Monthly Archives: October 2018

The Fisherman’s Tale

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Two-heads_980

This is a clip from the Prayer on the Shore illumination mentioned in yesterday’s post. Unfortunately the detail is not the best. Nevertheless it is sufficient to make a comparison with a similar feature in the Just Judges panel.

My assessment is that the two men represent Jan van Eyck and John the Fearless, duke of Burgundy. The minature from the Turin-Milan Hours is attributed to Hand G, generally thought to be Jan van Eyck or his brother Hugh.

The Prayer on the Shore makes references to the Hook and Cod wars, “a series of wars and battles in the County of Holland between 1350 and 1490.”

Jan’s hood is shaped as a trawl dragged behind a boat to catch fish – the bulging end is known as the “cod-end”. The tail of the duke’s chaperon is shaped to represent a hook.

Holland-mapThe two men face in opposite directions to represent the polarised positions taken up by the Hook and Cod factions over the title to the Count of Holland.

The shape of the space between the two heads also corresponds to the area of Holland in dispute; the red region representing the hook countered by the hood or cod-end shape on the opposite side of the bay.

Here’s how Jan van Eyck replicated the iconography when he came to paint the Just Judges panel.

hook-cod_450The clip alongside shows the bearded man wearing a hooded chaperon with a “cod-end”. The man below represents Philip the Bold, and his grandson Philip the Good who doubles up as Jan van Eyck (a common motif repeated by the painter and also used in the Prayer on the Shore). Jan’s chaperon is tied and shaped to form a hook. The hook is also meant to refer to the hook nose common to the three Burgundian dukes, Philip the Bold, John the Fearless and Philip the Good.

The cod-end also picks up on the painting’s connection to The Canterbury Tales. In this instance it represents a pelican’s elastic pouch designed for catching fish! This in turn is used by Van Eyck to link to the fish as a Christian symbol and the biblical reference to “fishers of men” (Matthew 4 :19), not forgetting that the pelican is also a symbol of Christ’s Passion and the Eucharist.

• images sources: closer to van eyck and rkd

Like Father, like Son

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Succession is a prominent theme in the Just Judges painting, most obvious in Jan van Eyck succeeding his brother in completing the Ghent Altarpiece after Hubert’s death in 1426.

The two rows of riders can also be viewed as being placed in succession, one following another, akin to each pilgrim’s story in Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales.

Hereditary examples of succession also feature – kings and princes – as do talents and trades passed down through families.

Charles-VIJan van Eyck makes these connections through ‘groupings’. For example, I pointed out in the previous post that the principal identity he assigned to the central rider in the Just Judges panel is the French king Charles VI (d. 1422). Other identities are Philip’s court painter Jan Maelwael (d. 1416), the sculptor Claus Sluter (d. 1405/06), and his nephew Claus de Werve (d. 1439)

A key ‘connector’ in this grouping is the relationship of uncle:
• Jan Maelwael was the uncle of the three Limbourg brothers whose work is referenced elsewhere in the panel.
• Claus Sluter was the uncle of Claus de Werve. Their work is also alluded to in the painting.

The ‘uncle’ key also helps unlock the grouping and one of the identities of the rider in black next to Charles VI as being Philip the Bold, an uncle of the French king.  When Charles inherited the French throne at the age of 11, the government was entrusted to a regency council comprising his four uncles until he reached the age of 21.

Another point Van Eyck is making about succession is that what follows each rider is the certainty of death and a final judgment.

He illustrated this point (or was it his brother Hugh?) in the Prayer on the Shore illumination, an earlier work that forms part of the Turin-Milan Hours. As in the Just Judges the composition is based on a procession of riders. The main group is followed by three men with visors closed on their skull-shaped helmets. They are a personification of death.

With the coming of evening that same day, Jesus said to them, “Let us cross over to the other side.” Mark 4 : 35

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Prayer on he Shore by Hand G, Turin-Milan Hours,
Biblioteca Nazionale Universitaria di Torino

Brim of extinction

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brim

Compare these two copies of a section from the Just Judges panel of the the Ghent Altarpiece. The left image is a photographic copy taken by art historian Max Friedländer sometime before the original panel was stolen in April 1934. The right image is a copy painting completed by the Belgian art restorer Jef Van der Veken in 1945 and used as a replacement part for the altarpiece.

There is a noticeable difference in the two copies. In the photographic copy the brim of the hat worn by the bearded man is extended to cover the mouth of the man behind him. In the Veken copy the wide brim is reduced so as to show the mouth.

It is claimed that Veken replaced one of the riders with the face of the Belgian king Leopold III to distinguish the copy painting from the original, which may explain the brim reduction, presuming, of course, the uncovered face is that of Leopold.

However, in doing so Veken also destroyed clues that could help identify three of the riders. Apart from the Frieländer photograph and the Veken version there is another copy painting which was produced by Michiel Coxcie sometime in the mid-16th century. It remains close to the original and retains the wide-brimmed hat.

As mentioned in previous posts, several identities are attributed to each rider, but in this instance the rider with the covered mouth represents the French king Charles VI or Charles the Mad as he was sometimes referred to because of his frequent bouts of psychosis, a symptom of which can be incoherent speech.

There is further connection to Charles’ covered mouth which relates to the rider above in the guise of Joan of Arc, but this is a seperate narrative to be revealed at another time.

The extended brim is similar to a ‘galero’ style hat and is the connection to one of the identities of the first rider in the line as Henry Beaufort, bishop of Winchester. He was elevated to the rank of Cardinal in 1426, the same year Jan van Eyck’s brother Hubert died. Beaufort is also linked to other riders in the painting. One of the identities applied to the figure in the wide-brim hat is the Holy Roman Emperor, Sigismund.

A second identity given to the figure is St Bavo, a nobleman who gave up his riches to lead the life of a hermit. He later received the ‘tonsure’ at a monastery in Ghent, hence the emphasised rim of of hair. St Bavo is the patron saint of the Ghent diocese.

A third identity is St Judoc whose body, according to tradition, was said to be incorrupt, and whose hair continued to grow after death and had to be continually cut. The inclusion of St Judoc is also a hat-tip to the patron of the altarpiece Joos (Judoc) Vijd.

• images sources: closer to van eyck and rkd