medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture

On Saturday, March 13, 2010, at 11:27 am, Jim Bugslag wrote:

> John Dillon wrote:
> >The inscription on the sarcophagus reads (punctuation mine):
> >VIRGINIS OSSA LATENT TVMVLO QVEM SUSPICIS, HOSPES / HAEC DECVS
> EXEMPLVM PRAESIDIVMQVE SUIS. / NOMEN FINA FVIT; PATRIA HAEC; MIRACVLA
> QVAERIS? /PERLEGE QVAE PARIES VIVAQUE SIGNA DOCENT. MCCCCLXXV
> >
> >("Stranger, a virgin's bones lie hidden in the tomb that you behold.
> She is the glory of her people, an example to them, and their bulwark.
> Her name was Fina. This was her home town. Do you seek miracles?
> Scrutinize what the walls and living sculptures teach. 1475")
> >
> >
> John,
> Far be it from me to question your Latin (!!), but I wonder whether
> "viva signa" might not refer to actual people who had been cured by St
> Fina. What do you think?
> Cheers,
> Jim

Dear Jim,
_signum_ of course has many meanings. A very standard one is "figural representation", esp. in sculpture (cf. the _OLD_, s.v., 12; modern classicizing example: the Corpus signorum Imperii Romani). In a chapel whose mural paintings and whose altar adorned with figural relief sculptures all illustrate Fina's life and miracles, the inscription's instruction to the viewer seeking miracles to scrutinize the teachings of the walls and the _signa_ is surely an instruction to look at those paintings and sculptures.

In this context, the epithet _vivum_ reprises an ancient conceit: the figures are so well done that they seem to be alive and by hyperbole are said actually to be so. Later fifteenth-century readers -- as opposed to mere viewers -- of the inscription are likely have remembered the opening lines of a famous passage in Vergil's _Aeneid_ proclaiming the special Roman art to be that of ruling others:
Excudent alii spirantia mollius aera
(credo equidem), vivos ducent de marmore vultus (_Aen._ 6. 847-848)
with its "breathing bronze" and its "living faces" of marble.

It's just possible that the _viva signa_ of the inscription could refer not to the carved _signa_ on the upper part of the altar just below the sarcophagus but rather to the paintings, i.e. that _paries vivaque signa_ is an hyperbole. On this view, Cantalicio will have been told that the chapel was to be frescoed with scenes of the Beata's life and miracles but will not have known that the sarcophagus with the inscription was to be placed directly above an altar bearing carvings of similar import. I'm not sure whether Cantalicio's role in the preparation of the chapel's decor has been researched sufficiently to allow one to say with absolute certainty that he did _not_ know about the planned altar reliefs.

Secondarily, it is at least possible and perhaps likely that Cantalicio knew that the inscription was to be place above an altar containing a reliquary bust (another _signum_) that would sometimes be visible to the reader and that on those occasions the reader should also consider what the reliquary would teach. For something inanimate, but holy, as a _vivum signum_ compare the lines of the hymn _O redemptor sume carnem_ in which the Savior is asked to consecrate as chrism _Hoc oleum signum vivum contra jura dæmonum_.

For _viva signa_ to refer to actual people -- as opposed to their figural representations -- who had been cured by Fina, Cantalicio would have to have thought either 1) that such people would be present in that small chapel whenever someone read the inscription _in situ_ (the reader is directed to scrutinize the _signa_) or 2) that the reader would then go out into the church and perhaps the town and there observe people who had been cured by Fina. That he would have entertained such notions strikes me as implausible.

Best again,
John Dillon

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