The Madonna of Humility: Development, Dissemination and Reception, c. 1340-1400

By Beth Williamson

New York: Boydell Press, February 2009. Cloth: ISBN 978-1-84383-419-9, $95. 195 pages.

Review by Denis V. Vovchenko, Northeastern State University

Beth Williamson seeks to completely revise the historiography of the group of images known as the Madonna of Humility – a composition of the Virgin seated on the ground, with the Christ-child seated on her lap, dating back to 1340s. She set it as her goal “to show that the old orthodoxies about its origins, its development, its dissemination and its meaning are all too simplistic” (12). While not claiming to come up with a single definitive interpretation, she attempts to point to “a multiplicity of possibilities.” To do that, she challenges the prevalent approach of a search for a prototype as devaluing local variations of the same theme as more or less imperfect reproductions. Specifically, she argues that the way to recover local agency is to go beyond the obsession with tracing “cultural influence” in favor of “cultural translation” into “vernacular” forms (2-5). With this goal mind, Beth Williamson attempts to contribute to “New Art History” and “Marxist Art History.” For Dr. Williamson, this approach means examining cultural and social contexts where the image was produced. At the same time, her study of the Madonna of Humility is supposed to encourage the use of visual evidence to shed light on the formation of social and religious identities.

All those ambitious attacks on the edifice of traditional scholarship are organized into eight chapters divided into three parts in accordance with the subtitle – development of the image in historiography and in its historical place of origin, dissemination from Avignon through Italy to Bohemia, and reception of the image with its different meanings.

In the first chapter, “The Madonna of Humility: Descriptions and Definitions,” Williamson discusses the shortcomings in the existing historiography of this image type. They include the relationship between the inscription and the image, the common etymological connection of “humus” (ground) and “humilitas” (humility), or the linkage between occasional suckling motif to humility because the practice of breastfeeding was associated with low classes in society. The biggest problem is in the question of the origins of the image. The author suggests that all the iconographical elements of the image cannot be traced to any single narrative image such as the Nativity, Annunciation, Crucifixion, or Woman of the Apocalypse in Spanish Apocalypse manuscripts.

After undermining the strongholds of the entrenched tradition in their entirety, in the remaining seven chapters she launches separate assaults on each one of them, starting with the earliest appearance of the theme in Chapter 2, “The Madonna of Humility in Avignon.” While she agrees with many commentators that Simone Martini was the most likely author of the image, she complicates the conventional account of an Italian Renaissance genius providing a model for subsequent mediocre imitators. Since Tuscan versions of the Madonna of Humility did not typically feature Apocalyptic motifs, Dr. Williamson argues that the original image must have been closely related to the fresco in the Papal Palace in Avignon (c. 1341). She strongly urges the reader to consider the possibility that that image did not spring from the mind of Simone Martini independently of the environment but rather was inspired by the French cultural milieu. In particular, she turns our attention to the Metz manuscript illustrations that contained the elements of the Madonna of Humility – the suckling or Lactans motif, the Apocalyptic symbols, and elements recalling the Annunciation (56). In addition to questioning the supremacy of the artist genius, this longest chapter challenges two more entrenched art history assumptions. It suggests that Europe beyond the Alps was not simply a recipient of new ideas from “a progressive Italian center” and that as an artistic medium, manuscript illustrations should not be automatically considered as less dynamic and innovative than panel and fresco paintings.

In chapter 3, “Early Appearances of the Image,” Williamson proposes to examine the early spread of the Madonna of Humility not in terms of style, composition, or personal influences of Simone Martini, or other Avignon artists on their counterparts in Southern Italy, but rather by focusing on how the preferences of local patrons might have shaped the variations made by the artists. Thus, the author draws our attention to pre-existing connections between the papal court at Avignon and the French-ruled Kingdom of Naples that could have made local patrons aware of the Northern European sources of the image. She also attempts to rescue local agency by stressing a receptive devotional climate. Based on the depiction of kneeling devotees beneath the image in the church of S. Pietro a Majella in Naples, she points to the flails in the hands of some of them and suggests that the church was associated with a local flagellant confraternity.

While offering “no definitive answer” again, in chapter 4, Williamson similarly emphasizes patronage networks as she traces the spread of the theme to Bohemia in 1360s. This methodology is not really revisionist art history as such, but it has never been used to analyze this specific group of images. In particular, the author mentions artists and patrons affiliated with Italian and Bohemian branches of the Dominican Order, but even more so, personal and familial connections of King Charles IV to France and Italy.

In contrast to the very pronounced interest in Apocalyptic themes in Naples and Prague, in Central Italy there was a strong tradition of the suckling or nursing motifs in art (chapter 5). The Sienese had long considered themselves a second Rome, and their civic emblem featured the she-wolf suckling Romulus and Remus. Also, the Virgin was considered the queen and the mother of the city, which made the image of the Virgin Lactans popular even before the transmission of the Madonna of Humility from Avignon. This tradition goes at least some way toward explaining the absence of Apocalyptic symbols in Central Italy. In this chapter, the author makes the strongest case to suggest how variations on the theme could depend on the local context.

In the last part of the book, “Reception,” the author seeks to challenge the existing interpretations of the meaning of the Madonna of Humility to late-medieval viewers. In the opening of that part, chapter 6, “Image and Reality,” stands out for two reasons. Unlike previous chapters, it relies not on the visual evidence but on an impressive body of primary and secondary textual sources. Also, it engages with the much broader context of late medieval social history as it questions the dominant historiographical view that the suckling motif was crucial to the perception of the Virgin’s humility. Williamson argues that while wet-nursing was indeed becoming a widespread practice among upper classes in Florence and elsewhere, breastfeeding should not be seen as socially degrading and humiliating. Instead, she points to a common medical belief that pregnancy resulted in poorer quality breast milk. Thus, hiring wet-nurses was a way to avoid having to stop conjugal relations after birth. Seen in this light, the suckling Virgin motif stood not for humility but rather for purity “because of the link between sexual continence and effective or safe breastfeeding” (147). Shifting back to the interpretation of visual aspects, in chapter 7 Williamson further questions the meaning of humility associated with the image. She argues that in all locations under consideration the image had funerary and devotional functions and emphasized the role of the Madonna as an intercessor and a co-redeemer of the deceased and penitents.

What is left of humility? Not much, after Williamson cautions against treating the inscription “Our Madonna of Humility” as a title describing a category of images; rather, she suggests, we should see the inscription as “an epithet relating to the Virgin and her qualities” (173). The traditional view considered the posture of the Virgin seated on the ground as crucial to the idea of humility seemingly supported by the medieval etymology linking “humus” (ground) and “humilitas” (humility). Williamson reminds the reader that not all examples of the image have inscriptions, and that they usually feature visual references to the Annunciation. The author argues that to the late medieval viewer that episode signified humility as a reminder of when the Virgin humbly accepted her destiny to become the Mother of God (174). As in other chapters, this specific argument may have broader implications and in this case encourage reassessment of the connection between image and inscription elsewhere.

Overall, Williamson succeeds in pointing to “a multiplicity of possibilities” of interpretation and questioning established historiography. Her argument can not amount to a full-scale revision because the evidence is often circumstantial and conjectural. Nevertheless, in its engagement with fresh methodology and diverse visual and textual sources, the book will be interesting to art historians generally and medievalists specifically. A general reader may find the book dense in places unless one’s fascination with devotional practices is used to overcoming the challenges of academic texts.