Feminae: Medieval Women and Gender Index


  • Record Number: 3258
  • Author(s)/Creator(s): Duclow , Donald F.
  • Contributor(s):
  • Title: The Virgin's "Good Death": The Dormition in Fifteenth-Century Drama and Art [The author argues that the Virgin's dormition served as a model for dying well; handbooks in the "ars moriendi" tradition also emphasize a serene, holy death with the consoling intervention of the Virgin Mary].
  • Source: Fifteenth Century Studies 21, ( 1994): Pages 55 - 86.
  • Description:
  • Article Type: Journal Article
  • Subject (See Also): Ars Moriendi Treatises (Latin: Art of Dying) Art History- General Death Literature- Drama Mary, Virgin, Saint- Dormition in Art Mary, Virgin, Saint- Dormition in Literature Mystery Plays N-Town Plays- Assumption of Mary York Plays
  • Award Note:
  • Geographic Area: General
  • Century: 15
  • Primary Evidence:
  • Illustrations: Nineteen illustrations. Unless otherwise designated, each figure comes from the same source as the figure preceding. Figure One Dormition and coronation of the Virgin (Tympanum, west portal, Liebfrauenkirche, Worms). Figure Two Altar panel, Master of St. Lawrence, Köln, 1415-1440 (Köln, Wallraf-Richartz Museum, WRM 737). Figure Three Dormition, detail of Figure Two. Figure Four Dormition, altar panel, second half of the fifteenth century (WRM 400). Figure Five Dormition, altar panel, German, late fifteenth century (The Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, gift of Bertram Newhouse, 44.19). Figure Six Dormition, Linden wood relief, Alsace, Hans Bongards?, circa 1500 (Freiburg im Breisgau, Augustiner Museum, S 59/2). Figure Seven Detail of Figure Six. Figure Eight Joos van Cleve, Dormition, central panel of triptych with Dormition, 1515 (Köln, Wallraf-Richartz Museum, WRM 430). Figure Nine Manuscript illumination of the Dormition (Rare Book Department, Free Library of Philadelphia, Widener MS 6, fol. 96r). Figure Ten Manuscript illumination of the Coronation, Widener MS 6, fol. 105v. Figure Eleven Manuscript illumination of the Coronation, Widener MS 6, fol. 156v. Figure Twelve Manuscript illumination of the Dormition, Widener MS 97, fol. 52v. Figure Thirteen Manuscript illumination of the Coronation, Lewis MS 97, fol. 56v. Figure Fourteen Manuscript illumination of the Dormition, MS leaf, M5 26. Figure Fifteen Manuscript illumination of the Dormition, with the book's female owner in the margin, Lewis MS 90, fol. 48r. Figure Sixteen Temptation to avarice, Ars moriendi, Master E. S. (Lionel Cust, The Master E. S. and the 'Ars moriendi', Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1898, plate V.a). Figure Seventeen Inspiration against avarice, plate V.b. Figure Eighteen Moriens' Death (Triumph over all temptations at the hour of death), plate VI. Figure Nineteen Moriens' Death, Ars moriendi, woodcut (The Ars Moriendi, Editio Princeps, circa 1450, ed. W. Harry Rylands, London: Holbein Society, 1881).
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  • Author's Affiliation: Gwynedd-Mercy College
  • Conference Info: - , -
  • Year of Publication: 1994.
  • Language: English
  • ISSN/ISBN: 01640933