Category Archives: Jean Jouffroy

Panel of the Relic… more connections

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Over the years art historians have speculated on the identity of the 60 figures in the St Vincent Panels, without ever able to agree on a definitive line-up. Their efforts, it seems, have always focused on linking the 58 males and two women to Portuguese society, perhaps led by the fact the panels were discovered in the 1880s – in the monastery of Saint Vicente de Fora, in Lisbon.

So for some figures multiple names have been posited for their identity. In a sense this mixed bag of identities held an answer historians were searching for, but had yet to consider since they were focused on producing a single identity for each figure. The fact is that each figure usually has more that one identity, depending on a particular theme the artist embedded. While the painting is officially attributed to the Portuguese painter Nuno Gonçalves, my preference is the Flemish artist Hugo van der Goes who is featured on the back row of the Panel of the Prince. It may be that the work and the commission was shared between the two men, similar to the Ghent Altarpiece attributed to the brothers Jan and Hubert van Eyck.

The Ghent Altarpiece is perhaps the principal source of inspiration for the St Vincent Panels, and especially for the concept of using multiple identities. In the Just Judges panel Jan van Eyck has applied four identities to each of the ten riders. This was the challenge for Hugo van der Goes, to create a similar work embedded with multiple identities. To truly get to grips with the St Vincent Panels one has to understand the embedded themes and iconography Jan introduced in the Ghent Altarpiece. Without this knowledge or understanding it is not possible to grasp and comprehend all that Van der Goes presented in the St Vincent Panels.

Another painter, Barthélemy van Eyck, had knowledge of Jan’s disguised iconography in the Ghent Altarpiece and incorporated parts in the January folio he produced for Les Très Riche Heures when the manuscript was later in the possession of René d’Anjou. It’s also likely, Lambert van Eyck, a brother to Jan and Hubert, had knowledge of the cryptic narratives in the Ghent Altarpiece.

In the Panel of the Relic, Hugo van der Goes depicted the likeness of the three Van Eyck brothers. Barthélemy is also referenced but not seen and is a second ‘hidden’ identity given to Jan van Eyck. Jan also appears as John the Baptist, his name saint and the name of the church the Ghent Altarpiece was originally commissioned for until it was later renamed as St Bavo after it was rebuilt in the 16th century. St Bavo is the patron saint of Ghent.

Hugo van der Goes sourced a painting by Rogier van der Weyden for the image of Jan Van Eyck. The painting, now fragmented, portrayed Jan as Joseph the husband of the Virgin Mary, The section, which is housed at the Calouste Gulbenkian Museum in Lisbon shows part of a church tower with a vacant aedicula to house a statue of some kind. The platform and canopy are there but the statue is missing. It’s very likely this motif partly inspired Van der Goes to portray Jan standing in front of an empty wooden box, which most observers presume is a coffin.

The wooden box acts as a visible link between the two Van Eyck brothers, so does it have other levels of meaning associated with the two figures? It’s constructed from a number of panels. Could it point to the wood panels that Jan and Hubert painted on to create the Ghent Altarpiece, perhaps a particular unfinished panel started by Hubert before his death in 1426? The Ghent Altarpiece is also known as The Adoration of the Mystic Lamb.

Observe Van Eyck’s red hat, shaped as a resting lamb, and a pointer to Jan’s self-portrait titled Man in a Red Turban, painted a year after the Ghent Altarpiece was unveiled. Hugo would have understood that the turban’s intricate folds also depicted the ‘Lamb of God’.

The Ghent Altarpiece was commissioned by the prosperous Flemish merchant and nobleman Joos Vijd, for his funeral bay chapel in the Ghent church of St John the Baptist. When completed in 1432 the painting was placed above the St Bavo altar in what became known as the Vidj Chapel.

St Bavo is the patron saint of Ghent. He came to faith late in life ‘after leading a worldly and dissipated life’ as a knight for nearly fifty years. His conversion came following his wife’s death and after listening to the preaching of St Amand. For a while he attached himself to a Benedictine monastery in Ghent but eventually moved out and lived a more secluded life out of a hollow tree in the forest of Malemedum, surviving only on herbs and spring water. The hollow tree, a natural harbour for shelter and rest, and a bay within the forest, has partly inspired Hugo’s empty wooden box. The mention of forest connects to the figure alongside of St Hubert whose conversion took place while hunting in a forest. However, the principle connection to the empty coffin or the hollow tree, is a pun to reference All Hallows’ Evening (Halloween, also known as All Saints’ Eve) followed by All Hallows Day – the Christian feast of All Saints; hence the many references made to Christian saints in the Panel of the Relic. The reference also serves to link to the phrase “communion of saints” (sanctorum communionem) declared in the Apostles’ Creed, which in turn connects to an earlier mention of the medieval poem: William’s Vision of Piers the Plowman.

There are other links. Understood as a niche or a nook, the box leads to a prevalent theme in the Panel of the Relic, that of books, and one of the most obvious being the holy book held by Jean Jouffroy. At the time of the painting Hugo van der Goes was a lay brother in a religious community known as the Brethren of the Common Life based at the Red Cloister priory near Brussels that housed an impressive collection of books as well as a workshop for book production.

The pious way of life adopted by the brothers of the community was also known as Devotio Moderna (the Modern Devotion). An early follower was Thomas á Kempis who wrote the popular book on Christian meditation, The Imitation of Christ. One of the famous quotes attributed to Thomas is used by Hugo to link the wooden box with books: “I have sought everywhere for peace, but found it not, except in nooks and in books.” Hugo repeated the quote in a later painting known as the Dormition of the Virgin, depicting Kempes gripping the headboard of the Virgin’s bed and decorated with the carved shape of an open book.

Another written source Hugo called on so as to link Jan and his brother Hubert to a specific feature of the Ghent Altarpiece was Pliny the Elder’s Naturalis Historia (Natural History). The Roman author’s ‘encyclopedia’ provides an account of a contest between two Greek artists, Apelles and Protogenes. Apelles was attached to the court of the Macedonian king Philip II, and later served his son Alexander the Great. His rival Protogenes resided in Rhodes.

• More on this in my next post

Plowmen, poems and puns

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In a previous post I revealed how Hugo van der Goes embedded a reference in the Panel of the Relic to a medieval poem titled William’s Vision of Piers the Plowman. This was to mimic the references Jan van Eyck made to Geoffrey Chaucer and The Canterbury Tales in the Ghent Altarpiece. Another ‘tale’ that was given a place in the Just Judges panel of the altarpiece was the Plowman’s Tale, said to have been sourced from Pierce the Plowman’s Crede. Van der Goes also included references to these two poems in the Panel of the Relic.

Barthélemy van Eyck picked up on Jan’s references and depicted the conversation between the Pelican and the Griffin in the January folio of Les Très Riche Heures. Hugo went further back in time for his source to a similar debate found in the poem, The Owl and the Nightingale.

It’s not difficult to recognise Hugo’s owl in the Panel of the Relic. It’s the figure portrayed as Jean Jouffroy, except that in this scenario the figure is given a fourth identity, William of Paris, a Dominican priest and theologian, and confessor to the French king Philip IV. He was made Inquisitor of France in 1303 and began a campaign against the Templars in 1307.

The other three identities Hugo has applied to the figure in black is Jean Jouffroy, René of Anjou and Pierre Cauchon.

Detail from Rogier van der Weyden’s Seven Sacraments

The link to William of Paris comes via the group of three Van Eyck brother alongside Jouffroy. The four men are also grouped in one of the scenes from the triptych painted by Rogier van der Weyden, known as the Seven Sacraments Altarpiece (1445-1450), now displayed in the Royal Museum of Fine Arts, Antwerp. 

William of Paris completed writing the Dialogus de Septem Sacramentis (Dialogue of the Seven Sacraments) in 1314, the same year the Templar knight Geoffroi de Charney was executed, burnt at the stake on a small strip of land in the River Seine.

The nightingale can be discovered in the central panel of the surplice worn by man in the red collar, already identified as symbolic of the Templar flag, the Beauceant. The panel also represents the island in the Seine, known as both Jews Island and Templars Island.

As stated in an earlier post Hugo van der Goes was an accomplished heraldic artist. ‘Engrailed’ around the top of the centre panel in the surplice is a series of of border arcs forming outward points. ‘Knight’ coupled with ‘engrail(ed)’ puns as ‘nightingale’! 

Not without coincidence is the engrailed feature and the eyes of the man in black placed on the same level, although the debate makes clear the owl and the nightingale did not see ‘eye to eye’.

More signs and pointers

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It’s about three weeks since I last posted information about the St Vincent Panels and in particular the Panel of the Relic. All previous posts with links are listed in the masthead menu under the title St Vincent Panels.

Detail from the Panel of the Relic (St Vincent Panels).

In a post made in April I identified the figure in black from the Panel of the Relic as being two French prelates, Jean Jouffroy doubling up as Pierre Cauchon, and connected them to the French heroine Joan of Arc and the surplice worn by Hubert van Eyck, suggesting the shaped arch in the centre represented the stake Joan was tied to when burnt alive, and its pattern symbolised the flames.

There is also a secondary French connection to the shaped arch or stake which relates and plays on the name Jouffroy.

The link is what was a small island in the middle of the River Seine in Paris known as île aux Juifs – Jews Island. It was named for the number of executions of Jews that took place there during the Middle Ages. The Island is also known as Île des Templiers – Templars Island – after several members of the Order of Templars were executed by being burnt at the stake on March 18, 1314.

The Burning of the Templars at Paris (British Library). Notice the Isle in the River Seine.

One notable Templar was Geoffroi de Charney, Preceptor of Normandy for the Knights Templar  – the name Geoffroi connecting to the name Jouffroi.

Also known as Guy d’Auvergne, Geoffroi de Charney and the Knights Templar reference is disguised as a third identity for the figure already revealed as representing Hubert van Eyck and St Hubert. The white surplice, the red colour and the black background to the figure are a combination of colours that make up the Templar beauceant; the cross-bow shape of the collar is substituted for the conventional red cross.

The Templar flag, the Beauceant, matched to the colour arrangement seen in the figure of Hubert.

Another Geoffroi de Charny (not Charney) came to prominence as a French knight and author after the death of Guy d’Auvergne. He wrote books on chivalry and along with the French king John II was a founding member of the Company of the Star. De Charney was also the carrier of the Oriflamme (Golden Flame), the standard of the crown of France, and died at the Battle of Poitiers in 1356 defending the French king. 

The Battle of Poitiers shows the fallen figure of Geoffroi de Charny, bearer of the Oriflamme.
Illustration by Graham Turner, from the book: Poitiers1356, The Capture of a King, by David Nicolle.

Observe that the ‘flamed’ centre section of the surplice is crowned, and the transparency of the fabric allows for “see through” to the red cassock underneath, a subtle pointer to the garment representing the Oriflamme. This provides a link to the ‘pilgrim’ figure of Jan van Eyck in the guise of John the Baptist, depicted wearing a white garment under his camel-skin coat. 

The Company of the Star was an order of chivalry and its insignia was a white star on red enamel inscribed with the motto: The star shows the way to kings, a reference to the star that led the three kings or magi to Bethlehem. So here we have a link to the star featured on the breast of Jouffroy representing the Order of Our Lady of Bethlehem. The star also unites with the two saints in the back row, Hubert and Lambert. Both served as bishops of Maastricht, and the city’s coat or arms features a white star on a red shield. As a group, the three red-shield references, link to the coat of arms of the de Charny family: three white shields or escutcheons emblazoned on a red shield.

Left to right: The Order of the Star, the Star of Maastricht, the star depicteed on Jean Jouffroy and associated with the Order of Our Lady of Bethlehem, and the coat of arms of Geoffroi de Charny.

Geoffroi de Charny and his wife Jeanne de Vergy were once owners of what is known as the Holy Shroud – the Shroud of Turin – said to be the cloth that covered the body of Jesus when he was entombed after his crucifixion. Jan van Eyck referred to the Shroud in at least two of his famous paintings: The Arnolfini Portrait and his self portrait of a Man in a Red Turban. The Shroud is also featured in the illuminated manuscript The Turin-Milan Hours on one of the leaves attributed to Jan van Eyck, The Birth of John the Baptist.

The manuscript once belonged to John, Duke of Berry, third son of King John II of France, founder of the Company, or Order, of the Star. The Duke, a collector of books (as Jouffroy was) also owned another famous manuscript: Les Très Riches Heures (The Very Rich Hours), magnificently illustrated by the three Limbourg brothers, Paul, Herman and Johan but incomplete when all three brothers and the Duke of Berry died in 1416, probably of the plague. It is suggested that the calendar miniatures were worked on as late as the 1440s, possibly by Barthélemy van Eyck, thought to be related to the three Van Eyck brothers. Barthélemy was in the service of Duke René of Anjou who became the owner of Les Très Riche Heures following the death of John of Berry who is the third identity that Hugo van der Goes has given to the figure in red.

Detail from the March folio of the Calendar series featured in Les Très Riches Heures.

Barthélemy van Eyck is also identified with being the “Master of René of Anjou” and the alias “Master of the Shadows”, the latter associated with the shadow features depicted in Les Très Riche Heures. Van der Goes points to this style by showing the right elbow of the man in black ‘eclipsing’ the right arm of the pilgrim, except in this scenario the composition is points to a shadow or eclipse feature in the March calendar folio of the Très Riche Heures. Here we see a field being ploughed by two oxen. The one in the forefront is brown; the other black, seemingly eclipsed or a shadow of the brown ox.

Detail from the Panel of the Relic suggesting a partial Lunar eclipse.

The ‘elbow’ eclipse also refers to a solar eclipse where a segment of the Earth is immersed in shadow cast by the Moon partially blocking out sunlight. The brown colouring of the pilgrim’s coat represents the earth, while the crescent-shaped, white hair of the kneeling man in red represents the moon. Notice, too, the sun flare extending from the elbow, and another reference to the Oriflamme. More on this theme in a future post.

This eclipse motif leads to another identity given to the pilgrim figure, and is one of a “series of pointers’ Hugo van der Goes has embedded in the panel… pointing stars, pointed weapons, porcupine needles, pointing fingers and hands, pointed ears – hare and donkey and the left ear of Jouffroy, pointed stake,  pointed saw teeth, cutting instruments, hence the reference to the plough (and symbolic of another heavenly navigator. All these pointed motifs can be summed up by the word ‘pierce’ – even the fingers and hand, a reference to Christ’s invitation to Thomas to examine the piercing he suffered on the Cross. And this brings us to connect the piercing action of the plough to the medieval poem: William’s Vision of Piers the Plowman, attributed to William Langland.

• More on this in a future post.

Pointing the way

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Detail from the Panel of the Relic, St Vincent Panels, Museu Nacional de Arte Antigua.

In October 2020 I posted details here on two of the identiies given to the two men standing on the back row of the Panel of the Relic – Hubert and Lambert van Eyck, brothers of Jan, as representing their name saints.

Both saints served as prelates in their time; Lambert as bishop of Maastricht from about 670 until his death in 705; Hubert as bishop of Liege after the martyrdom of Lambert who had been Hubert’s spiritual director.

Detail from the Palude Diptych showing the murder of St Lambert of Maastricht, Grand Curtius Museum, Liege

Lambert was murdered along wth two of his nephews, Peter and Audolet, after he had denounced the affair of a local clan leader and his mistress.

The uncle and nephews relationship is connected to one of the identities represented by the figure in black in the Panel of the Relic – another bishop, Jean Jouffroy. Hugo van der Goes has taken his lead from a still-visible wall painting in the Holy Cross Chapel of St Cécile, at Albi in France. It depicts Jouffroy with two of his nephews Henry and Hélion, along wth their patron saints. Standing alongside Jean Jouffroy is St Jerome, known for his translation of the bible from Hebrew into Latin.

Fresco in the Holy Cross Chapel of St Cécile, Albi, France

Hugo has employed the Jouffroy/Jerome pairing but switched positions of the two men to pun on the name of Jouffrey to suggest Jew. Hugo creates other links to emphasise the connection of the bishop to Judaisim, notably the pseudo Hebrew text in the book held by Jouffrey. But the main pointer is the claim that a Christian convert from Judaism assisted Jerome in translating the Hebrew text, hence why Jouffroy is shown as the figure supporting the kneeling Jerome and the suggestion of a cardinal’s hat on the saint’s back.

But don’t be misled by the five-pointed star on the bishop’s coat. Some researchers claim it represents the red star that Jews were forced to wear by Portuguese rulers. But that was a yellow star and not red. The star represents the Order of Our Lady of Bethlehem founded to commemorate the star that the Magi followed to Bethlehem. Another Order of the same name was founded by Pope Pius II two centuries later in 1459 and it was the second order that Jouffroy belonged to. He was made cardinal by Pius II in 1461.

So now we have another identity associated with the kneeling figure – St Jerome – to add to Cardinal Henry Beaufort, the French king Charles VI, and the artist Hans Membling. Apart from the skull fragment and a cardinal’s hat, there are other attributes associated with Jerome, notably a lion, a donkey, sometimes a rabbit or hare, and a crucifix. These are not so obvious as the skull relic and the cardinal’s galero but they are there to be discovered and introduce another artist – Leonardo da Vinci.

• More on this in my next post.

Making straight highways…

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Detail from the Knights of Christ panel of the Ghent Altarpiece by Jan and Hubert van Eyck.

Last May, I posted an item titled “A case of déjà vu” which explained some of the iconography in the Panel of the Relic, the sixth section in a set known as the St Vincent Panels painted by Hugo van der Goes.

I pointed out the figure in black represented bishop Jean Jouffroy (among others) and the open book of Scripture referred to a passage from Isaiah (40:3-5), echoed in John’s gospel (1:23) by John the Baptist:

A voice cries, “Prepare in the wilderness a way for Yaweh. Make a straight highway for our God across the desert. Let every valley be filled in, every mountain and hill laid low, let every cliff become a plain, and the ridges a valley; then the glory of Yaweh will be revealed and all mankind shall see it; for the mouth of Yaweh has spoken.”

Close inspection of the book’s pages reveals the straight highways between columns and verses, and the ridges and valleys on the turning pages.

More recently I discovered that the inspiration for this symbolism was based on iconography Jan van Eyck used in the Knights of Christ panel that forms part of the Ghent Altarpiece. Van Eyck makes reference to the same passage but in a different way. Instead, it is the two curved shields which represent the curved pages – the mountains and hills. The straight highway – the straight lines and verse segments on the opposite page – is represented by the straight lines depicted as the cross of St George on the leading rider’s shield. Van Eyck also confirmed the passage with another representation – the three vertical flag poles and furled banners.

Revealing the Relic

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It has never been established which saint or martyr the skull fragment depicted in the so-called Panel of the Relic belongs to. Is it St VIncent of Zaragossa or, as some historians have suggested, Ferdinand, known as the Holy Prince or the Saint Prince (but never canonised), who died as a captive in a Moroccan prison?

Hugo van der Goes, the Flemish artist who painted the St Vincent panels, provided visible clues that point to another saint, possibly even two, which as far as I know have never been considered before by historians.

While the focus of the Altarpiece is on St Vincent, he is not the only saint or martyr represented in the panels. There are many. In fact, Van der Goes has made “uncovering saints” one of the main themes in the painting. This stems from a connection with the first in the lineup of many figures representing a saint – in this instance St Ambrose of Milan, depicted in the top left corner of the Friars Panel. More on this connection at another time.

So it should not be assumed that the so-called ‘twin’ figures said to be of St Vincent simply represent that particular saint alone. We are invited to “uncover the saints and martyrs” represented in all of the six panels, as well as other idenities associated with the St Vincent figures.

Van der Goes links each clue to another, as a method of confirming identities and connections. He was influenced in this type of construction by Jan van Eyck who employed the same technique in the Ghent Altarpiece, particularly in the Just Judges panel where the ten riders interlock as jigsaw pieces.

Let’s explore how Van der Goes leads the viewer to discovering the saint associated with the skull fragment. The artist was well versed in producing heraldic decorations for the Burgundian court and the city of Ghent. In 1468 he was commissioned to do so for the marriage of Charles the Bold to Margareta of York and other works for important occasions.

Aspects of Hugo’s knowledge and experience of heraldic disciplines and terminology feature in the St Vincent Panels. One particular term Hugo has utilised from the language of heraldry is ‘erasure’ which, according to The Oxford Guide to Heraldry, is the tearing off a part of a charge, to leave a jagged edge, and mostly applied to heads depicted with a ragged edge as if forcibly torn from the body.

In another post I pointed out that one of the works of art which Hugo borrowed features from to include in the St Vincent Panels was the Monsaraz fresco known as the Good and Bad Judge, most notably the damaged or ‘erased’ section that formed part of the Good Judge’s right arm and hand. This ‘erased’ or ‘hidden’ motif is utilised in all of the St Vincent Panels in a variety of ways – for instance: men with arms, men without arms, in a literal and military sense. Very few of the figures standing in the back row of the panels are depicted with arms or hands, and if they are, then there is usually a significant meaning to why this is so.

The Panel of the Relic is a typical example. Only the figure of Jan van Eyck doubling up as John the Baptist shows both arms and hands, and even his arms are partly cut off or covered. His two brothers on the back row, Hubert and Lambert, both named after saints, are also armless. The figure of the French prelate and diplomat Jean Jouffroy, twinned with Pierre Cauchon, another French bishop and also a prosecutor in the trial of Joan of Arc, is depicted with the right arm on show and hand on a holy book. Jouffroy later attacked Joan’s ‘saintly’ reputation in a eulogy given in 1459 to Philip the Good, duke of Burgundy, which may explain the symbolism of the hidden arm and underhand motif.

As to any visual reference to St Joan of Arc – yet another French connection – it is found in the patterned surplice worn by Hubert. Notice the stake-shaped arch in the centre and what appear to be rising flames, a reminder of how Joan suffered martyrdom by being burnt at the stake. The flames can also be understood as symbolic of the Holy Spirit.

The kneeling figure in the bright red gown depicts the French king Charles VI, referred to as ‘Charles the Mad’, who was plagued throughout his life with bouts of mental illness. The figure is also representative of Cardinal Henry Beaufort, said to have had a a hidden hand in the prosecution of Joan of Arc, although the absent left hand seemingly supporting the skull fragment also has a connection to the relic itself. Both Beaufort and Charles VI are also presented in Jan van Eyck’s Just Judges panel in the Ghent altarpiece.

As to the skull fragment itself, close inspection shows a ragged edge on its top side. This makes the connection to the heraldic term ‘erasure’ and a reason why Charles VI is holding the relic.

With its spiked back, the ‘torn’ fragment is meant to depict a porcupine and links to the French king’s younger brother, Louis I Duke of Orleans, who was assassinated on November 23, 1407, on the orders of John the Fearless, duke of Burgundy. He was lured to his death on a Paris street in broad daylight after being told his brother wished to meet with him. When he mounted his horse to start on his way a gang of fifteen masked men attacked and fatally stabbed him, cutting off one of his hands in the process, hence the image of his brother Charles depicted with one hand only.

As to the porpupine motif, this represents the chivalric Order of the Porcupine founded by Louis in 1394 to mark the occasion of the baptism of his son Charles of Orleans who was later held captive by the English as a prisoner of war for 25 years.

The Order’s insignia was represented by a gold porcupine standing on a green enamelled oval-shaped base, hence the green cloth base behind the skull fragment. The Order was sometimes referred to in France as the Ordre du Camail and here Hugo van der Goes makes another link to confirm his intended reference to the insignia. Depicted just above the king’s right shoulder is the coat of camel hair worn by John the Baptist. The word-play, camel and camail, is confirmed by the folds in the Baptist’s coat shaped to represent the legs of a camel.

But there is more to link to the Order of the Porcupine. Louis, duke of Orleans, did not enjoy the best of reputations with the people. He had many enemies and is said to have taken his brother’s wife as a mistress. It was also claimed that he dabbled in magic and the black arts, even necromancy. So when we look at the fuller figure in red, there are other clues that point to Louis, duke of Orleans. Saint he wasn’t, it seems.

To the right and slightly above the green cloth is the shape of demonic face with a sharp-pointed nose. It also has an open, laughing mouth with two teeth. The demonic face represents John the Fearless, noted for his long sharp nose, piercing the cameo, and the stabbing of Louis. This motif is also adapted by Hugo from the Monsaraz fresco, shown below.

But take a look at the green cloth to its full extent and we see portrayed another demonic feature, screaming on its way into the fires of hell. The folds in the red garment are angled and accentuated in a descending formation.

Some twelve years later John the Fearless was assassinated in similar fashion on the bridge at Montereau when an attempt to parley with the French dauphin and future Charles VII of France went amiss. One of the dauphin’s escorts panicked and attacked the duke of Burgundy with an axe to his face. The shape of the axe head can be made out in the demonic face of John the Fearless, cleaving his skull through to the socket of his eye.

So where is the saint feature in all of this? Van der Goes is pointing the way back to another Louis and another king, the only French king canonised by the Cathoic Church, Louis IX.

It was Louis who built a dedicated chapel, the Sainte-Chapelle, as a shrine to house the many relics associated with the life of Christ presented to him by Emperor Baldwin II of Constantinople. These included the Crown of Thorns and a fragment fo the True Cross, so the skull fragment held by king Charles VI can also be understood as a relic of St Louis and the porcupine’s thorns as the Crown of Thorns placed on the head of Christ during his Passion.

In all of this there is another connection to Jan van Eyck and a folio attributed to him in the Turin-Milan Hours depicting the Birth of John the Baptist. The minature refers to many of the items Louis IX received from Baldwin II and were kept in the Sainte-Chapelle. More recently, the Crown of Thorns was rescued from its sanctuary when the Paris cathedral of Notre Dame caught fire in April 2019.

The Order of the Porcupine is not the only chivalric company represented in the St Vincent panels. There are several, and at least three others in the Panel of the Relic.

• More on this and other connections to be discovered in the Panel of the Relic in my next post.

End of the line… part two

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My previous post pointed out the connection between the two end panels of the Merode Altarpiece and the two end sections of the St Vincent Panels.

Detail from the St Joseph panel of the Merode Altarpiece by Robert Campin – The Met Cloisters

Another link is the pair of pincers seen on the workbench in the St Joseph Panel, used to identify the figure standing next to the coffin in the Relic Panel. He is Jan van Eyck’s brother, Hubert. On Hubert’s left is another brother, Lambert van Eyck. The three brothers, Jan, Hubert and Lambert were all artists.

Detail from the Panel of the Relic, St VIncent Panels, Nuno Gonçalves – MNAA, Lisbon

The circumstances of Hubert’s death are unknown. He died in September 1426 and was buried in St Bavo’s Cathedral in Ghent, next to his sister Margaret. Wikipedia states that one of his arms was preseved in a casket above the portal of St Bavo. Hubert never married and it is thought he may have belonged to a minor order of the Church.

When Jan van Eyck died in July 1441 he was buried in the graveyard of St Donatian’s church in Bruges. A year later, his brother Lambert organised for Jan’s body to be exhumed and reinterred inside the church next to the baptismal font.

Rogier van der Weyden, a contemporary of Jan van Eyck, recorded this new place of rest in the Seven Sacraments Altarpiece. In fact, Jan is depicted in all of the seven scenes. Hubert and Lambert also show up, standing behind Jean Jouffroy – the duke of Burgundy’s almoner at the time – between the two scenes depicting Baptism and Confirmation. The third figure alongside Jouffroy is Jan van Eyck to complete the trio of brothers.

Hugo van der Goes has repeated this arrangement of the four figures in the Panel of the Relic.

Another painting attributed to Van der Weyden and his workshop that features the three Van Eyck brothers is The Exhumation of Saint Hubert, housed at the National Gallery, London. Hubert is shown wearing a cotta over his red cassock, and in conversation with the Burgundian prince Charles the Bold. But seemingly Hubert’s left arm has been overpainted in a neutral grey colour, covering the cassock’s red sleeve.

Could this overpaint signify and confirm the claim that Hugo’s left arm was removed and put on display in a casket after his death?

So where does the pair of pincers come into this? Hugo van der Goes has matched them, to the shape of Hubert’s collar. They also double up as the shape of a bow – hence the ‘double collar’. The doubling-up reference is a pointer to the legend of the conversion of Holy Hubertus, or St Hubert.

When Hubert’s wife died giving birth to their son he retreated from court life for a pastime of hunting in forests. One Good Friday morning while pursuing a stag, the animal turned to face Hubert who was shocked to perceive a crucifix fixed between the stag’s antlers. A voice then warned Hubert that he needed to turn back to God and directed him to seek out Lambert, a bishop at Mastricht, who became his spiritual director.

Hubert van Eyck’s red collar represents both a hunter’s bow and the stag’s antlers. The anguished face of Van Eyck represents his final agony shared with the suffering Christ on his Cross. Jan van Eyck was away on ducal business, possibly in England, when his brother Hubert died. So the burial arrangements were most likely undertaken by Lambert van Eyck. It was Lambert who also arranged for the translation of Jan’s remains to be moved inside St Donatian’s church.

The Three Marys at the Tomb, Hubert van Eyck – Museum Boijmans Beuningen, Rotterdam

There are very few extant examples of Hugo’s work. He was commissioned to produce the Ghent Altarpiece but after his death the work was offered and completed by his brother Jan. Another painting considered to be by Hubert is The Three Mary’s at the Tomb. What is noticeable in this work is the wooden coffin lid laid across the open stone tomb. Christ has already risen.

The Resurrection theme, the open coffin and lid is echoed in the two end frames of the St Vincent Panels, the lid and coffin both upright. Van der Goes has placed the coffin lid next to the figure of Robert Campin in the Friars Panel, while the upright coffin stands beside Hubert van Eyck in the Relic Panel. There is a reason for this placing, Van der Goes is acknowledging a similar Resurrection scene (right) from Campin’s Sielern Triptych which shows Christ stepping out from his stone tomb, its lid askew, and suggesting that perhaps this was the inspiration for Hubert’s version. And instead of Three Marys portrayed beside the tomb, Hugo has shown three Van Eyck brothers.

A common theme throughout the St Vincent Panels is the translation of relics, of bodies and bones, and not just those of St Vincent. This theme is also extended to translation in other senses – of words and languages –crypt to cryptic – visual to verbal, of shifts in power and authority, of inspiration, both human and divine.

Although the St Vincent Panels are generally attributed to the Portuguese painter Nuno Gonçalves, my choice for the painting the Panel of the Relic would be Hugo van der Goes. It’s the same choice that Dutch painter Rembrandt made some 170 years later when he ‘translated’ many references to Hugo’s work in his etching known as The Death of the Virgin.

End of the line – for a reason

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The St Vincent panels attributed to Nuno Gonçalves, Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga

The two end frames of the St Vincent Panels – the Friars Panel (left) and the Relic Panel (right) are similar in composition. Their “end of the line” positioning is a pointer by the artist, be it Nuno Gonçalves or Hugo van der Goes, to another painting known as the Merode Altarpiece and attributed to Robert Campin. Art historians generally agree that its two end panels were painted at a later date, and possibly by a young Rogier van der Weyden.

The Merode Altarpiece, Robert Campin, The Met Cloisters, New York City

In the two St Vincent Panels the bearded friar represents Robert Campin, while the pilgrim or hermit figure is portrayed as Jan van Eyck, aka Joseph, husband of the Virgin Mary, (a carpenter’s saw hangs from his belt), as explained in a previous post.

In the Merode Altarpiece the so-called ‘messenger’ in the left panel, standing beside the garden door has never been identified, but I would suggest that he represents Robert Campin, the same bearded ‘messenger’ patting the wooden plank in the Friars Panel.

The other end panel in the Merode Altarpiece sees a busy St Joseph in his workshop drilling or ‘tapping’ holes into a plank of wood – a pointer to the holes seen in the plank alongside the beared friar (Campin).

Another Campin connection seen in the Relic Panel is the figure dressed in black supporting the holy book. He is the French prelate Jean Jouffroy. The likeness is based on a portrait by Robert Campin titled Portrait of a Stout Man, now housed at the Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza in Madrid.

• More on this in my next post which will identify the two men placed on the back row of the Relic Panel.

Rembrandt’s homage to Hugo

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Could the ‘mirror’ effect shown below be evidence that points to the St Vincent Panels attributed to the Portuguese painter Nuno Gonçalves – the work considered one of Portugal’s national treasures – may have been produced in the Burgundian Netherlands?

On the left is detail from Rembrandt’s etching Death of the Virgin dated 1639. On the right is the section from the St Vincent Panels known as the Panel of the Relic and estimated to have been painted between 1450 and 1480, some 150 years before Rembrandt made his etching at the age of 33. The title of the etching, Death of the Virgin, is a misnomer. The bed-ridden person is not the Virgin Mary but the painter Hugo van der Goes. Rembrandt’s etching is about paying homage or tribute to Hugo – homage being one of the prominent themes of the St Vincent Panels.

Knowing this, it’s not difficult to match the figures and the iconography. The detail shown in the hand and arm of John the Evangelist extending in from the left represents the man holding the book of scripture in the Relic Panel. He is the French priest Jean Jouffroy and an ambassador of the Burgundian court at the time. Behind him are two clerical administrators matched to the two seated women in the etching. The figure in red is Henry Beaufort and Rembrandt has matched himself to the prelate as a kind of cameo appearance drawing back the curtain to symbolise an act of revelation in a similar way the cardinal is revealing the precious relic wrapped in a green cloth.

The man matched to the shadowy figure in the etching, is the man portrayed as a pilgrim in the Relic Panel. This is the painter Jan van Eyck, placed in front of the wooden box – some say, a coffin. This piece of furniture, cupboard or coffin, can be matched to the empty chair seen in the lower corner of the etching.

It is said that Rembrandt never left his native Holland, although there are myths suggesting he may have travelled to England and Italy, even Sweden! But the myths never mention Portugal.

So for Rembrandt to have recorded such detail from the Relic Panel and rearrange it, or rebuild the temple, so to speak, he must have had sight of the St Vincent Panels to be able to make notes and preparatory sketches for his engraving. This would suggest that circa 1439 the St Vincent Panels were located in the Burgundian Netherlands and possibly Amsterdam at the time when Rembrandt moved to the city late in 1431.

If the panels were commissioned and produced in Holland, and it certainly seems that Hugo van der Goes had a hand in painting them, then who could have commissioned the work and when did the panels make their way to Lisbon in Portugal?

Many art historians consider the six panels formed part of a twelve-panel retable in Lisbon Cathedral. Other researchers dispute this. What seems very probable is that the panels did not leave Holland before Rembrandt had sight of them to embed details from the Relic Panel in his engraving. This isn’t the only example of Hugo’s later work that features in the engraving. The Vienna Diptych (Kunsthistorisches Museum) gets a good showing, and there are references to Hugo’s Adoration of the Shepherds (Gemäldegalerie, Berlin), and his version of Death of a Virgin (Groeningmuseum, Ghent).

• More details on this in a future post.

Spot the plagues

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The biblical Book of Exodus describes a number of plagues inflicted on Egypt because of the stubborn heart shown by the Pharoh in not wanting to allow the Israelites their freedom from captivity.

The Panel of the Archbishop section from the St Vincent Panels.

A similar scenario is expressed in the Panel of the Archbishop, the fourth section of the polyptych known as the St VIncent Panels. The stubborn hearts belong to the young king of Portugal Afonso V and his uncle Afonso duke of Braganza. In the aftermath of the Battle of Alfarrobeira in May 1449, when their army defeated the forces of Peter, duke of Coimbra – also an uncle of the king and half-brother to the duke of Braganza – they refused to allow Peter’s body to be buried at Bathala Monastery alongside his father, the Portuguese king João 1 and founder of the House of Aviz. Peter’s son John was taken prisoner during the battle, so were his brothers James and Peter afterwards.

Isabella, duchess of Burgundy and sister to Peter of Coimbra, later petitioned for her brother’s body to be translated to Bathala, but to no avail. Eventually, in December 1449, her husband, Philip the Good, commissioned the French dean of Vergy, Jean Jouffroy, to personally travel to Portugal with instructions that Peter’s remains be given an honorable funeral and the properties and dignity of his children be reinstated. Jouffroy, shown right, is depicted in the Panel of the Relic.

Jouffroy made three presentations, the final audience being on January 16, 1450. Eventually Alphonso V agreed to release Peter’s two sons who afterwards went into exile and travelled to Burgundy with their entourage. Their properties and titles were later reinstated, but the young king refused to give into the demands for Peter’s body to be buried at Bathala. Fearing the corpse might stolen he had it transported to the Chateau d’Abrantès. It took another five years for Afonso V to have a change of heart – brought on by the birth of his son Juan – before the Duke of Coimbra’s remains were finally translated and buried in the Bathala monastery.

So why the references to the plague in this particular panel? Firstly the father of Afonso V king Edward of Portugal was a victim of the plague in September 1438, as his father and mother were before him. Edward stands behind the young king. His neck is blemished with a dark circular mark – a sign of the plague. Secondly the artist is comparing the stubborn heart of Afonso V, perhaps influenced by his mentor the duke of Braganza, with the stubborn heart of the Pharoh portrayed in the Book of Exodus.

Another pointer to the Egyptian plagues or curses, is that before the birth of Afonso’s son John in 1455, his wife Isabella of Coimbra, daughter to his uncle Peter, gave birth earlier to another son in January 1451. He was also named John and was heir to the throne. However he died within the same year. This also is a pointer to one of the plagues inflicted on Egypt when the Lord said: “About midnight I will go throughout Egypt. Every firstborn son in Egypt will die, from the firstborn son of the Pharoh, who sits on the throne, to the firstborn of the slave who is at her handmill…” (Exodus 11:4-5)

Notice the couter on the kneeling knight’s elbow, depicted as a young child’s face! The lacing on the knight’s front represents the plague of frogs, while the knots, or gnats, on the young king’s hat is symbolic of another plague.

Are the ten churchmen standing in the back row meant to be synonomous with the ten plagues associated with Egypt, perhaps considered a plague on the people at the time, and guilty of the sin of simony (selling of church offices and relics) – the translation of relics being a major theme of the St Vincent panels?

The plague mark on King Edward’ neck, and the child’s face depictied on the knight’s elbow protector.

• More on this in a future post.

The Pearl Poet… a third sighting

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Some months ago I discovered that Jan van Eyck had embedded in the Ghent Altarpiece the identity of the Pearl Poet, author of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. Jan wasn’t the first artist to do so. Pol Limbourg included him as one of the figures in the January folio from the book of hours known as the Très Riche Heures du Duc de Berry.

Detail from the Panel of the Friars and the Panel of the Relic in the St Vincent Panels

Recently I came across another painting that features the Pearl Poet – the St Vincent Panels attributed to the Portuguese artist Nuno Gonçalves.

In all of the three paintings the iconography attached to the figure of the Pearl Poet confirm his identity as Hugh Stafford, 2nd earl of Stafford, KG, c1342 – October 13, 1386.

The St Vincent Panels was an attempt to emulate the lower register of the Ghent Altarpiece, It includes several references to the work of the Van Eyck brothers and even a portrat of Jan in one of the panels, as there are of other Netherlandish artists.

The Pearl Poet appears in the first frame titled the Panel of the Friars. He is the figure with long hair and a straggling beard. His right hand is placed on a plank of wood. He wears a similar habit to the other two friars but a darker shade. On his head is a fez-type hat marked on the front with a cross amid what appear to be flames of fire.

Like Van Eyck in the Ghent Altarpiece, the artist has applied more than one identity to each figure – in this instance, three. The iconography that points to the name of the Pearl Poet is less detailed than that created by Van Eyck but, like Jan, the artist has split the name into three syllables: Hugh-Staf-ford.

Why the darker shade of the man’s habit? For this, read HUE. The staff is the STAVE or plank of wood he his holding. The FORD is the crossover he is about to make to the water reference in the panel alongside and also the mirror panel on the far side, referred to as the Panel of the Relic. In this scenario the plank is seen as the lid of the coffin placed behind the figure of Jan van Eyck who is presented as a poor pilgrim.

Sir Hugh died at Rhodes while returning from a pilgrimage to Jerusalem. His bones were translated back to England by his squire and entombed at Stone Priory alongside his wife Philippa Beauchamp who had died a few months earlier.

Van Eyck also pointed to Sir Hugh by referencing text from Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. So has Gonçlaves, and from the same passage: “Face fell as the fire, and free of his speech.” The fire reference is the symbolic flames at the end of his beard – a kind of singeing of the beard which also refers to another narrative in the painting.

The second identity given to the figure is the artist Robert Campin, considered the first great master of Flemish painting. He is one of several Flemish artists featured in the St Vincent Panels. He can be identified in three ways.

Firstly, In other Flemish paintings he is generally portrayed with a beard and as the third king or wise man that followed a star to Bethlehem to pay homage to Jesus, the new-born king of the Jews, hence the celestial motif on his hat.

Jean Jouffroy, painted by Roger Campin and (right) as he appears in the St Vincent Panels.

The second connection to Campin is the ‘mirror’ image in the far-right frame – the Panel of the Relic. The man wearing the black habit is Jean Jouffroy, almoner to Philip the Good duke of Burgundy. The image is adapated from Roger Campin’s painting, Portrait of a Stout Man. The motif on the front of the habit represents the Order of Our Lady of Bethlehem.

Detail from the Merode Altarpiece showing a self portrait
of Roger Campin. Could the horse-rider be Jan van Eyck?

A third connection to Campin is his placement alongside the plank. In this scenario it represents a door to to a sanctuary and is borrowed from a feature in Campin’s painting of the Merode Altarpiece where he has portrayed himself standing next to an open door that leads into a garden and the scene of the Annunciation.

I shall reveal the figure’s third identity in a future post.

Translating hidden relics

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In my previous post I explained how the iconography relating to the pages of the mysterious script in the Panel of the Relic translated into a passage from Isaiah (40 : 3-5), and is echoed in John’s gospel (1 : 23) by John the Baptist. But the artist also used another source to translate from: a section of the Knights of Christ panel that forms part of the Ghent Altarpiece.

The translation is focused on the central knight leading two other knights and a group of kings and princes. In this particular narrative the knight is a depiction of two people of a young age, Jan van Eyck and Henry Beaufort. Both men are also placed in the Panel of the Relic. Beaufort, as a Cardinal in later life, is on his knees holding the relic.

In the Knights of Christ panel the group is making a “straight way” to the Holy Land or the “New Jerusalem”.

So how is the passage from the Book of Isaiah, referenced by John the Baptist in John’s Gospel, identified in the iconography surrounding the knight? At this stage it is worth repeating Isaiah’s words:

A voice cries, “Prepare in the wilderness a way for Yaweh. Make a straight highway for our God across the desert. Let every valley be filled in, every mountain and hill laid low, let every cliff become a plain, and the ridges a valley; then the glory of Yaweh will be revealed and all mankind shall see it; for the mouth of Yaweh has spoken.”

The “straight way” is the red cross on the knight’s shield, similar to the vertical and horizontal spaces between the written words on the pages displayed by Jean Jouffroy in the Panel of the Relic. The valleys, mountains, hills and cliffs are the various shapes formed from the shields. The ridges are the highlight’s on the knight’s breastplate but “made plain” on the front of the knight to his right.

Another “straight way” is the straight strap across the knight’s breastplate. It’s stems from a descending, scrolling pattern of light, symbolic of the Holy Spirit, and ends in shadow at the point of the cross on the shield, and also at the elbow of the knight alongside the central knight. “Elbow” translates as EL-BOW, God’s bow (a rainbow) symbolising his Covenant promise (Genesis 9 : 12-13).

Amidst the shadow area is a red triangular shape intended to represent the head of Christ as he hangs on his Cross. The upward sweep of the strap represents one of his arms, while his back is connected to another arm, that of the red cross on the shield. This represents God’s New Testament or New Covenant fulfilled by Christ’s death and resurrection.

Below this motif is a galaxy of “stars’ on a blue background. However, one star has risen to appear in the groove of the shield. Not only is symbolic of the Resurrection but it also represents the rising star the wise men saw and followed and which led them to Bethlehem to pay homage to the infant king. So the three knights can also be viewed as “wise men” making a straight way to Bethlehem. A similar motif is seen in the composition of the Panel of the Relic (and other panels) – the three front men are arranged as three wise men bearing gifts and paying homage.

The straight strap is also present in the Panel of the Relic. It falls across the chest of Van Eyck the pilgrim and ends at the elbow of Jean Jouffroy. While the prelate’s hand turns the pages in the book, the star is settled above another passage from Isaiah that prophesied “the coming of the virtuous king” (Isaiah 11 : 1-2).

In the previous post I mentioned what appears to be a head under the camel coat of Van Eyck, portrayed also as John the Baptist in the Panel of the Relic. The shape represents the head of the Baptist who while imprisoned was beheaded on the orders of Herod because the king had promised Salome anything she wanted after dancing for him. She requested the head of John on a dish.

The bloody head of John appears on the right arm of the knight from the Ghent Altarpiece, mounted on a green cushion. The curved piece of armour supporting his head is the dish.

This piece of iconography relates to the latter part of Isaiah’s prophecy: “… then the glory of Yaweh will be revealed and all mankind shall see it; for the mouth of Yaweh has spoken” – the mouth of Yaweh being both Isaiah and John the Baptist.

Unfortunately, since the recent restoration of the Ghent Altarpiece the face depicted on the arm is now hardly noticeable. The version shown here is before the altarpiece was “restored”.

The fact that the knight is a double image – Jan van Eyck and Henry Beaufort – is interesting. A connection is being made between the two men and the head of John the Baptist. Nuno Gonçlaves also connects the two men and the head in the Panel of the Relic, the relic beign a part of John’s skull. Both paintings also point to a location in England – Templecombe in Somerset – where a painting of John the Baptist was discovered in the roof of an outhouse that had a connection with a Templar priory and later the Knights Hospitaller (Order of Knights of the Hospital of Saint John of Jerusalem), John being John the Baptist.

A case of déjà vu

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This section of the St Vincent Panels is known as the Panel of the Relic, so called because of the kneeling prelate holding the fragment of a skull. Some say the relic belongs to St Vincent of Zaragoza, the saint who is the focus of the two panels in the centre of the altarpiece, while others suggest it belongs to Ferdinand the Holy Prince, the youngest son of John l of Portugal who was taken as a hostage following the Siege of Tangier and eventually died in captivity.

The panels are attributed to the Portuguese painter Nuno Gonçalves and one of the main narratives is the translation to Lisbon of the relics belonging to St Vincent and Ferdinand. But what makes the Panel of the Relic notably different from the rest is that there are no Portuguese representatives. The kneeling prelate is English whose father was Flemish, and the four other men represent the House of Valois-Burgundy. So why should any of them be associated with a relic of St Vincent or Ferdinand the Holy Prince?

If the relic belonged to neither of these two saintly men then what relic could link the Portuguese House of Aviz with Cardinal Henry Beaufort, son of John of Gaunt, and the rest of the group of Flemings? The clue lies is in ‘translating’ the open pages of the book held by the prelate dressed in black. He is Jean Jouffroy, one time almoner of Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy. The two men standing in the back row are assistants to Jouffroy, but unnamed. The figure portrayed as a humble pilgrim is Jan van Eyck.

Gonçlaves has sourced two of Van Eyck’s paintings and the work of another Flemish painter, Rogier van der Weyden, to build on the ‘translate’ narrative found in the altarpiece. Van der Weyden is portrayed as one of four artists featured in the Panel of the Knights.

The two works of Van Eyck are the Knights of Christ panel in the Ghent Altarpiece, and the portrait of Henry Beaufort, currently mistitled, Portrait of Cardinal Niccolò Albergati. The Van der Weyden paintings are: The Seven Sacraments, the Altarpiece of the Virgin and Child with Saints (now fragmented with some parts lost) and the Exhumation of St Hubert.

By using some of the iconography created by other artists in their paintings and translating it to a new location, Gonçlaves is, in a sense, paying homage to the particular artist and their work. This echoes the foremost theme of the St Vincent panels – paying homage and celebrating the translation of St Vincent’s lost relics to Lisbon, and so establishing a new creation and a spiritual rebirth for the city, commemorated annually.

The translation of Jan van Eyck

There is a reference by the art historian James Weale in his book on the life and works of Hubert and John van Eyck, that in March 1442, at the request of Lambert van Eyck, the Chapter of St Donatian, Bruges, “grants permission for the body of his brother John, buried in the precincts, to be, with the bishop’s licence, translated into the church and buried near the font, on condition of the foundation of an anniversary and of compliance with the rights of fabric.”
 
In his Seven Sacraments painting, Van der Weyden depicts this translation of Van Eyck’s remains as the raised stone covering the grave and supporting the baptismal font. Hence the ‘raised’ coffin also signifying the upright baptismal font. The child in the baptism scene is Van Eyck’s own, and the Sacrament signifies being raised to new life in Christ. And so in death Van Eyck is resurrected to new life through the Sacrament. Close inspection of the priest performing the baptism reveals the same priest that stands next to the coffin Van Eyck is placed in front of in the Panel of the Relic.

But there is another reason why Jan is portrayed standing in front of the coffin, and it connects to another painting by Rogier van der Weyden. It’s part of the cut-down altarpiece referred to as the Virgin and Child with Saints. The figure of Joseph is represented by Jan van Eyck, frail and seemingly approaching the end of life. The head and upper part of his body is now a portrait presentation housed at the Calouste Gulbenkian Museum in Lisbon.

The building in the background shows an empty tabernacle or aedicula. The pedestal and canopy are there but the statue is missing. This may be seen as Van der Weyden preparing to elevate his humble friend Jan to kingly or even saintly status. “King of Painters” was an epithet awarded to Jan.

So the empty coffin is also symbolic of the empty tabernacle. However the surplice worn by the priest alongside the coffin also depicts a tabernacle, but not vacant. It contains the presence of the Holy spirit, symbolised by the flames shown within the veil.

The Holy Flame is reflected in the Panel of the Friars, under the figure with the long beard. The figure also has his right hand placed on what is said to be the lid of the coffin behind Van Eyck. But the plank has other meanings as well.

The figure of Jean Jouffroy, who later became an influential ‘Prince of the Church’ – a Cardinal – is shown holding open a book of Scripture. The text is unreadable (although it has been claimed that some Hebrew words can be identified) but its message can be understood when read as a piece of iconography. It relates to the passage from Isaiah (40:3-5), echoed in John’s gospel (1-23) by John the Baptist:

A voice cries, “Prepare in the wilderness a way for Yaweh. Make a straight highway for our God across the desert. Let every valley be filled in, every mountain and hill laid low, let every cliff become a plain, and the ridges a valley; then the glory of Yaweh will be revealed and all mankind shall see it; for the mouth of Yaweh has spoken.”

Close inspection of the book’s pages reveals the straight highways between columns and verses, and the ridges and valleys on the turning pages. The wise men who came from the East to pay homage to the new-born King had to travel across the desert, and were led straight to Bethlehem by following a star. That’s the red star seen on the front of Jouffroy. It also represents a military order of that time known as the Order of Our Lady of Bethlehem.

A second connection to John the Baptist is the Jan van Eyck figure dressed in a camelskin coat. The hind legs of the camel are shaped in the folds below his belt. His coat is opened at the front and beneath the belt is a suggestion of a head in profile. The profile is facing the head of Henry Beaufort, and in his hands he holds part of the skull of John the Baptist. How the relic came into the possession of Van Eyck and eventually Beaufort is another story, but for the artist to link this feature to a painting that is primarily about St Vincent and the Portuguese House of Aviz is a pointer to where the skull relic was translated from to arrive in England.

The connection also links to what is known as the Templecombe Head, a painting on wooden boards of a head discovered in 1945 in the roof of an outhouse in Templecombe. The painting is of the beheaded John the Baptist.

• More on the Panel of the Relic in a future post.