Saint Sebastian in Tuscany - two martyrdoms by Benozzo Gozzoli

The martyrdom of Saint Sebastian is a recurring theme on this blog, as can be seen here, here and here. This time I wish to introduce you to two renditions of this legend by 15th-century Italian painter Benozzo di Lese (1420-97), better known by his cognomen Gozzoli, which suggests he was fond of a feast (gozzoviglia = party). One of Gozzoli's perhaps most splendid and well-known works is his fresco work at the Chiesa di San Agostino in San Gimignano, executed in the period 1463-65. He did, however, also paint some magnificent frescoes in the Duomo di Santa Maria di Assunda, namely the decorations for the chapel of the city's patron saint Fina and a spectacular martyrdom of Saint Sebastian.

Courtesy of Wikimedia

I saw this wonder myself as I explored the cathedral of San Gimignano last summer, but then I had no idea that it was a work by Gozzoli. The fresco is found on the rear wall of the nave and is executed very skilfully in that familiar theatrical composition so typical of the Quattrocento, and which becomes particularly evident in the depictions of Saint Sebastian.

San Gimignano

Duomo di Santa Maria Assunta

Sebastian was a very popular saint in 15th-century Italy because he was believed to guard his devotees against the sundry plagues that haunted the communes. In cities like San Gimignano, which had a rich mercantile estate willing to express its devotions expensively, it is therefore no wonder to find such a sumptuous and centrally located depiction as Gozzoli's.

During my stay in Tuscany I also happened upon another Gozzoli's renditions of Saint Sebastian, this time in the nearby city of Certaldo, which can be seen from the towers of San Gimignano. In one of the churches of the old city, the Chiesa di SS Tommaso e Prospero, located right next to the Pretorian palace, a beautifully painted altar can be found, where the martyrdom of Saint Sebastian can be found on the backside.

Chiesa di SS Tommaso e Prospero

As seen below, the martyrdom is splendidly depicted and surrounded by the coat-of-arms of the city (as seen by the onion, Certaldo's most famous produce) and local families. It is less grandiose than the fresco of San Gimignano, but the rigid style, the profusion of arrows and the beard of the saint are all recognisable features. It was likely executed around 1464-65, when Gozzoli was in Certaldo for the decoration of another local chapel.

What is most interesting about thes frescoes, however, is to note Sebastian's ante-apollonian beard, a detail that fell out of vogue towards the close of the 15th century, as painters like Mantegna and Botticelli turned to Classical renditions of Apollo for their models (hence ante-apollonian). This fashion is particularly evident in Mantegna's three paintings of the saint, the first of which dating as early as the 1450s. Benozzo Gozzoli, in other words, stuck to an older, pre-Quattrocento paradigm in his depictions of Saint Sebastian.

Saint Sebastian with beard

As readers of this blog will have noticed, I have a particular fascination for Saint Sebastian (as evidenced here and here). This fascination stems in part from how his cult has affected medieval art and iconography, and in part from the iconographic evolution the saint himself underwent toward the close of the Late Middle Ages, when he was adapted into a more apollonian iconography. For more information on this transition, see Hasan Niyazi's excellent blogpost.

The transition of Sebastian from a soldier-saint largely of the same mould as SS. George and Christopher into an apollonian youth, is a testament to the quattrocento's commitment to classical postures and imagery. This is also the transition - or perhaps rejuvenation - of a bearded late-antique soldier growing into a barefaced athletic youngster. Such a transformation should of course not be misunderstood as a pagan appropriation or a return to the Roman pantheon, but it is interesting to note how ancient iconography was adapted into a Christian context, and how the Christian Saint Sebastian became represented through the symbols of the religious system he allegedly abandoned and which in turn resulted in his martyrdom.

In this blogpost, however, I present a few representations of Saint Sebastian from before and into the apollonian shift, depicting him with a bearded face in a manner customary to non-clerical male saints. It is interesting to note that the selection spans four centuries and includes both French, Italian and German renditions. Almost all the images are taken from the British Library online catalogue.

The torture of Saint Sebastian, MS. Royal 20 D VI, France, 2nd quarter of 13th century

From MS. Royal 19 B XVII, Legenda Aurea, France, 1382

From MS. Egerton 1070, French book of hours, c.1410

From MS. Yates Thompson 7, book of hours following the Roman Use, Florence or Mantua, c.1480

From MS. Yates Thompson 5, book of hours after the Roman Use, Central France, c.1500

In the last case I have cheated a little bit, since we clearly operate in a borderland. I have nonetheless decided to include this 16th-century German depiction, just to illustrate the variety which existed well into the apollonian paradigm.

Saint Sebastian, detail from the Isenheim Altarpiece by Matthias Grünewald, c.1510

Image courtesy of this website

As we see, the depictions of Saint Sebastian retained a certain variety even after the Italian masters such as Andrea Mantegna and Sandro Botticelli had cast the saint in a new, apollonian appearance. We see also that Sebastian enjoyed a fairly wide geography of devotion, and this may of course account for some of this variety. It is, in any case, important to note that the most famous rendition of Saint Sebastian is far from the only one.

Names of the Hedgehog

and whatsoever Adam called every living creature, that was the name thereof.

- Genesis 2:19

Linguistics is one of my many passions and I find great pleasure in learning new words or learning how words have come about. One of the great things about being a Medievalist is the opportunity the subject-matter gives you to come across and learn new words when elving into a past age and its texts. In the course of my thesis work I have come across several great words, both in English and in Latin, and this blogpost is dedicated to the words used to describe one particular animal: the hedgehog.

Edmund's martyrdom

Old English

The oldest of the texts I will deal with in this blogpost is Life of St. Edmund by Ælfric of Eynsham (c.950-c.1010). This text is a hagiography of king Edmund of East Anglia who was killed by Vikings in 869 and it is written in Old English. In the story King Edmund is captured by the Viking chieftain Hingwar who wants him to become his underking and reveal the whereabouts of the royal treasure. The king, a Christian, refuses to become the subject of a pagan and steadfastly resists the tortures brought about by the Vikings. Hingwar orders his men to pierce the king with arrows, a martyrdom like that of St. Sebastian. In describing this episode Ælfric employs a very effective comparison, effective both because it is precise and because its hyperbolic nature increases the shock-effect of the brutality of martyrdom: Edmund, pierced by arrows, resembles an ígl, a hedgehog. The passage concludes as follows:

he eall wæs besæt mid heora scotungum swilce igles byrsta, swa swa Sebastianus wæs.

(he was covered with arrows in the manner of a hedhehog, as was Sebastian)

This particular passage will be a recurring feature of this linguistic expedition since this is the story in which I have found most of the names of the hedgehog, and indeed it is the story that put me onto this idea in the first place.

The name in question here is, as mentioned, ígl, a name that can, according to the Old English dictionary also be rendered as ígil or íl. Interestingly this particular name can be recognised as the root of the modern Swedish word for hedgehog: igelkott.

 Hedgehogs from the Aberdeen bestiary, c.1200

Latin

Like all other animals of the Middle Ages, real or mythical, the hedgehog was interpreted allegorically or "in mystical terms" in the bestiaries where it was made a didactic example for men to learn from. In the bestiary of MS Bodley 764, written between 1220 and1250 and translated and abbreviated by Richard Barber, the author first describes the creature's habits and way of life. He commends it for its cleverness and claims that they gather grapes directly from their vine with their spines, a myth that probably dates all the way back to Roman times. When he turns to the didactic part of the text, the mystical interpretation, the author is quite severe and says that the hedgehog is "a sinner full of vices like spines, skilled in wicked cunning, and in deceits and robberies. He cheats others of the fruit of their labours and takes their food for himself." Like the sinner who fears the judgement of God, it is claimed, so the hedgehog hides among rocks.

This unfavourable reputation owes probably much of its severity to the Vulgate where Jerome mistook the Hebrew word for owl, kippoz, for kippod, hedgehog. In Bible passages such as Isaiah 34:11 and Zephaniah 2:14 the hedgehog thus becomes a symbol of desolation and deserted places, said to inhabit the places that will be destroyed in the vengeance of God.

In Latin the hedgehog is known by the name irenaceus or erinacius. According to the author of the MS Bodley 764 bestiary the animal was also known by the name echinus and this rendition, perhaps a vulgarisation, we will find vestiges of in vernacular texts.

 Hedgehogs from the MS Bodley 764

Middle English

In one of the secondary sources I've been working with, I have been referred to three Middle English texts in which the hedgehog is named. Each of these texts is a version of the story of St. Edmund and they all employ the classic simile when describing the pierced King Edmund. I have also come across another Middle English text in which the hedgehog features poetically, a poem by William Dunbar, but here the matter does not pertain to the life of Edmund of East Anglia.

The oldest of the three hagiographic texts is the South English Legendary. This book is a collection of saints' lives rendered in verse and composed in the latter half of the 13th century somewhere close to Gloucester. Here the vernacular word for hedgehog resembles very much the Old English word and we see here one of the stations in the word's trajectory towards modern Swedish. In the words of the compiler of the legend, King Edmund was [a]s ful as an illespyl is of pikes al about.

John Lydgate (c.1370-1449/50), a monk at Bury-St-Edmunds, wrote the poetical rendition of the lives of Edmund and his cousin Fremund as a gift for the child-king Henry VI. The king stayed at Bury from Christmas 1433 to April 23, St. George's day, the following year and was given this didactic present, presumably aimed at shaping the young monarch to become a good and righteous Christian. In this work we may detect that the evolution of the language has favoured the name most resembling the Latin word. John Lydgate states that Edmund [r]assemble an yrchoun fulfillid with spynys thikke /As was the martyr seint Sebastyan.

A similar usage we can also find in the third text, the Gilte Legende. This opus is a mid-15th-century hagiographical collection translated from the French work Legende doree, which in turn is a translation of Jacobus the Voragine's 13th-century Legenda Aurea. Although more or less contemporary with John Lydgate the saint's martyrdom is rendered differently, owing perhaps to a difference in sources or the fact that Lydgate wrote in rhyme royal. According to the author of the Gilte Legende King Edmund appierid fulle of arowys lyke as an urchyn fulle of pryckis.

In conclusion of this linguistic excursion we must turn to a work by William Dunbar (1460?–1513x30), The Tretis of the twa mariit wemen and the wido. This poem is Dunbar's longest opus and one of the first to be printed. It is a comical work recounting a conversation between the three titular women.The subject is the trials of marriage and in a passage dealing with a husband's kisses the husband's cheeks are compared to the pines of a hedgehog: He schowis one me his schewill mouth & schendis my lippis / And with his hard hurcheone scyne sa heklis he my chekis.

St Sebastian by Andrea Mantegna

With Dunbar we come to a close as he stood on the threshold of Modern English and the English Renaissance. As we have seen the hedgehog has furnished authors with poetic and didactic material - and the simile of Edmund can be said to be both - throughout the Middle Ages. Due to its recurring role we have here been able to follow the evolution of its name in a long-spanning, but of course vastly incomplete, trajectory. The names I have presented above are not the only names awarded the hedgehog in Medieval times, but they serve nonetheless as a nice overview.

Pain as Erudition

Today is St. Sebastian's day and because I find his place in cultural history interesting, this blogpost is dedicated to him and what I consider to be the first stage of his martyrdom.

Sebastian is a saint whose life is sufficiently obscure to allow for creative biographies. Of the historical figure little is known or can be proven except that he was a martyr. A vita, or saint's biography, from the 5th century dates his death to 286, in the time of Emperor Diocletian's persecution of Christians. According to this biography he was an officer in the imperial bodyguard and in secret performed charitable deeds to fellow Christians. Upon discovery he was placed before a group of Mauretanian archers and shot, but after the execution he was taken care of by the widow Irene - herself canonised - and restored back to strength. His final martyrdom happened at a later stage, when he was killed with a club.

The earliest depiction of St. Sebastian probably dates from the end of the 7th century and portrays a bearded man dressed as a courtier. The arrow-pierced - and naked - body appears in the Renaissance, perhaps because it was a subject which allowed the painters to portray what Renaissance artists considered the ultimate motif: the nude male, or what Michelangelo would term as ignudo.

Sebastian is in Renaissance art depicted not only as a naked or semi-naked man, but also as a young and muscular man. His iconography bears strong resemblance to that of Apollon and there has probably occurred some conflation along the way, either deliberate or not. The naked man was to the Renaissance artists an ideal way of testing their talents, as this motif would give them opportunity to portray a vibrant anatomy in various positions.

Three of the finest - and most disturbing - examples of St. Sebastian in art have been created by Andrea Mantegna (ca. 1431-1506) and are shown below, each accompanied by a poem written for the painting in question.

Triptych for Saint Sebastian

After Mantegna

Apollonian Archery

That fine Apollonian archery,

Piercing the faithful flesh

Makes not martyrdom manifest,
But suffering,

                    a suffering that in itself

Holds no catharsis, but suggests

Salvation for the plagued

By demonstrating that knowledge,

That intimate knowledge, of pain,

Promising comfort.

- December 25-29 2010

The Passion of Saint Sebastian

Words grow out of the speechless mouth, pain flows

In quiet cadence through the pierced veins; coiled

About a marble pillar, the saint writhes

In holy agony to ascertain

The soul's endurance in a heathen time

By fortitude that makes not merely soul

But also flesh immortal, as the hands

Of artists hence assail the dual challenge

To merge emotion and anatomy

According to the tastes of benefactors.

- December 25-29 2010

Tu de peste huiusmodi

Me deffende et custodi

- O Sancte Sebastiane, Guillaume Dufay

A Prayer to Saint Sebastian

In your fashion and according to your manner

Defend me, O Martyr, from Death's bitter bodkin

And as you were with me at Azincourt come forth

Again to aid me in my dire need, as blots

Black as sin appears upon my flesh to blight me,

Poor wretch, and make my living days a dream of death,

Tempting my hand to guide the arrow through my skin

That life may escape this breathing, black'ning carcasse.

Help me, O Martyr, that neither sin nor sickness

May coax me to damnation at this final hour,

But ease my tribulation that I may die and live.

- December 26 2010



Notes

Apollonian archery: Saint Sebastian is patron saint of archers and athletes, and was considered to be willing to assist in case of plague. His patronage of archers is obvious since his martyrdom - or rather its first stage - is connected to archers. Saints usually - and logically - becomes the patrons of their trespassers' crafts. His connection to Apollon may derive from the imagery of the Grecian god as a deliverer of plague, a delivery he would perform with his bow and arrows. Also his appearance as a muscular young man may have its root in depictions of Apollo.

A prayer to Saint Sebastian: The epigraph is taken from Guillaume Dufay's (1397?-1474) motet O Sancte Sebastiane which may have been composed during an outbreak of plague in Ferrara. The excerpt loosely translates as "In your fashion guard and defend me from the plague". 


Azincourt: Also spelled Agincourt. In the battle of 1415 the English forces vanquished the French. There were archers on both sides, so the nationality of the praying persona is unsettled. 


blots black as sin: A symptom of the bubonic plague.


that I may die and live: To despair is considered a deadly sin by Catholics since this emotion is considered to question God's omnipotence. To despair on one's death bed would be even more disastrous since desperation then would be final and irredeemable, and if this despair were to lead to suicide redemption would be considered hopeless to attain.