medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture
Martha, the sister of Mary of Bethany and of Lazarus of Bethany, appears three times in the Gospels, at Luke 10:38-42, John 11:1-44, and John 12:1-3. In a medieval legend popular in the Latin West, e.g. in her late twelfth- or early thirteenth-century Vita by pseudo-Marcilia (BHL 5545-5546) or in Jacopo da Varazze's abbreviation in his later thirteenth-century _Legenda aurea_, cap. 105, she accompanied Mary Magdalene (understood to be the same person as Mary of Bethany) and Lazarus to Provence and was active there as a missionary before dying at, and being buried at, Tarascon, the town she had freed from a man-eating monster (called, in modern French, la Tarasque).
Some period-pertinent images of St. Martha of Bethany:
I. -- without the Tarasque
a) as depicted (left of center, at the Raising of Lazarus; beneath her, Mary of Bethany) in the later tenth-century Codex Egberti, a book of Gospel pericopes (ca. 980; Trier, Stadtbibliothek, Ms. 24, fol. 52v):
http://tinyurl.com/q4onjkd
b) as portrayed in a twelfth-century statue (prob. 1140s; perh. late 1160s or 1170s) from the now destroyed tomb of St. Lazarus in the église (later, cathédrale; now basilique cathédrale) Saint-Lazare at Autun and now in the very nearby Musée Rolin:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/28433765@N07/15482748680/
Detail view:
http://tinyurl.com/o44wmfs
c) as depicted (wearing a dark robe contrasting with Mary Magdalene's red one; two scenes: the Meal at Bethany and the Raising of Lazarus) in an earlier thirteenth-century psalter for the Use of Paris (betw. 1200 and 1225; Paris, BnF, ms. Nouvelle acquisition latine 1392, fol. 6v):
http://tinyurl.com/26n9w46
d) as depicted in an earlier thirteenth-century lectionary of German origin (vicinity of Halle; ca. 1220-1230; New York, The Morgan Library and Museum, Morgan MS M.299, fol. 128r):
http://ica.themorgan.org/manuscript/page/12/77426
e) as depicted (at center, standing; beneath her, in bright red, Mary Magdalene) by Duccio di Buoninsegna in an early fourteenth-century panel painting (betw. 1308 and 1311; from the rear predella of his Maestà for the cathedral of Siena) in the Kimball Art Museum, Fort Worth:
http://www.wga.hu/art/d/duccio/maesta/predel_v/pre_v_9.jpg
f) as depicted (bas-de-page at far right, serving the Meal at Bethany; Mary seated on floor near Jesus' feet) in the earlier fourteenth-century Holkham Bible Picture Book (ca. 1327-1335; London, BL, Add MS 47682, fol. 25v):
http://www.bl.uk/manuscripts/Viewer.aspx?ref=add_ms_47682_f025v
g) as depicted in two illuminations in a mid-fourteenth-century copy, from the workshop of Richard and Jeanne de Montbaston, of the _Legenda aurea_ in its French-language version by Jean de Vignay (1348; Paris, BnF, ms. Français 241, fols. 163r, 179r):
1) at left, with her siblings Mary (holding her unguent jar) and Lazarus of Bethany:
http://tinyurl.com/26fj3w5
2) at right, with Jesus:
http://tinyurl.com/qf2pa2h
h) as depicted (at right, in blue, wearing an apron and kneading dough; at left, in bright red, Mary Magdalene in a _Noli me tangere_ scene) by the Virgil Master in an earlier fifteenth-century copy of part of Augustine's _De civitate Dei_ in its French-language version by Raoul de Presles (ca. 1410-1412; Den Haag, Museum Meermanno, cod. 10 A 12, fol. 191r):
http://tinyurl.com/nqhtcg6
http://manuscripts.kb.nl/zoom/BYVANCKB%3Amimi_mmw_10a12%3A191r_min_2
i) as depicted (guiding pilgrims to an inn) in an early fifteenth-century copy of the _Elsässische Legenda aurea_ (1419; Heidelberg, Universitätsbibliothek, Cod. Pal. germ. 144, fol. 41r):
http://digi.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/diglit/cpg144/0097
j) as depicted (top register, at far right, serving the Meal at Bethany while, further to the left, Mary anoints Jesus' feet) by Lukas Moser on his earlier fifteenth-century Magdalenenaltar (1432) in the St. Maria Magdalena Kirche at Tiefenbronn (Lkr. Enzkreis) in Baden-Württemberg:
http://tinyurl.com/nm5nngh
k) as depicted (wearing an apron and holding an aspergillum and a holy water bucket) in the earlier fifteenth-century Hours of Catherine of Cleves (ca. 1440; New York, The Pierpont Morgan Library, ms. M.917, p. 316; image greatly expandable):
http://www.themorgan.org/collection/hours-of-catherine-of-cleves/127#
l) as depicted (three times, in dark clothing contrasting with Mary Magdalene's bright red) by Nicholas Froment on all three panels of his later fifteenth-century Resurrection of Lazarus altarpiece (1461) in the Galleria degli Uffizi in Florence:
http://www.wga.hu/art/f/froment/lazar.jpg
m) as depicted (second from right, betw. St. Mary Magdalene and St. Maximinus; arriving at Marseille) by Giacomo d'Ivrea in his later fifteenth-century frescoes (ca. 1463) in the apse of the chiesa di Sainte-Marie-Magdeleine de Villa at Gressan (Val d'Aosta):
http://tinyurl.com/hpvhtj9
n) as portrayed (with penitents and holding a holy water bucket) in a late fifteenth-century statue from Schwaben in the Musée national du Moyen Âge (Musée de Cluny) in Paris:
http://tinyurl.com/ncd9vsd
o) as portrayed in relief on the cover of her late fifteenth-century "tombeau gothique" in the crypt of the collégiale Ste.-Marthe in Tarascon:
http://tinyurl.com/haohp3j
http://tinyurl.com/hb8b4r5
Detail view:
https://tbeartravels.files.wordpress.com/2013/02/27-martha.jpg
p) as depicted (in blue, wearing an apron; reproaching her sister Mary) in a late fifteenth-century copy of Vincent of Beauvais' _Speculum historiale_ in its French-language version by Jean de Vignay (ca. 1480-1490; Paris, BnF, ms, Français 245, fol. 12v):
http://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/btv1b8425999d/f32.item.zoom
q) as depicted (wearing an apron and some keys and holding an aspergillum and a book) in the late fifteenth-century Isabella Breviary (ca. 1497; London, BL, Add. Ms. 18851, fol. 417r):
http://tinyurl.com/orwz9g3
Mis-en-page (greatly expandable):
http://www.bl.uk/manuscripts/Viewer.aspx?ref=add_ms_18851_f417r
r) as portrayed (holding a holy water bucket and, probably, part of an aspergillum) in an earlier sixteenth-century statue (betw. 1500 and 1525), attributed to the Master of Chaource, in the église Sainte-Madeleine in Troyes:
http://tinyurl.com/nwgquq8
II. -- with the Tarasque
aa) as depicted (in an historiated initial "M") in a fourteenth-century copy, from the diocese of Girona, of a Catalan-language version of the _Legenda aurea_ (Paris, BnF, ms. Espagnol 4, fol. 150r [continue clicking on the image for increasingly higher resolution]):
http://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/btv1b52506309k/f305.item.zoom
bb) as depicted in a pen-and-ink drawing (bas-de-page, at left) in an earlier fourteenth-century copy of Neapolitan origin of Paulinus of Venice, _Chronologia magna_ (after 1329; Paris, BnF, ms. Latin 4939, fol. 61r):
http://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/btv1b55002483j/f129.item.zoom
cc) as depicted in an earlier fourteenth-century copy (ca. 1335) of Vincent of Beauvais' _Speculum historiale_ in its French-language version by Jean de Vignay (Paris, BnF, ms. Arsenal 5080, fol. 95r):
http://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/btv1b55000813g/f195.item.zoom
dd) as portrayed in relief (holding an aspergillum) in the later fourteenth-century capitals in the western gallery (ca. 1375) of the cloister of the basilique primatiale St.-Trophime in Arles:
http://jalladeauj.fr/claveyrolasprovence/page1/page2/files/page2-1039-full.html
Another view of the tarasque:
http://ekladata.com/Qp574SQ3m0N2OrQvF45vNqInQmM.jpg
ee) as depicted in a fifteenth-century panel painting, thought to be of Italian origin, in the Musée des Beaux-Arts in Chambéry:
http://i43.servimg.com/u/f43/11/53/59/59/sainte34.jpg
ff) as depicted (holding a cross) in an early fifteenth-century copy of the _Legenda aurea_ in its French-language version by Jean de Vignay followed by the _Festes nouvelles_ attributed to Jean Golein (Paris, BnF, ms. Français 242, fol. 154r):
http://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/btv1b8426005j/f323.item.zoom
gg) as depicted (holding a cross) in the early fifteenth-century Châteauroux Breviary (ca. 1414; Châteauroux, Bibliothèque municipale, ms. 2, fol. 254v):
http://www.enluminures.culture.fr/Wave/savimage/enlumine/irht2/IRHT_054094-p.jpg
hh) as depicted in an earlier fifteenth-century missal for the Use of Aix-en-Provence (1424; Aix-en-Provence, Bibliothèque municipale, ms. 11, p. 668):
http://www.enluminures.culture.fr/Wave/savimage/enlumine/irht3/IRHT_069345-p.jpg
ii) as depicted (in an historiated initial "M") by the court workshop of Frederick III in a mid-fifteenth-century copy of the _Legenda aurea_ (1446-1447; Vienna, Österreichische Nationalbibliothek, cod. 326, fol. 142r):
http://tarvos.imareal.oeaw.ac.at/server/images/7006860.JPG
jj) as portrayed in a later fifteenth-century statue in the église Saint-Germain at Saint-Germain-le-Gaillard (Manche):
http://tinyurl.com/pbs7klh
kk) as depicted in a later fifteenth-century Book of Hours of French origin (betw. 1460 and 1480) in the Haggerty Museum of Art at Marquette University in Milwaukee:
http://tinyurl.com/njvloqh
ll) as portrayed in relief (detail view at right) on the front of her late fifteenth-century "tombeau gothique" in the crypt of the collégiale Ste.-Marthe in Tarascon:
http://tinyurl.com/hxox4jj
mm) as depicted (holding a holy water bucket with an aspergillum) by Jean Poyer in the late fifteenth- or early sixteenth-century so-called Hours of Henry VIII (New York, The Pierpont Morgan Library, ms. H.8, fol. 191v; image greatly expandable):
http://www.themorgan.org/collection/hours-of-henry-viii/54#
nn) as portrayed in relief (holding a mace-like aspergillum) in a late fifteenth- or early relief in sixteenth-century chapelle Ste.-Anne (betw. 1491 and 1518) in the priory of Chanteuges in Chanteuges (Haute-Loire):
http://tinyurl.com/zxawug9
oo) as depicted (at left, holding a holy water bucket and a cross; at right, St. Mary Magdalene) among the early sixteenth-century paintings (prob. ca. 1511-1512) of protectors of travelers, chapelle Notre-Dame de Benva, Lorgues (Var):
http://lorgues.free.fr/benva/ste-madeleine2.jpg
Detail view (Martha):
http://lorgues.free.fr/col-chapelles/benva-ste-marthe.jpg
pp) as depicted (holding a cross) in a panel of the early sixteenth-century Martha-Altar (1517) in the St.-Lorenz-Kirche in Nürnberg:
https://c1.staticflickr.com/9/8067/8200691220_001fffe53f_b.jpg
Best,
John Dillon
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