The Flight into Egypt

Les Très Riches Heures du Duc de Berry

COLOMBE, Jean

1485-1489

vellum

Musee Conde

Chantilly, France

 

The Flight into Egypt, placed at the beginning of the Vespers for the Virgin, is the only illustration for the Hours of the Virgin that the Limbourg brothers did not have time to execute.

Jean Colombe has devoted two miniatures to the subject: one large illumination, in the usual format, above a smaller illumination placed like a predella, both within a rather heavy architectural frame. Each miniature illustrates an anecdote popular in the Middle Ages.

The first comes from the apocryphal Gospel of Mary's Birth and tbe Savior's Childhood. This text states that on the third day of their flight, the Virgin stopped to rest beneath a tree bearing fruit which caught her fancy. But the tree was tall, and, realizing that the fruit was beyond Joseph's reach, the Infant Jesus said, "Tree, bow your branches and feed my mother with your fruit." The tree leaned, and the family was able to pick and eat its fruit.

Jean Colombe has treated the scene with his usual vigor, placing it in a setting of bluish mountains and rocks that in no way resembles a desert. Jesus, already a tall boy, seems to be talking to the tree as it bends within reach of Joseph, who typifies the heavy- bearded figures we see so often in Jean Colombe's miniatures.

The Virgin, with her arched brow and long blonde hair, maintains an air of charming modesty in the swaying hipshot stance fashionable at the time of the artist.

On the right, startled villagers observe the scene, while on the left two girls are seated, one apparently arousing the amazement of the other by showing her some fruit she was able to pick.

The scene below illustrates another anecdote related to the Flight into Egypt. While fleeing Herod's men, the Virgin and Child met a peasant sowing wheat. Jesus reached into the bag of seed and threw onto the path a handful, which immediately sprang into wheat as high and as ripe as if it were a year old.

When Herod's soldiers arrived and asked the peasant if he had seen a woman carrying a child, he answered, "Yes, when I sowed this wheat," whereupon they gave up the pursuit.

Also of interest on this page is the initial that decorates the text separating the two miniatures. Within it, the figure of the Christ Child is simply modeled with light touches of gold.

 

http://www.christusrex.org/www2/berry/f57r.html

 

See also:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Très_Riches_Heures_du_Duc_de_Berry

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Are you willing to forget what you have done for other people,

and to remember what other people have done for you;

to ignore what the world owes you, and to think what you owe the world;

to put your rights in the background, and your duties in the middle distance, 

and your chances to do a little more than your duty in the foreground;

to see that your fellow-people are just as real as you are,

and try to look behind their faces to their hearts, hungry for joy;

to own that probably the only good reason for your existence 

is not what you are going to get out of life, but what you are going to give to life;

to close your book of complaints against the management of the universe, 

and look around you for a place where you can 

sow a few seeds of happiness--are you willing to do these things even for a day?

Then you can keep Christmas.

~ Henry van Dyke

 

 

 

 

 

 

"The stockings were hung by the chimney with care …"

 

 

Christmas Eve Candlelight Service

 

 

Anne and Mark Vickstrom are home from Australia

and Mark was our Guest in the Pulpit for the Christmas Eve service.

 

 

Carma Scheafer, Bob Meade, and Don Unger

all celebrated late December birthdays at a Friday night gathering.

 

 

 

Practicing for next week's big tournament.

 

LOTS of fishing at the other end of the lake!!!

 

 

We celebrated Rebecca Martin's (October) birthday at Bistro Colorado.

(A little bit late.)

 

 

Harold and Deborah Linke had another lovely Holiday Party

with interesting people and lots of yummies.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Whatever else be lost among the years,

Let us keep Christmas still a shining thing:

Whatever doubts assail us, or what fears,

Let us hold close one day, remembering

Its poignant meaning for the hearts of men.

Let us get back our childlike faith again.

~ Grace Noll Crowell

 

Agnus Day, by James Wetzstein

 

 

Agnus Day appears with the permission of www.agnusday.org