stylistically influenced by other painters from Central Italy17. Another representation of Saint Veronica showing the Veronica, which according to Carla Travi’s research also dated to the fourteenth century, is similarly a fresco18. The saint is portrayed

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It is interesting to note that in a coat of arms of the Capitani family, even if modern because recorded by Marco Cremosano in 1673 (Lo stemmario di Marco Cremosano, Andrea Borella D’Alberti ed., Teglio 1997, vol. ii, p. 60), there is a similar castle with a great entrance and two towers with battlements. This detail may be considered as a piece of evidence that the castle in the fresco also recalls the Capitani family. Zastrow, Affreschi romanici (n. 5), pp. 246–247; Mikóls Boskovits, “Pittura e miniatura a Milano: Duecento e primo Trecento”, in Il millennio ambrosiano. La nuova città dal Comune alla Signoria, Carlo Bertelli ed., Milan 1989, pp. 26–69, sp. p. 66 n. 49; Fabrizio Lollini, “Varese”, in La pittura in Lombardia. Il Trecento, Milan 1993, vol. ii, pp. 84–107, sp. p. 106 n. 11; Fabio Scirea, Pittura ornamentale del Medioevo lombardo. Atlante (secoli viii–xiii), Milan 2012, p. 74; Giovanni Valagussa, “Maestro di Angera nel 1280 circa”, in Pittura tra il Verbano e il lago d’Orta dal Medioevo al Settecento, Mina Gregori ed., Milan 1996, pp. 227–228, sp. p. 228; Idem, “Pittore novarese (?) del 1280–1290 circa”, in Ibidem, p. 231. For Master of Angera see also: Fabrizio Lollini, “Maestro di Angera”, in La pittura in Lombardia. Il Trecento, Valerio Terraroli ed., pp. 424–425. Tiziana Di Blasio, Veronica, il mistero del Volto. Itinerari iconografici, memoria e rappresentazione, Rome 2000, p. 145. Gerhard Wolf,“’Or fu sì fatta la sembianza vostra?’ Sguardi alla vera icona e alle sue copie artistiche”, in Il volto di Cristo, catalogue of the exhibition (Roma, Palazzo delle Esposizioni 2000–2001), Giovanni Morello, Gerhard Wolf eds, Milan 2000, pp. 103–114, sp. p. 107. Wolf, “Or fu sì fatta la sembianza vostra” (n. 9), p. 107. This statue was part of a great artistic project commissioned by Enguerran de Marigny (1260–1315), powerful chamberlain to the French king Philip iv the Fair, see François Baron, “La collégiale d’Écouis, sanctuaire a reliques”, in Chefs-d’œuvre du Gothique en Normandie. Sculpture et orfèvrerie du xiiie au xve siècle, exhibition catalogue (Caen, Musée de normandie 2008/Toulouse, Ensemble conventuel des Jacobins 2008–2009), Catherine Arminjon, Sandrine Berthelot eds, Milan 2008, pp. 101–109. In the same exhibition catalogue see also Brigitte Béranger-Menand, “Trois siècles de sculpture gothique en Normandie (1200– 1500)”, pp. 65–99, sp. pp. 73–74, 76–77. Virgilio/Borghi, Arte e Territorio (n. 4), pp. 246–247. Liber notitiae sanctorum Mediolani: manoscritto della Biblioteca capitolare di Milano, Marco Magistretti, Ugo Monneret de Villard eds, Milan 1917, cols 400–401. Mirella Ferrari, “Liber Notitiae sanctorum Mediolani”, in Dizionario di liturgia ambrosiana, Marco Navoni ed., Milan 1996, pp. 268–270; Paolo Tomea, “San Giorgio in Crimea. Per una nuova edizione del Liber notitiae sanctorum Mediolani (con una nota sulla papessa Giovanna)”, Aevum, lxxiii (1999) pp. 423–458. Liber notitiae (n. 13), cols 400–401. Moreover, in Milan, again according to the Liber notitiae (Liber notitiae, n. 13, cols 400–401.), there were only three altars consecrated to Saint Veronica in three different churches, which no longer exist today (San Pietro in Corte, Sant’Alessandro Maggiore, San Pietro in Caminadella), and a feast-day in honour of the Saint which was held at the altar of the Holy Cross in the Santa Maria d’Aurona monastery, which had been destroyed too. Maria Teresa Fiorio,“San Giovanni in Conca”,in Le Chiese di Milano, Maria Teresa Fiorio ed., Milan 2006, pp. 315–319; Edoardo Rossetti, “In ’contrata de Vicecomitibus’. Il problema dei palazzi viscontei nel Trecento tra esercizio del potere e occupazione dello spazio urbano”, in Modernamente antichi. Modelli, identità, tradizione nella Lombardia del Tre e Quattrocento, Pier Nicola Pagliara, Serena Romano eds, Rome 2014, pp. 11–44; Edoardo Rossetti, “’Poi fu la bissa’. Due dinastie, una città e non solo”,in Arte Lombarda dai Visconti agli Sforza. Milano al centro dell’Europa, exhibition catalogue (Milan, Palazzo Reale 2015), Mauro Natale, Serena Romano eds, Milan 2015, pp. 23–33, sp. p. 28. Carla Travi,“Scheda 37”,in Museo d’Arte Antica del Castello Sforzesco. Pinacoteca, Maria Teresa Fiorio ed., Milan 1997, vol. i, pp. 83–84; Raffaele Argenziano, La pittura a Milano tra Duecento e Trecento. Stile e iconografia, Siena 2006, pp. 196–197. I would like to thank Dr. Laura Basso for letting me see the fresco. Carla Travi, “Affreschi del xiii e xiv secolo”, in Galliano pieve millenaria, Marco Rossi ed., Sondrio 2008, pp. 262–277, sp. pp. 271–274; Carla Travi, “I rinnovamenti pittorici nella basilica di San Vincenzo a Galliano e nella sua pieve nel corso del xiii e del xiv secolo”, Arte Lombarda, clvi (2009), pp. 76–85, sp. pp. 79–81.

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on the counter-façade of the well-known San Vincenzo at Galliano, near Cantù (Como) within an assembly of saints surrounding the Madonna enthroned with Child. Saint Veronica is portrayed according to the expected iconography [Fig. 4]. The Christ’s face is at the center of the veil, which, in this case too, is no longer recognizable due to a broad section of the wall’s surface being missing. It is possible to see how it once was, however, from a valuable nineteenth-century image19. The fresco was the work of a Lombard artist who, though not outstanding, was nevertheless in touch with the new trends of fourteenth-century Italian art. Carla Travi has also suggested linking this work to the Grassi family, which ruled Cantù independently both from Como and Milan from 1324 to 1335. Another example of the Veronica held by Saint Veronica, although quite different from the three already discussed, is found in an illuminated manuscript now in Berlin (Kupferstichkabinett, ms 78 c 16, fol. 123r), dating to the fourth decade of the fourteenth century. The manuscript, composed in Milan by a single copyist, was decorated with a most extensive and valuable set of miniatures, and includes seventeen illuminated initials and 123 historiated pages20. The miniature is the work of Master of the Pantheon, an anonymous miniaturist, possibly from Lombardy, who worked on a Milanese manuscript now held in the Bibliothèque nationale de France, Paris (lat. 4895), which contained Godfrey of Viterbo’s Pantheon21. The Paris manuscript was copied in 1331 for Azzone Visconti (1302–1339), Lord of Milan from 1329. The Berlin codex, however, consists of a Psalter, a Hymnarium and a Martyrologium; twenty-one pages have been cut out from the book and subsequently placed at the beginning of a manuscript now in the Biblioteca Ambrosiana of Milan (p 165 sup., fols 1r–22v)22. Therefore, the manuscript is a liturgical book, perhaps designed for the local cathedral. Its most relevant part is without doubt the Martyrologium, an Ambrosian historical martyrologium, “the first and only liturgical text of that kind to be assembled in Milan during the Middle Ages”23. It lists 136 hagiographic texts, all but three embellished with a miniature. Moreover, the majority of the illuminated

4 /  Saint Veronica holding the Veil with the Face of Christ, Cantù (Como), San Vincenzo in Galliano Church, counter-façade, 14th century 5 / Saint Veronica handing the Veil with the face of Christ to two presbyters, Psalter, Hymnarium and Martyrologium, 4th decade of the 14th century / Berlin, Kupferstichkabinett, ms 78 c 16, fol. 123r

folios are perfectly consistent with the written text and the iconographic invention seems to have been inspired by hagiographic tales narrated in the Martyrologium. Stylistically, the miniatures are outstanding for their verve in narration and detailed realism. On February 4 (fol. 123r), the Martyrologium remembers Saint Veronica’s depositio [Fig. 5]. The illuminated image depicts Saint Veronica handing the veil with the face of Christ to two presbyters. The scene is set on rocky ground against a goldleaf background. On the left are three women and Saint Veronica, with a halo and dressed in very rich, sophisticated robes. She holds in her hands the veil with the face of Christ at its center. On the right, the two presbyters in their vestments, receive the holy effigy. At the core of the scene,

19 Carlo Annoni, Monumenti e fatti politici e religiosi del Borgo di Canturio e sua Pieve, Milan 1835, pl. xii a, fig. 1. 20 Paul Wescher, Beschreibendes Verzeichnis der Miniaturen-Handschriften und Einzelblätter des Kupferstichkabinetts der Staatlichen Museen Berlin, Leipzig 1931, pp. 77–80; Stefano Candiani, “La decorazione miniata del Martirologio ambrosiano trecentesco (Berlino-Milano, Kupf. Hs. 78 c 16 e Ambr. ms p 165 sup.)”, Arte lombarda, clxxv/3 (2015), pp. 13–30. 21 François Avril, Marie-Thérèse Gousset, Manuscrits enluminés d’origine italienne. xive siècle. Lombardie-Ligurie, Paris 2005, vol. iii/i, pp. 29–32; Marianne Besseyre, “Scheda 123”, in Giotto e il Trecento. “Il più Sovrano Maestro in dipintura”. Le opere, catalogue of the exhibition (Roma, Complesso del Vittoriano 2009), Alessandro Tomei ed., Milan 2009, vol. ii, pp. 282–284. Godfrey of Viterbo’s Pantheon is a universal chronicle probably written in the 1180s by Godfrey of Viterbo (1125 ca. – sec. xii ex.), chaplain and imperial notary, see Gian Maria Varanini, “Goffredo (Gaufridus, Godefridus, Gotefredus) da Viterbo”, in Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani, Rome 2001, vol. lvii, pp. 549–553. 22 Marco Navoni, “Il martirologio milanese nel codice Ambr. p 165 sup.”, in Martirologio milanese (Ambr. p 165 sup.), Marco Navoni, Cesare Pasini eds, Milan 1996, pp. 31–81; Raffaele Argenziano, “Precisazioni iconografiche sulle scene miniate nel codice ambrosiano p 165 sup.”, Rivista di storia della miniatura, xi (2007), pp. 135–166; Candiani, “La decorazione miniata” (n. 20), pp. 15–16. 23 Paolo Tomea, “Il culto e la memoria di Lorenzo a Milano (sec. v–xiii)”, in Il culto di san Lorenzo a Milano tra Roma e Milano, Raffaele Passarella ed., Milan 2015, pp. 55–114, sp. p. 82.

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6 /  Saint Veronica shows the Veil with the Face of Christ to Volusianus, Evangelica Historia, 3rd quarter of the 14th century / Milano, Biblioteca Ambrosiana, ms l 58 sup., fol. 66r

then, there is the offering of the venerated image, an offering which is made clear by the simple gesture, almost stiff and blocked, but effective at the same time. Behind the two clerics there is a church. The picture is quite enigmatic, but the text, which accompanies it, may help. It says that Saint Veronica was the hemorrhaging woman of the Gospel who, after the ascension of Christ into Heaven, left Jerusalem, and her husband, reached Rome, and was eventually buried inside St Peter’s 24: “Hanc tradunt eam esse mulierem que duodecim annis in profluvio sanguinis laborans cum omnia sua in medicos erogasset et nichil profecisset, tandem tacta Domini vestimenti fimbria sanitatem recepit. Quam etiam aiunt post Domini ascensionem relicto in iudea viro suo Romam venisse, ibique in ecclesia Sancti Petri in pace quiescere”.

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If, on one hand, it is obvious that the hagiographic legend is part of the tradition established by the Vindicta Salvatoris, Cura sanitatis Tiberii, Legenda Aurea and Liber notitiae sanctorum Mediolani, on the other, the textual origin of the saint buried inside the Vatican basilica has remained thus far unknown. Giacomo Grimaldi (1568–1623) in his

famous and useful book De sacrosanto Veronicae Sudario ac lancea (1618) has simply noted a sort of hagiographic tradition of this kind, referring to it in an Ambrosian Breviary, whose reading dedicated to Saint Veronica was faithfully copied by Grimaldi at fols 7rv25. There does not seem to be a direct textual relationship between the text copied by Grimaldi and the one in the Martyrologium divided between Berlin and Milan. As to the iconography, in light of what has just been observed, it could be argued that the church behind the two priests should be identified as St Peter’s Basilica in Rome. The points in common between the image and the text, however, are limited, since the presence of the holy veil and its offering are not referred to in the narrative. It is perhaps possible to say that the reason for the offering of the relic will find an explanation in some literary source still to be discovered. The origin of this episode can probably be viewed as a justification for the presence of the venerated relic in St Peter’s, linking both the Cura sanitatis Tiberii and the Vindicta Salvatoris to the famous image within the Vatican Basilica26. So far, the only possible parallel

is a hagiographic tradition referring to Saint Veronica leaving her veil to Pope Clement27. This tradition, communicated by the Bollandists, seems to be repeated in only a few manuscripts from different European regions, but chronologically later than the Martyrologium. The first dates to the fifteenth century and is located in the Brabant region, and is dependent on a now lost Martyrologium, called Florarium sanctorum. The second is Giacomo Grimaldi’s De sacrosanto Veronicae Sudario ac lancea (fols 3rv; 6r; 7rv), which quoted, in turn, the Ambrosian Breviary, and the Giacomo Filippo Foresti’s Supplementum chronicarum (cap. viii, fol. 6r). The words about Saint Veronica in the latter, first published in 1483, are exactly the same as those in the Florarium sanctorum28. However, it is certainly true that neither of the presbyters portrayed in the miniature can be identified as a pope, because in other miniatures of the Martyrologium the pope is clearly identifiable by his papal tiara, in the same way as in fol. 7r (Milan, Biblioteca Ambrosiana, ms p 165 sup). Finally, it is interesting to note that the position of the holy veil is also quite uncommon, since it is not strictly frontal. However, the position could perhaps be explained by the Master of the Pantheon’s characteristic style, which is heavily defined and recognizable by his non-conventional verve in narration29. In this miniature, indeed, the core of the scene is a narration, more than a simple ostensio. Therefore, the Martyrologium miniature can be considered as a unicum in iconography, in that there is nothing of its kind in either the visual arts or the hagiography of the saint and her veil30. Another fourteenth-century manuscript, probably from the third quarter of the fourteenth century, definitely from Lombardy and possibly from Milan, the Evangelica Historia (Milano, Biblioteca Ambrosiana, l 58 sup), contains several Veronica images. Written in library Gothic font, the codex tells the story of the life of Christ, the circumstances of the death of Pilate, the siege and destruction of Jerusalem, and finally the transitus Virginis. It is embellished with 158 elegant drawings, which are in most cases faithful to the narration. The miniatures, drawn in monochrome directly onto the parchment, are the work of an unknown miniaturist who worked during the second half of the fourteenth century, and who

was profoundly influenced by French Gothic culture. However, it is also rooted in the realism and vivacious narrative style that are peculiar to the cultural and artistic milieu of Lombardy31. The presence of two biscioni, the emblem of the House of Visconti (fols 27v and 53v), aside from proving the Milanese origin of the manuscript, also suggests that it might have been commissioned by the Visconti family, or by someone close to them. 24 Berlin, Kupferstichkabinett, ms 78 c 16, fol. 123r. 25 Città del Vaticano, Archivio del Capitolo di S. Pietro, ms h. 3, fols 7rv; see also fol. 3r. According to Grimaldi (fol. 7r), the Ambrosian Breviary was published in 1513. The Ambrosiana Breviary quoted by Grimaldi seems not to exist today. However, in the Library of the Metropolitan Chapter, there is an earlier Breviary, published in 1508 (Milano, Biblioteca del Capitolo Metropolitano, inc. ii-o-09-048, fol. 153v; see Ubaldo Valentini, Giovanni Battista Malusardi, Incunaboli e cinquecentine della Biblioteca capitolare di Milano, Milan 1983, p. 80), which contains the same reading. Finally, it is interesting to note that the only Ambrosiana Breviary published in the fifteenth century that contains a reading for Saint Veronica is Gentilino del Maino’s Breviary (Milano, Biblioteca Ambrosiana, inc. 437, fols 136rv), published in 1487. In that case, the reading for Saint Veronica was copied perfectly from the Martyrologium. I would like to thank Father Federico Gallo who, during the conference, let me read a copy of Grimaldi’s book. 26 Ernst von Dobschütz, Christusbilder Untersuchungen zur christlichen Legend, Leipzig 1899, vol. i, p. 218; Emanuela Fogliadini, Il volto di Cristo. Gli Acheropiti del Salvatore nella Tradizione dell’Oriente cristiano, Milan 2011, p. 171. 27 Acta sanctorum quotquot toto orbe coluntur, vel a catholicis scriptoribus celebrantur quae ex Latinis et Graecis, aliarumque gentium antiquis monumentis collegit, digessit, notis illustravit Joannes Bollandus Societatis Jesu servata primigenia scriptorum phrasi, operam et studium contulit Godefridus Henschenius. Februarii, Paris/Rome 1863, vol. i, pp. 455–458; Fogliadini, Il volto di Cristo (n. 26), p. 172; Dobschütz, Christusbilder (n. 26), vol. i, p. 242. 28 For the Martyrologium from the Brabante region see Valerie Vermassen,“Le Florarium sanctorum de Nicolaus Clopper Jr et le martyrologe brabançon de Pierre de Thimo: Deux martyrologes perdus, deux hagiographes brabançons méconnus”, Analecta Bollandiana, cxxvi/1 (2008), pp. 119–150, sp. pp. 145–146. Concerning the fact that the Floriarium sanctorum and the Supplementum chronicarum use the same words, the Bollandists wrote that this peculiarity is due either to them sharing a common literary source, or to the fact that one text could be the literary source of the other, see aa. ss. Februarii, i, p. 457. 29 François Avril, “Godefroid de Viterbe, Pantheon”, in Dix siècles d’enluminure italienne (vie-xvie siècles), exhibition catalogue (Paris, Galerie Mazarine, 8 May – 30 May 1984), Paris 1984, pp. 91–92. 30 For the iconographic repertories consulted see Louis Réau, Iconographie de l’art chrétien. Iconographie des Saints, Paris 1959, vol. iii/ iii, pp. 1314–1317; Johannes Emminghaus, “Veronika”, in Lexikon der christlichen Ikonographie. Ikonografie der Heiligen, Rome/Frieburg/ Basel/Vienna 1976, vol. viii, cols 543–544; George Kaftal, Saints in Italian art, Florence 1952–1985; Index of Christian Art [https://ica. princeton.edu/]; Veronica Route [https://veronicaroute.com/]. I would like to thank Prof. Herbert L. Kessler and Prof. Aden Kumler for their advice during the conference about this topic. Many thanks also to Mrs. Emanuela Bossi, Dr. Federico Riccobono, Mrs. Silvana Tassetto and Mrs. Raffaella Zardoni for their bibliographical advice. 31 Evangelica Historia. Disegni trecenteschi del ms l 58 sup. della Biblioteca Ambrosiana, Bernhard Degenhart, Annegrit Schmitt, Angelo Paredi eds, Milan 1978; Isa Ragusa, “Il manoscritto ambrosiano l.58 sup.: l’infanzia di Cristo e le fonti apocrife”, Arte Lombarda, lxxxiii (1987), pp. 5–19; Pier Luigi Mulas, “La miniatura in Lombardia”, in La miniatura in Italia, Antonella Putaturo Murano, Alesandra Perriccioli Saggese eds, Naples 2005, vol. i, pp. 147–155, sp. p. 154.

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7 /  Saint Veronica reached Rome and Volusianus telling Tiberius of the death of Jesus, Evangelica Historia, 3rd quarter of the 14th century / Milano, Biblioteca Ambrosiana, ms l 58 sup., fol. 66v

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Folios 65r to 68v recount the story of Mors Pilati qui Ihesum condempnavit from the Legenda aurea, itself a combination of the Cura sanitatis Tiberii and one historia apocrypha32. In fol. 66r [Fig. 6], Saint Veronica, with nimbus and wearing a wimple, can be seen showing Volusianus the veil with the image of Christ, which, as stated in the text, was miraculously imprinted on the cloth by Christ himself. The cloth, whose hems are fringed, shows the face at its center with a cruciform, punched nimbus. Christ’s hair is long and curly, and his flowing beard, equally long and curly, is pointed, rather than parted. His gaze is central and his mouth closed. The woman, as in the following three folios, is stiff, frontal, and holding the upper part of the holy veil with both hands, in compliance with the traditional iconography. The oddity of the overall configuration is due to the position in which the saint is standing, and the fact that she does not interact with the characters who appear in the episodes. This may have been the result of the miniaturist’s own desire to show the face of Christ clearly and centrally as the iconographic

tradition demanded, rather than being part of the narration, as Philine Helas has correctly observed. Therefore, this is more of a devotional image than a narrative one33. Saint Veronica is then depicted (fol. 66v [Fig. 7]) right at the center of the sheet, between Volusianus, on her left, and Tiberius, on her right. The scene probably conflates Saint Veronica and Volusianus reaching Rome with Volusianus reporting Jesus’ death to Tiberius. The depiction gives the incorrect impression that the two events occurred simultaneously, yet it is clear from the text that Saint Veronica was not present at the Emperor’s meeting with his servant. In the following sheet (fol. 67r [Fig. 8]) two more episodes are summarized: Saint Veronica shows Tiberius the veil with the face of Christ, and Tiberius bids Volusianus to arrest Pilate. Some brief results can be drawn from this research. First, there is a quite considerable number of Veronica representations in the Lombardy area, beginning in the thirteenth century and continuing throughout the following century. The images seem to be consistent only in the western part of

the actual Lombardy region, that is, in the territory of the ecclesiastic diocese of Milan34. Moreover, these can be linked principally to lay patrons, such as the Capitani from Hoè, or the Grassi and Visconti families. Secondly, Christ’s face is never suffering but is iconic and composed, gazing on the gazers, as in the Eastern tradition. Thirdly, it is quite evident that Christ is never depicted alone, but always linked to Saint Veronica, who shows his image to the faithful. With regard to the female saint herself, it is possible to claim, as Gerhard Wolf observed, that she became so widespread because she was the means by which Christ’s face could be channeled to the faithful; but, at the same time, she was also a symbol of the whole of mankind consoled by the beatific vision of the precious relic35. Moreover, from the depictions previously cited and from the presence of Saint Veronica in the more antique Ambrosian calendars, it is possible to draw the conclusion that the worship of Saint Veronica was significantly widespread in the ecclesiastic diocese of Milan. By contrast, the cult of Saint Veronica was less widespread in the Roman area36.

Two different observations must be made about frescoes and miniatures. In the two fourteenth-century frescoes, the veil with the face of Christ seems gradually to have been reduced to an iconographic trait of Saint Veronica, losing the central role it held in its most ancient depiction at Hoè. The same iconography seems to be repeated without significant changes – apart from the detail of the neck in the Hoè fresco – and also 32 Dobschütz, Christusbilder (n. 26), pp. 237–238; Fogliadini, Il volto di Cristo (n. 26), pp. 173–174. 33 Philine Helas, “Scheda iv. 40”, in Il volto di Cristo (n. 9), pp. 198–199. I would like to thank Dr. Philine Helas and Prof. Milvia Bollati for their advice. 34 The possibility of discovering other Veronica representations in Lombardy, or that came from Lombardy, cannot be ruled out. 35 Wolf, “’Or fu sì fatta la sembianza vostra?’” (n. 9), p. 111. 36 Ibidem. The feast date of Veronica is attested to in ancient Ambrosian calendars. Indeed, as stated by Odilo Heiming, in the Lombardy region the worship of Saint Veronica is first registered in calendars in the twelfth century – quite early then – and it then spreads in the following centuries, until the feast is removed from the Ambrosian Calendar and Breviary by Carlo Borromeo (Archbishop of Milan from 1560 to 1584); see Odilo Heiming, “Die ältesten ungedruckten Kalender der mailändischen Kirche”,in Colligere fragmenta. Festschrift Alban Dold zum 70. Geburtstag am 7.7.1952, Bonifatius Fischer, Virgil Ernst Fiala eds, Beuron in Hohenzollern 1952, pp. 214–235, sp. p. 234; Francesco Spadafora, “Veronica santa”, in Bibliotheca sanctorum, Rome 1969, vol. xii, cols 1044–1048.

8 /  Saint Veronica shows Tiberius the Veil with the Face of Christ and Tiberius bidding Volusianus to arrest Pontius Pilate, Evangelica Historia, 3rd quarter of the 14th century / Milano, Biblioteca Ambrosiana, ms l 58 sup., fol.67r

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with some recurrent elements. It is significant that Saint Veronica is always depicted dressed in a red cloak, and twice with a hood covering her hair, as a sign of modesty. This detail should not be taken for granted, given the all-pervasive French style, especially popular in Northern Italy, which tended to portray religious female figures with a veil and wimple instead. Choosing a hood may have been a way of choosing a more traditional iconography, dependent probably on the presence of a common iconographic model. Furthermore, it can be noted that the frescoes are mainly simple devotional images. With regard to the two illuminated drawings, it is clear that their features are quite different from the frescoes, especially in terms of the narrative intensity and the denser iconographic quality. The latter is closely connected to the textual hagiographic traditions that, as in the case of the Psalter, Hymnarium and Martyrologium, need further study. Finally, differences between the illuminations in the Evangelica Historia and the Martyrologium are also clear. In the first miniatures, the woman is hieratic and frontal even though in a narrative scene; the second stands out for its non-conventional gestures, and less severe and repetitive iconography, which is evident in all the other images cited above.

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summary

Ikonografie Veraikonu v Lombardii třináctého a čtrnáctého století

Článek Stefana Candianiho se soustředí na rozšířenost ikonografie roušky s Kristovou tváří – zvané Veraikon – v oblasti Lombardie během třináctého a čtrnáctého století. Podrobnější bádání ukazuje, že se na území Lombardie nachází poměrně velký počet těchto znázornění. Veraikon je možné najít na třech freskách: v kostele Santa Veronica ve městě Santa Maria Hoè, v dnes již neexistujícím chrámu San Giovanni in Conca v Miláně a v kostele San Vincenzo à Galliano poblíž Cantù. Dále se objevuje ve dvou rukopisech pocházejících z okolí Milána (Berlín, Kupferstichkabinett, 78 c 16; Milán, Biblioteca Ambrosiana, l 58 sup.). Zdá se, že tato zobrazení pocházející z oblasti milánské diecéze vykazují shodné rysy. Rouška s Kristovou tváří není nikdy znázorněna samotná, ale vždy ji drží sv. Veronika, která ji ukazuje věřícímu. V milánské diecézi bylo uctívání sv. Veroniky velmi rozšířené a freska v kostele Santa Veronica v Santa Maria Hoè je jedním z nejstarších vyobrazení této ikonografie. Předchází i slavnou sochu z kostela Notre-Dame d’Écouis (v departementu Eure v Normandii), datovanou do desátých let čtrnáctého století, přesněji mezi roky

1311 a 1315. Ikonografie fresky v kostele sv. Veroniky se opakuje bez výraznějších změn (kromě detailu krku v Hoè) na ostatních dvou freskách, bohužel vážně poškozených. Všechna tato zobrazení jsou převážně devocionální, pouze u miniatur můžeme mluvit o narativním charakteru. To se týká především znázornění svaté Veroniky podávající roušku s Kristovou tváří dvěma klerikům (Berlín, Kupferstichkabinett, 78 c 16). Klerici jsou pravděpodobně kněží ze Svatého Petra v Římě a obraz tak představuje přinesení roušky do chrámu. Tuto miniaturu můžeme považovat za ikonografické unicum, neboť se zdá, že ve výtvarném umění či v hagiografii světice a uctívané roušky žádný podobný příklad neexistuje. Další miniatury se nacházejí v poslední části spisu Evangelica Historia (Milán, Biblioteca Ambrosiana, l 58 sup.), kde můžeme spatřit hned tři vyobrazení: sv. Veroniku ukazující roušku s Kristovou tváří Volusianovi, sv. Veroniku a Volusiana přijíždějící do Říma, a sv. Veroniku ukazující roušku Tiberiovi. Žena je vždy znázorněna zepředu a neobrací se k ostatním postavám v příběhu, což může být výsledkem miniaturistovy snahy o soulad s tradiční ikonografií – ukázat Kristovu tvář v jasné a ústřední pozici.

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Abstract – The Roman Veronica and the Holy Face of Lucca. Parallelism and Tangents in the Formation of their Respective Traditions – There are various points of contact between the cult of the Holy Face of Lucca (the statue documented from the end of the eleventh century) and that of the Veronica. Before the publication of a critical edition of the Leobinian legend, Michele C. Ferrari formulated various hypotheses regarding its formation in two distinct editions from the twelfth century, with the later addition of the Miracles. In the legend’s appendix, the narration includes Nicodemus in the making of the Holy Face, supposedly by sculpting Christ’s visage on the basis of an image left by His body on its shroud. On the strength of various clues, particularly a list of the altars in St Martin’s Cathedral, which distinguishes between the altar ante vultum and that ante crucem veterem, Chiara Frugoni has hypothesized that in Lucca there was a painted image similar to the Veronica. Attempting to reconstruct the spread of apocryphal traditions regarding the civic value attributed to the two cults, this paper presents an interpretation of these clues and analyzes the documented traces of Luccan citizens’ pilgrimages to Rome. Keywords Lucca, Holy Face, Veronica, Charles iv, Nicodemus, Leboinus, Sansepolcro, Bocca di Magra, indulgences

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Raffaele Savigni Università di Bologna [email protected]

The Roman Veronica and the Holy Face of Lucca Parallelism and Tangents in the Formation of their Respective Traditions Raffaele Savigni

The cult of the Holy Face of Lucca and that of the Roman Veronica show many common elements: even if the Vultus from Lucca is a wooden statue of the Crucifix, they were both considered equal in representing the authentic image of Christ. Gervase of Tilbury describes them in his Otia Imperialia in terms of equal dignity. Moreover, the narration of the making of the Holy Face in the Leobinian legend shows Nicodemus sculpting the Face of Christ on the basis of an image left by his body on the veil (velamen) he had been covered with. This veil was sometimes identified with Veronica’s image. The Holy Face in Lucca was worshipped from the end of

the eleventh century (but the tradition consolidates in the early 1200s). Both the Holy Face and the Veronica were on the right of the entrance in Lucca Cathedral and in St Peter. Romano Silva underlined this spatial parallelism, and Chiara Frugoni hypothesized that in the eleventh century there was in Lucca a painted image similar to the Veronica and a Crucifix. In the fourteenth century, Emperor Charles iv from Bohemia appreciated both cults, and promoted their parallel spread in Prague. This paper attempts to reconstruct – from these clues – the spread of apocryphal traditions regarding the civic value attributed to the two cults.

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The Legend of the Holy Face: Traces of Two Different Traditions

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During the age of the Medieval Commune, the civic cult of the Holy Face developed in the city of Lucca, where it became the symbol of the identity and the libertas of the town. Due to its location on the Via Francigena, in the eleventh century, Lucca became the destination for pilgrims wishing to honor the simulacrum. The sacrarium of the Holy Face was attested in 1107. The chapel was consecrated in 1119, coinciding with the birth of the Commune; but the cult itself achieved particular success during the thirteenth century, when the Holy Face was depicted on city coins, and the tribute of candles on the feast of the Luminara (September 13) was imposed on the communities governed from Lucca1. This cult, called peregrina religio in Bishop Rangerio’s Vita metrica Anselmi episcopi (ca 1096) and regarded as something new2, probably originated from the merging of two different devotions, addressed to two different objects: a crux, called vetus in a list of cathedral altars recorded in manuscript 124 of the Biblioteca Capitolare, and a vultus3, probably an image of the Veronica type (although some scholars have speculated that the passage referred to a second, and more recent, crucifix)4. Chiara Frugoni hypothesized the coexistence of two different objects of worship. She identified different editorial layers in the Legend of the Holy Face, and traces of two different traditions, which Leboino, the final editor, tried to harmonize by welding the cult of the crucifix-reliquary to a pre-existing local cult addressed to a two-dimensional image, typologically akin to the Veronica5. This hypothesis was largely rejected on the bases of the polysemy of the term vultus (which could designate a whole body, and even three-dimensional images)6. However, it has been recently reproposed by Piero Donati7. Unfortunately, a critical edition of the Legend of the Holy Face written in the twelfth century is still lacking. Stefano Butrione is said to have visited the Holy Land in 1098, during the First Crusade. There, a man called Giorgio revealed to him that the Holy Face represented “veram ymaginem et per omnem similitudinem veram Salvatoris formam”8. In this text, the crucifix of Nicodemus is also defined as icona9. In later Luccan texts, the two terms crux

and vultus appear to be used interchangeably to describe a work of complex origins, partly due to the artistic skill of Nicodemus, partly to a supernatural intervention, which conferred the dignity of an acheiropoieton on the opus. The second section of the legend, the Miracula, focuses on the relics inside the Holy Face: a fragment of the Crown of Thorns, a nail from the cross, the umbilical cord of the Christ Child, a phial of blood and the shroud that Jesus wore around his neck, and some of his nails and hair gathered in the Virgin’s Veil, “in capite velaminis eiusdem sancte Genitricis”. At the time of the reconstruction of Lucca Cathedral ad honorem beati Martini et sacratissimi Vultus, the Bishop of Lucca (that later sources identified with Rangerius) is accused of the attempt to open the reliquary and extract the treasures hidden in the Holy Face. Such depreciable act was prevented by a stupor mentis and the intolerable splendor of the icon10. Afterwards – according to the legend – a Luccan cleric on his pilgrimage to the Holy Land met the Patriarch of Jerusalem, who told him how the Holy Face had been made: Nicodemus sculpted the Face on the image left by Christ’s body on the veil (velamen) used as His funeral shroud11. At the time of Otto iv of Brunswick (who, crowned in Rome in 1209, stamped the Holy Face onto Luccan coins as a symbol of the Emperor’s universal), Gervase of Tilbury was evidently aware of the legend. In fact, he reports that Nicodemus shaped the Holy Face on model of the image imprinted on the cloth that had covered the whole body of Jesus. He added that this cloth was placed inside the Holy Face, near the relics of the Passion12. Gervase, who connects the Holy Face to the Veronica and to other images of Christ, quotes the text of the prayer that Nicodemus daily addressed to the Holy Face, inviting the Emperor himself to recite it silently, adding other invocations during the elevation of the Eucharist13. The Holy Face of Lucca can be connected to other crucifixes from the category traditionally defined as Christus triumphans14. This category depicts Jesus with a serene face and open eyes, wearing a belt, showing no signs of physical suffering, with a priestly and royal appearance. It is easily distinguishable from the later type of the

Christus patiens. Archaeological investigations carried out on the Holy Face of Sansepolcro (dating the wooden artefact to the eighth–ninth century)15, and other researches allowed scholars to identify the place of origins of the wooden and clothed/ robed (tunicati) Carolingian crucifixes. Rabanus Maurus’ figured poem De laudibus Sanctae Crucis prepares the ground for the full legitimacy of the three-dimensional representation of Christ, overcoming the mistrust of images proposed by the Libri carolini. In one of Rabanus’ poems, the cross itself is replaced by the representation of the crucifix, the man without the cross, with a well-defined face and open eyes16. A manuscript of this poem is preserved in Lucca. However, this does not constitute a direct evidence for the spread of the cult of the Holy Face, as local origin seems unlikely17. Manuscript 490 of the Biblioteca Capitolare Feliniana, copied in the late eighth or early ninth century, includes the Cura sanitatis Tiberii (fols 342r–346v). This is the oldest evidence of this text18, which together with the Vindicta Salvatoris (similarly centered on the figure of Nicodemus) contributed to the elaboration of the Veronica legend. Different redactions of the Vindicta Salvatoris (whose terminus ante quem is the ninth century) describe the Veronica either as a relic or as a miraculous image19. Luca Bellone analyzed the Tuscan vernacular redactions of the Vindicta: none of them can be directly linked to Lucca20. Veronica is not mentioned in Luccan liturgical calendars, nor in the Tuscan Passions. Furthermore, the source of Antoninus of Florence, featuring Veronica as the wife of Amateur, disciple of St Martial21, cannot be identified. In the Cura sanitatis, the Veronica is described as a picture painted by the bleeding woman of the same name who was healed by Jesus22. Another Frequently used abbreviations: asl = Archivio di Stato in Lucca; bsl = Biblioteca statale di Lucca. 1 See Lucca, il Volto Santo e la civiltà medievale. Atti del Convegno internazionale di studi (Lucca, 21–23 October 1982), Lucca 1984; Raffaele Savigni, “Lucca e il Volto Santo nell’xi e xii secolo”, in Il Volto Santo in Europa. Culto e immagini del Crocifisso nel Medioevo. Atti del Convegno internazionale di Engelberg (13–16 September 2000) Michele C. Ferrari, Andreas Meyer eds, Lucca 2005, pp. 407–497; Andreas Meyer,“Der Volto Santo in der Luccheser Gesellschaft des 13. Jahrhunderts”, ibidem, pp. 229–336; Stefano Martinelli, L’immagine del Volto Santo di Lucca: il successo europeo di un’iconografia medievale, Pisa 2016; and [http://www.archiviovoltosanto.org]. 2 Vita metrica Anselmi Lucensis episcopi, Ernestus Sackur, Gerhardus Schwartz, Bernhardus Schmeidler eds, (mgh, Scriptores, xxx/2), Leipzig 1934, vv. 4429–4432, pp. 1152–1307. 3 Pietro Guidi, “Per la storia della cattedrale e del Volto Santo (Note

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critiche)”, Bollettino storico lucchese, iv (1932), pp. 169–186, sp. p. 169. On different assumptions see Stefano Martinelli,“Lo status quaestionis bibliografico sul Volto santo: punti fermi e problemi aperti”, in Scoperta armonia. Arte medievale a Lucca, Chiara Bozzoli, Maria Teresa Filieri eds, Lucca 2014, pp. 119–130, who rejects (pp. 125–126) the idea of replacing an older crucifix with a new one. 5 Chiara Frugoni, “Una proposta per il Volto santo”, in Il Volto Santo. Storia e culto, Clara Baracchini, Maria Teresa Filieri eds, Lucca 1982, pp. 15–48. 6 Jean-Claude Schmitt, “La cité et son image: Lucques et le Volto Santo”, Annali di storia moderna e contemporanea, xvi (2010), pp. 125–144, sp. p. 129. 7 Piero Donati,“Sulla provenienza del Volto Santo di Bocca di Magra”, Giornale Storico della Lunigiana e del Territorio Lucense, lxiv (2013), pp. 145–162. 8 bsl, ms 110 (copied before 1352), ff. 21v–22r. 9 Ibidem, f. 19v. 10 Ibidem, ff. 21v–22r, 23r. 11 Ibidem, f. 25r: “Ad cuius vocem una illarum veloci gradu in Sion revertens velamen attulit quod diligenti cura adaptantes a capite Salvatoris usque ad pedes in longum protenderunt. Joseph vero postea a Pilato licentia impetrata cum de cruce Salvatorem deponeret velamen mulieribus reddit, quod ille intuentes expressam Salvatoris ymaginem et per omnia liniamenta verissima eius similitudinem et formam in eo sculptam invenerunt”. 12 Gervase of Tilbury, Otia Imperialia: recreation for an emperor, iii 24, S.E. Banks, James Wallace Binns eds, Oxford 2002, p. 598: “emerunt lintheum mundissimum, tam amplum et extensum quod totum crucifixi corpus operiebat; cumque deponeretur, pendens de cruce apparuit tocius corporis effigies in lintheo expressa. Ad cuius similitudinem et exemplar, Nicodemus Vultum Lucanum effigiavit, in cuius medio lintheum inclusit, et ampullam sanguinis Domini, et unum ex tribus clavis, partemque corone spinee”. 13 Otia Imperialia (n. 12), p. 600. On the central role of the Eucharistic elevation see Mario Sensi, “Culto eucaristico fuori della Messa”, in Il “Corpus Domini”. Teologia, antropologia e politica, Laura Andreani, Agostino Paravicini Bagliani eds, Florence 2015, pp. 103–138, sp. pp. 110–114; Eugenio Burgio,“Veronica e il volto di Cristo. Testi e immagini di una leggenda tardomedievale”, in Testo e immagine nel Medioevo germanico, Maria Grazia Saibene, Marina Buzzoni eds, Milan 2001, pp. 65–102, sp. pp. 89–97. 14 On these iconographic models see La croce: iconografia e interpretazione (secoli 1. – inizio 16.), Atti del Convegno internazionale di studi (Napoli, 6–11 dicembre 1999), Boris Ulianich ed., Napoli 2007. 15 Il Volto Santo di Sansepolcro: un grande capolavoro medievale rivelato dal restauro, Anna Maria Maetzke ed., Cinisello Balsamo 1994. 16 Michele C. Ferrari, Il “Liber sanctae crucis” di Rabano Mauro. Testo, immagine, contesto, Bern/Berlin 1999, pp. 291–410; Celia Chazelle, The Crucified God in the Carolingian Era: Theology and Art of Christ’s Passion, Cambridge 2001. 17 bsl, ms 370, 11th ex – 12th in., ff. 103r–121r, sp. 121v. See Michele C. Ferrari, “Il Volto Santo di Lucca”, in Il Volto di Cristo, Giovanni Morello, Gerhard Wolf eds, Milan 2000, pp. 253–275, sp. 271. 18 See the paper of Zbigniew Izydorczyk in this volume. 19 Rémi Gounelle,“Les origines littéraires de la légende de Véronique et de la Sainte Face: La Cura sanitatis Tiberii et la Vindicta Salvatoris”, in Sacre impronte e oggetti “non fatti da mano d’uomo”nelle religioni, Atti del Convegno Internazionale (Torino, 18–20 maggio 2010), Adele Monaci Castagno ed., Turin 2011, pp. 231–251; Jean-Marie Sansterre, “Variations d’une légende et genèse d’un culte entre la Jérusalem des origines, Rome et l’Occident : quelques jalons de l’histoire de Véronique et de la Veronica jusqu’à la fin du xiiie siècle”, in Passages. Déplacements des hommes, circulation des textes et identités dans l’Occident médiéval. Actes du Colloque de Bordeaux (2 et 3 février 2007), Joëlle Ducos, Patrick Henriet eds, Toulouse 2013, pp. 217–231. 20 La tradizione italiana della “Vindicta Salvatoris”: edizione dei volgarizzamenti toscani, Luca Bellone ed., Alessandria 2011. 21 Antoninus of Florence (†1459), Chronica vi 25, 2, Lugduni 1586, p. 438: “[Martialis] Venit autem cum beato Petro Apostolo Romam, et per eum missus fuit in Galliam, habens in comitatu suo Amatorem et coniugem eius Veronicam, quae familiaris et praecordialis amica fuit Virginis Mariae”; Gregorio Lombardelli da Siena, La vita del gloriosissimo san Marziale, Florence 1595, p. 11. 22 Ernst von Dobschütz, Christusbilder: untersuchungen zu christlichen Legende, Leipzig 1899, p. 176**.

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text written in the area of Nonantula (ca eleventh century), the Translatio sanctorum Senesii et Theopontii, refers to this image as a painted picture. In this passage, the author compares the devoted care of the famula Dei Anserada (trying to preserve the bodies of the two saints properly) with the femina Veronica’s23.

The Holy Face, the Veronica and Other Miraculous Images: Symmetries

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A Luccan Holy Face is attested from the late eleventh century. Traditionally considered the prototype of a group of clothed/robed (tunicati) crucifixes, the Holy Face of Lucca appears to be more recent than the one in Sansepolcro (venerated only from the fourteenth century)24. The Luccan cult was consolidated at the beginning of the thirteenth century, and it shares several features with that of the Veronica: Gervase of Tilbury suggests a connection between these cults. In fact, he not only says that the Face was modelled by Nicodemus on the likeness of the shroud on the body of Jesus, but he also suggests a parallel between the Lateran acheiropoieton, the St Peter’s Veronica (which he traces back to Lazarus’ sister, Martha, identified with the bleeding woman), and the Holy Face of Lucca. Gervase records that the Veronica was placed to the right of the basilica of St Peter, “in basilica sancti Petri iuxta valvam a parte introitus dextra recondite”25: a location mirroring that of the Holy Face of Lucca, as Romano Silva observed. According to the Legend of Leboinus, the Holy Face of Lucca was placed in St Martin’s “prope valvas eiusdem basilicae ad australem plagam”26. In the Luccan architecture of the age of ecclesiastical reform Silva saw a strong imitatio Romae (with important liturgical echoes). In Lucca, Alexander ii may have introduced not only the architectural model of the five-naves cathedral, but also the cult of the Veronica27. In 1942, Pedemonte noted elements common to both the legends of the Veronica and the Holy Face28. More recently, Michele Bacci – echoing Sible de Blaauw’s analysis of the liturgical space in the Roman basilicas29 – emphasised the mirrored location of the altars dedicated to the worship of the Cross and the

Saviour in Lucca and in Rome30. Chiara Frugoni noticed the presence of the Holy Face together with that of the Veronica in the church of Matraia, in the diocese of Lucca. There, in 1857, a statue of the Holy Face replaced a seventeenth-century painting (1643) on the altar, while the Veronica is depicted in a cartouche placed at the foot of the same altar31. In the Acta of the Council of Nicaea ii (787) is preserved a variant of a pseudo-Athanasian text. This text, preserved in a manuscript of the eleventh century (Vat. Lat. 641), narrates the miraculous outpouring of blood from the imago depicta of Beirut, and also credits the Beirut image (iconiam) to Nicodemus, who on his death bequeathed it to Gamaliel32. In the Modern Age, the Luccan erudite tradition also ascribes the authorship of the image of Beirut to Nicodemus33. In Pisa, a tradition recorded by P. Tronci in the seventeenth century dates around the year 1100 the arrival of the relics of St Nicodemus in the city34; and in Genua, a thirteenth-century chronicle mentions a tower called Veronica, located at Porto Pisano35. Instead, the hypothesis of the existence at Bocca di Magra of an ancient cult of St Nicodemus combined with that of the Holy Cross is no longer credible: Eliana Vecchi’s edition of the Codex Pelavicino by Lupo Gentile corrected an erroneous reference to Nicodemus, the correct text refers to a cult of St Nicholas, a recognized sea saint (“in honore Dei et vivifice sactae Crucis et beatissimi Nicholai confessoris”)36. The Passio imaginis is mentioned in some liturgical calendars on November 9, the date of the Dedication of the Lateran Basilica of the Most Holy Savior37. This Roman cult of the Holy Savior may have been a model for Lucca, where, in the Middle Ages, we found a worship of the Savior which cannot be identified with the one addressed to the Holy Face38.

Charles iv, the Holy Face and the Veronica In his study on Luccan political iconography, Romano Silva underlines the role of Emperor Charles iv of Bohemia, who granted the people of Lucca freedom from Pisan domination in 1369, and who exported the cult of the Holy Face to

Bohemia39. In 1372, Charles insistently asked Lucca to send a copy of the Holy Face, woven in silk, (“unum palium de seta decorum in quo sit contexta imago sive figura Sancti Vultus et Sancte Crucis Lucane”) to be placed in a prominent position inside the Cathedral of Prague40. Matthias of Janow describes the Holy Face of Lucca as an imperial image, looking terribilis, completely different to the meek and mild image of the Veronica41. Giovanni Porta de Annoniaco gives us details of the Holy Week liturgy of 1355. The Emperor was then hosted at the cloister of the canons of St Peter, and, thanks to a cardinal, could benefit from a private nightly exposition of the Veronica that “devotissime rex ipse catholicus adoravit”, while the Veronica was shown to the people only on the following day, Good Friday42. The Annales Matseenses, another fourteenth century source, ascribe to Charles iv the attempt to remove the Veronica from Rome. According to a later tradition, he then tried to replace the original Veronica with a copy43. In December 1368 Charles iv received (as a gift from Pope Urban v) one of the veils employed to cover the shroud. Later, the emperor spread this cult in Bohemia, gifting the Prague cathedral with the so-called golden Veronica (that he probably brought from Rome in 1368, and was later represented in the cathedral mosaics), and a small table with the image of Veronica (“tabula parva cum veronica et lamina aurea”). In the same cathedral, it is preserved another copy of the Veronica, datable around 140044. The Italian sojourn of Charles iv, in Lucca and in Rome, left significant traces even beyond the Alps; and it can be inferred that this significant interest in images of the face of Christ was fostered by the theological debates on the concept of beatific vision dating from the time of John xxii and Benedict xii45.

Jubilee, Pilgrimages and Devotions Some copies of Boniface viii’s Bull of Indiction of the Jubilee (preceded by the letter of the pontifical scribe Silvester) are preserved in Tuscan Archives, but while the illuminated manuscripts of Cortona are decorated with the Veronica image, surrounded by the apostles Peter and Paul, the copy of

23 Translatio et miracula sanctorum Senesii et Theoponti (bhl 8116), 4, Percy Ernst Schramm ed., (mgh, Scriptores, xxx/2), Hanover 1934, p. 988. 24 Andrea Czortek, “La devozione al Volto Santo a Sansepolcro nel xiv secolo: nuove acquisizioni documentarie”, Pagine altotiberine, liv (2014), pp. 77–102: legacy (1336) “pro missis dicendis coram Vultu Sancto”. 25 Otia imperialia (n. 12), iii 24–25, pp. 598, 604–606. 26 bsl, ms 110, f. 12r. 27 Romano Silva, “La datazione del Volto Santo di Lucca”, in Imitatio Romae. Percorsi artistici fra Papato e Impero, Iacopo Lazzareschi Cervelli ed., Lucca 2012, pp. 419–427, sp. pp. 424–425: “gli autori della leggenda di Leobino consideravano o volevano far considerare il simulacro lucchese un acheropita al pari della Veronica”. 28 Antonio Pedemonte, “Ricerche sulla primitiva forma iconografica del Volto Santo”, Atti della Reale Accademia lucchese di scienze, lettere ed arti, v (1942), pp. 117–144, sp. pp. 136–137. 29 Sible De Blaauw, Cultus et decor. Liturgia e architettura nella Roma tardoantica e medievale, Vatican City 1994, pp. 192, 261, 670–671. 30 Michele Bacci, “Nicodemo e il Volto Santo”, in Il Volto Santo in Europa (n. 1), pp. 15–40, sp. pp. 35–36. 31 Frugoni, “Una proposta” (n. 5), p. 35. 32 Michele Bacci, “Quel bello miracolo onde si fa la festa del santo Salvatore: studio della metamorfosi di una leggenda”, in Santa Croce e Santo Volto, Contributi allo studio dell’origine e della fortuna del culto del Salvatore (secoli ix–xv), Gabriella Rossetti ed., Pisa 2002, pp. 7–86. 33 Sebastiano Tofanelli, Il primo ritratto del Crocifisso, Napoli 1644, pp. 25–34; Giovanni Battista Conti, Della origine, invenzione e traslazione del prezioso simulacro di Gesù crocifisso detto comunemente Volto Santo che si venera nella Metropolitana di Lucca, Lucca 1834, pp. 19–21. 34 Paolo Tronci, Memorie istoriche della città di Pisa, Livorno 1682, p. 37. 35 Iacobi Aurie, Annales Ianvenses, in Annali genovesi di Caffaro e dei suoi continuatori, Cesare Imperiale di Sant’Angelo ed., Rome 1929, pp. 23, 37–38, 54–55. 36 Regesto del Codice Pelavicino, Michele Lupo Gentile ed., Genova 1912, n. 542 (1176), pp. 615–617: “monasterium in honorem Dei et vivifice sancte Crucis et beatissimi Nichodemi confessoris”; see Eliana Vecchi, “La fondazione del monastero di Santa Croce del Corvo ed una titolazione mai esistita”, Giornale Storico della Lunigiana e del Territorio Lucense, lxiv (2013), pp. 97–143, sp. pp. 115–118. For a new digital edition of Pelavicino Code see [http://pelavicino.labcd.unipi.it/]. 37 Michele Bacci, “Le Majestats, il Volto Santo e il Cristo di Beirut: nuove riflessioni”, Iconographica, xiii (2014), pp. 45–66, sp. pp. 54–56. 38 Between 797 and 930 the existence of a church called Domini et Salvatoris is documented near the Cathedral of San Martino. This does not necessarily imply that it was already used to host the Holy Face, as hypothesized by Graziano Concioni, Contributi alla storia del Volto Santo, Pisa 2005, pp. 67–130, sp. p. 122. 39 Max Seidel, Romano Silva, Potere delle immagini, immagini del potere. Lucca città imperiale: iconografia politica, Venice 2007, pp. 131–196; Martin Bauch, “Öffentliche Frömmigkeit und Demut des Herrschers als Form politischer Kommunikation. Karl iv. und seine Italienaufenthalte als Beispiel”, Quellen und Forschungen aus italienischen Archiven und Bibliotheken, lxxxvii (2007), pp. 109–138, sp. pp. 119–132. 40 Seidel/Silva, Potere delle immagini (n. 39), pp. 91– 98; Martin Bauch, Divina favente clemencia. Auserwählung, Frömmigkeit und Heilsvermittlung in der Herrschaftspraxis Kaiser Karls iv., Vienna/Cologne/Weimar 2015, pp. 341–342. 41 Matthias de Janow dictus Magister Parisiensis, Regularum Veteris et Novi Testamenti liber v, De corpore Christi, Jana Nechutová, Helena Krmíčková eds, Munich 1993, p. 109: “neque hoc est sine mysterio, quod due tantum eedem facies sint Christi famose in ecclesia, una in Roma, quod vulgo dicitur ‘Veronica’, et hec eadem valde graciosa et admodum mansueta facies et mitis; alia in Luca intitulatur a Lucanis ‘vultus Christi’ in hystoria [...]. In illa eadem facies est valde terribilis aspectu quedam ymago et imperialis, pretendens in sua apparencia et exhibens quandam persone maiestatem”. 42 Johannes Porta de Annoniaco, Liber de coronatione Karoli iv. imperatoris, 39–40, Ricardus Salomon ed., (mgh, Script. rer. Germ. 35), Hanover/ Leipzig 1913, p. 78. 43 Annales Matseenses, Georgius H. Pertz ed., (mgh, Scriptores, ix), Hanover 1851, p. 830; Bauch, Divina favente clemencia (n. 40), pp. 263, 339–340. 44 Seidel/Silva, Potere delle immagini (n. 39), pp. 142–151, sp. pp. 142–144. 45 Ibidem, pp. 148–151.

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1 / Petition addressed to the pope by the habitants of Alessandria, parchment, 16th century / Lucca, Archivio di Stato, Diplomatico, Dono Gambarini

the State Archives of Lucca does not have this decoration46. Instead, the Veronica is represented in two sixteenth century petitions addressed to the pope by the habitants of Alessandria and Montpellier, claiming the right to choose a confessor allowed to change pilgrimage vows into charitable works. In these documents, the Veronica is depicted, eyes opened, at the center. In the Alessandria one, she has a pale skin tone, and is inserted between the symbols of papal and imperial power (on one side the keys and the tiara, on the other the eagle) [Fig. 1], while in the Montpellier one she has a darker skin and is placed between the apostles Peter and Paul [Fig. 2] 47. As of this date, no journal from a pilgrim visiting the saint’s shroud at Lucca has been found. A tribute to Veronica should have been implicitly included in the mentions of the ad limina apostolorum pilgrimage carried out by Francesco Guinigi48 or in the one completed for the jubilee of 1390 by Pacino del fu Cinello di Vorno49. Rome and Santiago of Compostela however remained the favorite destinations for pilgrimage50. In 1505, the abbess and nuns of the Luccan monastery of St Justine were registered, by initiative of the Hermits of St Augustine, in the Liber confraternitatis Sancti Spiritus in Saxia; thus including in the spiritual benefits enjoyed by the Roman Arcispedale the Luccan confraternities of the Holy Spirit (built in 1532 in St Masseo church) and of St Martha and St Mary Magdalene51. In 1514, Leo x gave to the nuns of St Giustina the right to choose their own (proprium) confessor and to visit the Holy Face once in a lifetime in small groups52. These dispensations prefigured the centrality achieved by the cult of the Holy Face in the Luccan Church and, at the same time, demonstrated the intention not to over-encourage 46 47 48 49

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asl, Diplomatico. Serviti, 22 February 1300. asl, Diplomatico, Dono Gambarini, xvi sec.; Recuperate, 1592. asl, Testamenti, 3, ser Federico Scortica, ff. 81r–87v, 14 May 1348. asl, Testamenti, 2, ff. 139v–142v, 22 November 1390: “iturus presentialiter

sicut asserit Romam visitaturus limina apostolorum pro assequenda generali indulgentia huius anni et plenam remissionem omnium peccatorum”. 50 Christine Meek, “Lucca and Pilgrimage in the Later Middle Ages: A Two-Way Traffic”, in Pilgrims and Politics: Rediscovering the Power of the Pilgrimage, Antón M. Pazos ed., Farnham 2012, pp. 103–118. 51 asl, Diplomatico, S. Giustina, 1 January 1505; Offizio sopra la giurisdizione, 10 September 1536; Serviti, 9 July 1607. 52 asl, Diplomatico, S. Giustina, 18 July 1514.

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it through too frequent expositions. This attitude is still evident in the seventeenth–eighteenth centuries, when the permits for the “gite (visits) al Volto santo” were given to single canons of the Cathedral or to their delegates53. A vernacular version of the legend, the anonymous Historia del Volto Santo di Christo, published in Lucca in 1586 and immediately recalled, ends with a reference to the Veronica54. What can be observed in Lucca, as well as in the Rome of Innocent iii and Guy de Montpellier, is the civic dimension of the cult of an image, and the strong bond between the development of that worship and the creation of a hospital institution. In the second half of the thirteenth century, soon after St Luke’s hospital was founded by merchants and dedicated to the poor (ca 1260), a confraternity of lay men and women was established: the Compagnia della Croce or del Volto Santo, whose aim was to promote the worship of the Holy Face, and to express devotion to the suffering Christ. In 1308, the book of the confraternity shows the emergence of the compassio Crucifixi theme, that can be seen in the practice of embracing the crucifix in tears, and in the monthly procession (every third Sunday) ending with a sermon preached by members of different religious orders in the cathedral55.

Indulgences Several bishopric indulgences show the importance of worship of the Holy Face and its central role in defining the identity of the city. In 1296, on June 12, Bishop Paganello accorded an indulgence to the brethren gathered every first Friday at the Hospital of Mercy (i.e. St Luke’s) to celebrate a solemn Mass and to care for the poor. In 1309, “ob reverentiam sanctissimi et pretiosissimi Vultus sancti de Luca”, a donation in favor of the societas sancti Vultus was made, introducing the distribution of bread to the poor on All Soul’s Day, on the first Monday of Lent (called dies lune caritativa) and on other occasions56. In 1339, April 5, in Avignon, nine bishops sig­ ned a privilege according 40 days’ indulgence

to brothers who participated in the first Friday Masses and sermons, visited a sick brother (or took part to his funeral rites), comforted a prisoner condemned to death, reunited in a confraternity chapter cum cappis et disciplinis ad faciendam memoriam passionis Christi, or went on pilgrimage. The decoration of the manuscript containing this text remarkably reflects the integration between the public devotion to the Holy Face and the new spirituality focused on the devotion to the suffering Christ, and on charity towards the poor: on the upper left side, an image of the Volto Santo is crowned by two invocations and by the inscription sanctus Vultus de Luca, and in the center at the top we find a small image of Christ, naked and suffering (with nails and blood) [Fig. 3] 57. In some illuminated manuscripts, and in the incunabulum 157 of the Biblioteca Capitolare of Lucca (dating from the end of the fifteenth century), a reference to the Eucharist can be recognized in the chalice on which Christ places his right foot58. Instead, I have not found in Luccan medieval iconography references to the Veronica or to the related cycle of Pontius Pilate59: it is possible to infer that, in Lucca, the strong rooting of the worship of the Volto Santo may have stopped the influx of the Roman Veronica. Lucca, in fact, while declaring its loyalty to the Church of Rome, already had its own Veronica, i.e. its own Volto Santo, perceived as the solid foundation of the city’s cultural and political identity.

2 / Petition addressed to the pope by the habitants of Montpellier, parchment, 1592 / Lucca, Archivio di Stato, Diplomatico, Recuperate

53 Archivio capitolare di Lucca, y + 15, Gite di S. Croce; Bartolomeo Beverini, Il pellegrino guidato per la città di Lucca (ca 1669), bsl ms 1875, published by Emanuele Pellegrini, Descrivere Lucca: viaggio tra note, inventari e guide dal 17. al 19. secolo, Pisa 2009, p. 184. 54 Historia del Volto Santo di Christo, Lucca 1586: “Un’altro (sic) Volto Santo si ritrova in Roma nella Chiesa di San Pietro, pieno di grandissima riverenza, et divotione: il quale fu quello di S. Veronica”. 55 Francesco Paolo Luiso, La leggenda del Volto Santo. Storia di un cimelio, Pescia 1928, pp. 94–95. 56 asl, Diplomatico. Compagnia della Croce, 1296 June 12; S. Croce, 1309 January 21. See Raffaele Savigni, “Il culto della Croce e del Volto Santo nel territorio lucchese (secoli xi–xiv)”, in La santa Croce di Lucca. Il Volto santo. Storia, tradizioni, immagini, Atti del Convegno di Studi (Lucca, 1–3 marzo 2001), Florence 2003, pp. 131–172, sp. pp. 141–143, 166–168. 57 asl, Diplomatico. Compagnia della Croce, 5 April 1339. 58 Bacci, “Le Majestats” (n. 37), pp. 56–58. 59 For an example of the seventeenth century see the oil painting Christ meets Veronica, ca 1650, from St Martin’s church in Pietrasanta; Roberto Contini, “Pittura nel Vicariato di Pietrasanta dal secondo Cinquecento al tardo Settecento”, in Arte sacra nella Versilia medicea, exhibition catalogue (Seravezza, Palazzo Mediceo, 5 agosto – 15 ottobre 1995), Clara Baracchini, Severina Russoe eds, Florence 1995, pp. 66–67, 81, pl. xiii.

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3 / Privilege according 40 days of indulgence to brothers of the confraternitas sanctae Crucis, signed by nine bishops, parchment, April 5, 1339 / Lucca, Archivio di Stato in Lucca, Diplomatico, Compagnia della croce

summary Římský Veraikon a Svatá Tvář z Luccy podobnost a protínání jejich tradic

Ve třináctém století se občanský kult Svaté Tváře stal pomyslným symbolem svobod a práv (libertas) města Lucca. Důležitost uctívání Svaté Tváře a její ústřední úlohu v utváření identity města dokládá i vyhlášení odpustků několika biskupy. Podle textu Legendy Svaté Tváře z dvanáctého století Nikodém vytvořil sochařský portrét Kristovy tváře podle otisku na pohřební roušce (velamen) a Gervasius z Tilbury dodává, že tato látka byla následně umístěna dovnitř dané sochy vedle relikvií umučení. Gervasius tak spojuje Svatou Tvář a Veraikon s dalšími zobrazeními Krista. Rukopis 490 v Biblioteca Capitolare Feliniana v Lucce, vytvořený na přelomu osmého a devátého století, obsahuje text Cura sanitates Tiberii. V manuskriptu Rabana Maura je zase zahrnuta báseň De laudibus Sanctae Crucis – dnes je tento spis rovněž dochován v Lucce, nicméně samotný vznik rukopisu na tomto místě je nepravděpodobný. Již dříve badatelé poukázali na obdobné umístění Svaté Tváře v katedrále sv. Martina v Lucce a Veraikonu ve vatikánské bazilice sv. Petra, kdy se oba obrazy shodně nachází napravo od vchodu.

Císař Karel iv., který osvobodil občany Luccy od nadvlády Pisy v roce 1369, podporoval oba kulty a zasloužil se o jejich rozšíření v Praze. Dekorace rukopisu bratrstva Svatého Kříže při nemocnici sv. Lukáše poukazuje na prolínání veřejné úcty Svaté Tváře a nové spirituality zaměřené na uctívání trpícího Krista s dobročinností vůči chudým. Lidová verze Legendy, vydaná v Lucce v roce 1586 (a okamžitě stažená z oběhu), končí odkazem na Veroničinu roušku. Ta je také vyobrazena na dvou peticích uchovaných v toskánském archivu, které papeži zaslali obyvatelé Alexandrie a Montpellier. Autor článku však v Lucce nenalezl středověké ikonografické reference na Veroničinu roušku nebo cyklus Piláta Pontského a Veraikon taktéž není zmiňován v místních liturgických kalendářích. Je možné, že právě silně zakořeněná tradice uctívání Svaté Tváře zastavila příchod římského Veraikonu. Přestože se Lucca prohlašovala za loajální k římské církvi, měla už svou vlastní Svatou Tvář, kterou vnímala jako pevný základ kulturní a politické identity města.

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Abstract – The Iconography of the Roman Veronica. From the Repertoires of Karl Pearson to Veronica Route This article seeks to identify the Roman veronica’s iconographic features by comparing the 200 veronicas’ characteristics noted by Pearson in 1887, the observations of diverse veronica scholars, and an online database of 3,817 veronicas (www.veronicaroute.com) in which each example is tagged for place and date. Pearson noted the veronica’s link to the Mandylion – the light/dark face, the transfigured/suffering face – and arrived at 1450 as the turning point from the transfigured to the suffering face. According to the Index of concentration, dark-faced veronicas with a “cut-out” outline are linked to the Roman relic, suggesting that early veronicas resembled the Mandylia in Rome and Genoa. According to the database, the early veronicas resembled the Mandylion; the dominant type of veronica between 1300 and 1500 had the transfigured face; and there is not necessarily a link between the dark face of the veronica and the suffering face of Christ. Keywords – Veronica Route, Karl Pearson’s veronicas, veronica iconography, original veronica, veronica and Mandylion, light/dark-faced veronica, suffering/transfigured veronica, statistical analysis Raffaella Zardoni Associazione Il Volto Ritrovato [email protected] Emanuela Bossi Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore [email protected]

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Amanda Murphy Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore [email protected]

The Iconography of the Roman Veronica From the Repertoires of Karl Pearson to Veronica Route1 Raffaella Zardoni, Emanuela Bossi, Amanda Murphy

Introduction It is well known that although there are thousands of reproductions of the Roman veronica2 in Europe, no one is able to say exactly what the original relic looked like. To echo Neil McGregor,“from the 14th century, wherever the Roman Church went, the veronica would go with it”3. The principal aim of the present work4 is to identify the characteristics of the Roman veronica by means of systematic comparison of the features of a large quantity of available veronicas. Such a task was previously performed in 1887 by Karl Pearson5, the eclectic English scholar famous in the field of mathematical statistics. Inspired by a friend working at Cambridge University library, he set out to investigate the development of the legend of the veronica and its iconography, examining about 200 artworks. In the same spirit and adopting the same comparative approach, we

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The Veronica Route project [www.veronicaroute.com] started in 2010 with the aim of studying the Roman veronica, reprising work by the English statistician Karl Pearson, Die Fronica, Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte des Christusbildes im Mittelalter, Strasbourg 1887. It is an online catalogue of artistic and literary citations of the Roman veronica, in the form of an open database in which all the objects are tagged and are searchable by characteristic, geographic provenance and/or century. The works are signalled and sent in by volunteers together with the information found in loco: the sources are considered trustworthy, unless an error of attribution or dating is easily demonstrable. Many works recorded on Veronica Route do not yet have complete captions such as those found in museum catalogues. Although the vr database covers all centuries, the richest and most relevant period for the present purpose is pre-1600. We have adopted the convention of a capital v only when referring to the woman named Veronica. Neil MacGregor, Erika Langmuir, Seeing Salvation. Images of Christ in Art, London 2000, p. 92. Drawing on research and the Veronica Route project started by Raffaella Zardoni, the intellectual property of this article is shared by the team of three authors, who developed the work together. The article was entirely written in English by Amanda Murphy. The first work of this type was performed by Wilhelm Grimm, the writer of fairy tales, in Saga dell’origine delle immagini di Cristo, (Scritti minori, vol. iii), Göttingen 1842, pp. 139 –157. For Pearson,“[t]his is the only work which can claim to be comprehensive and precise”, Fronica (n. 1), p. 74 [our translation].

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examine the dominant iconographic traits of the veronica, and using appropriate statistical measures, compare Pearson’s findings with a much larger database, namely the 3871 veronicas found in the online catalogue Veronica Route (vr). Importantly, our reading of Pearson’s work takes account of the reception and critique of his work by selected authors.

1. Part One: The Iconographic Characteristics Identified in Die Fronica In this section, we examine the salient findings of Die Fronica by Karl Pearson and present the hypotheses concerning the iconography of the veronica in the literature, with particular reference to works by Ernst von Dobschütz6, André Chastel, Gerhard Wolf and Giovanni Morello7.

1.1 The Link with the Mandylion First of all, for Pearson there is a clear relationship between the veronica and the Mandylion, “because the oldest known images of Christ are Byzantine works or display Byzantine characteristics, and are painted on cloth […]. These images therefore originate from Constantinople in the east. Above an image brought from there to Rome, the title ‘image of Jesus Christ’ was probably written; once declared ‘true’ by the Roman clergy, it was soon apparently called ‘vera higonia, true icon’” 8.

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In his collection of veronicas, Pearson describes the holy face of “Byzantine type” as a transfigured face, because of its “supernatural” features, “a thin face, disproportionately long nose and high forehead”9. This close link with the Mandylion is confirmed both by von Dobschütz10 and André Chastel11, although for the latter this association is iconographically irrelevant with respect to its copies, given the lack of access to a prototype. Nevertheless, Chastel notes how the Byzantine model (defined by perfect frontality and making no reference to the Passion) continues to be a possible choice for all copies of the veronica, and becomes dominant in the north after its re-interpretation by Jan van Eyck12. For Wolf too, in light

of the evidence available at the end of the thirteenth century, the iconography of the veronica is an evolution of the model of the Mandylion13; similarly, even recent critics, such as Giovanni Morello14, note the substantial overlap between the Mandylion and the first copies and reproductions of the veronica and identify the Mandylion of Saint Sylvester with the Roman veronica15.

1.2 Light/Dark Face A second general feature listed by Pearson is the dark or bluish face. He writes: “At first sight, it seems to be linked to the dark color of some representations, particularly Greek ones, such as for example the image of Lucca16 but on closer scrutiny of the manuscripts in which this bluish color appears, it seems that it is normally found on the images that are found close to the invocation Salve Sancta Facies, cf. p. 23, in which the ninth line reads: Ille color celicus qui in te splendescit. Thus, the bluish colour of the face may be intended as a symbolic representation of the color celicus, the color of the sky which streams from the face (cf. n. 26, 31, 43, 49, 132)”17. This hypothesis by Pearson gained no scholarly consensus, but the discussion continued as to the reasons for the different hues (dark/light) of the face of Christ. While the luminous face would indeed seem to be a reference to the hymn Salve Sancta Facies18 and to the indulgenced prayer, there is no unanimity among critics as to the origin of the dark-faced Veronica. As mentioned above, the simplest explanation might be that the dark face derives from Byzantine images. In this regard, von Dobschütz cites a letter that Jacques Pantaléon de Troyes19, the future pope Urban iv, wrote to his sister, the abbess of the monastery at Montreuilles-dames, together with his gift of what became known as the Holy Face of Laon [Fig. 6a]. In the letter he explains that the color of Christ’s face is the result of his tribulations during his Passion and of his peregrinations in the sun20. For Wolf, “the hymn Salve Sanctae Facies21 celebrates the beauty of divine splendor (‘species divinii splendoris’) on the pristine cloth given to Veronica by Christ as a sign of love, while Ave facies praeclara22 laments the face covered in blood and darkened by anguish, whose

1 / Thomas Heaphy, copy of the veronica from the Sacristy of St Peter’s (left) and of the Mandylion from St Sylvester in Rome (right), 1887

imprint was left on the linen as ‘norma compassionis’. This polarity of the characteristics of the image, first radiant, then suffering, is fundamentally characteristic of the tradition of the Veronica”23. This hypothesis is confirmed by Jeffrey Hamburger’s detailed study24 of the first literary descriptions of the veronica in texts by the German mystics Gertrude of Helfta and Mechtilde of Hackeborn, as well as that of Julian of Norwich which links the darkness of Christ’s face to his Passion25.

1.3 Transfigured/Sorrowful Face A third variant is the transfigured/sorrowful face. In Die Fronica this can be seen to be a fundamental theme for Pearson, since in the first illustrations in the volume he places Thomas Heaphy’s copies of the veronica [Fig. 1] in the Sacristy of St Peter’s side by side with a copy of the Mandylion from Saint Sylvester’s in Rome. In Pearson’s view, the image shown in Matthew Paris’ time was the Byzantine transfigured one, even though the sorrowful face must already have been accessible26. He notes that during the fifteenth century, the Veil of Veronica is welcomed as one of the symbols of the Passion and is represented among the Arma Christi and in St Gregory’s Mass27. Although the Ernst von Dobschütz, Christusbilder. Untersuchungen zur christlichen Legende, Leipzig 1899; Italian translation by Giuseppina Giuliano and Giulia Rossi: Immagini di Cristo, Milan 2006. 7 Gerhard Wolf, “‘Or fu sì fatta la sembianza vostra?’ Sguardi alla ‘vera icona’ e alle sue copie artistiche”, in Il volto di Cristo, exhi6

bition catalogue (Roma, Palazzo delle esposizioni, 9 dicembre 2000 – 16 aprile 2001), Giovanni Morello, Gerhard Wolf eds, Milan 2000, pp. 103 –114. 8 Pearson, Fronica (n. 1), p. 9 [all the translations are ours]. 9 Ibidem, p. 77. 10 Dobschütz, Immagini (n. 6), p. 167. 11 André Chastel, “La Véronique”, Revue de l’Art, xl–xli (1978), p. 71. 12 Ibidem, p. 75. 13 Wolf, “Or fu sì” (n. 7), p. 107 and “From Mandylion to Veronica: Picturing the ‘disembodied’ face and disseminating the true image of Christ in the Latin West”, in The Holy Face and the Paradox of Representation, Herbert Kessler, Gerhard Wolf eds, Bologna 1998, pp. 153 –181. 14 Giovanni Morello, “‘Or fu sì fatta la sembianza vostra?’ La Veronica di San Pietro: storia ed immagine”, in Idem, La Basilica di San Pietro. Fortuna e immagine, Rome 2012, p. 78. 15 The link between the tradition of the Mandylion and the veronica can be seen in the Sainte Face of Laon, a Byzantine icon sent to the monastery of Montreuil-les-Dames as a copy of the Roman veronica. Cf. Entry by Jean-Marie Sansterre and Elisabeth Yota in Il Volto di Cristo (n. 7), pp. 97–99. See also the thirteenth-century poems by Boniface of Verona and the anonymous author (Petoletti, this volume) which create a direct connection between the story of the veronica and the legend of King Abgar. 16 Pearson, Fronica (n. 1), p. 92: “Mrs Jameson (History of our Lord, p. 44) holds that the dark colour of the incarnate one is of much more recent origin (strictly speaking of modern origin) and that it was painted subsequent to the darkened Byzantine images. She connects these words to the hymn ‘I am black but beautiful’, which, as far as I know, in the Catholic Church never refer to Christ but to the Christian Church”. 17 Ibidem. 18 [http://veronicaroute.com/1316/01/04/1316-1334/]. 19 Dobschütz, Immagini (n. 6), p. 166. 20 See Kessler, introduction to this volume; Wolf, “Or fu sì” (n. 7), p. 107. 21 “Salve sancta facies nostri Redentoris / in qua nitet species divini splendoris/ impressa panniculo nivei candoris”. Attributed to John xxii (1316 –1334), Dobschütz, Immagini (n. 6), p. 165. 22 “Ave facies praeclara / que pro nobis in crucis ara/ es facta sic pallida/ anxietate denigrata/sudore sanguineo rigata”. Attributed to Innocent iv (1243 –1254), Dobschütz, Immagini (n. 6), p. 165. 23 Wolf, “Or fu sì” (n. 7), pp. 103 –105. 24 Jeffrey H. Hamburger, The Visual and the Visionary: Female Spirituality in Late Medieval Germany, New York 1998, pp. 350 –370.  25 Julian of Norwich: Revelations of Divine Love, Barry Windeatt ed., Oxford 2016, pp. 45 –46. 26 Pearson, Fronica (n. 1), p. 53. See Morgan, this volume. 27 Pearson, Fronica (n. 1), p. 14.

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