The Path of the Pregnant Virgins. Another route to Compostela.
Chandeigne| N° d'inventaire | 25993 |
| Format | 16 x 22 |
| Détails | 416 p., some color illustrations, paperback with flaps. |
| Publication | Paris, 2022 |
| Etat | Nine |
| ISBN | 9782367322445 |
Have you ever seen depictions of the pregnant Virgin? Statues of Mary waiting for Jesus, her hand resting on her round, prominent belly? They existed. Most of them have disappeared.
Between the 13th century and the end of the 16th century, sculptures of the pregnant Virgin enjoyed popular fervor in France, Spain, and Portugal. Women confided their hopes and anxieties to the One who shared their fate.
However, sensitive to Protestant criticism, the members of the Council of Trent demanded, in 1563, the removal of these images deemed "unwatchable." Just like the bedridden parturient Virgins and the representations of Mary breastfeeding her child. As a result, the sculptures of the Virgins of Waiting were removed from the churches. Destroyed, walled up, hidden, stolen? We don't know. Today, few of these representations of a "too human" Virgin remain. We have to look for them.
The mission is entrusted to Jean-Yves Loude, writer and ethnologist, and Viviane Lièvre, ethnologist and photographer, known for their detective investigations into the consequences of the slave trade and the memories murdered in the wings of history. Very quickly, the pair of investigators associate these disappearances with the logic of a discourse of exclusion developed by religious men at the expense of half of humanity. They decide to investigate along a route to Santiago de Compostela that will not follow any official markers. Their itinerary includes 14 stations, all dedicated to representations of the pregnant Virgin: between Le Puy-en-Velay and Santiago, passing through cathedrals, convents, discreet chapels, museums, remote villages, in the south of France, then in Alentejo, Ribatejo, in the center and north of Portugal, in the Douro, the Minho, the Trás-os-Montes, to finish in Galicia.
Have you ever seen depictions of the pregnant Virgin? Statues of Mary waiting for Jesus, her hand resting on her round, prominent belly? They existed. Most of them have disappeared.
Between the 13th century and the end of the 16th century, sculptures of the pregnant Virgin enjoyed popular fervor in France, Spain, and Portugal. Women confided their hopes and anxieties to the One who shared their fate.
However, sensitive to Protestant criticism, the members of the Council of Trent demanded, in 1563, the removal of these images deemed "unwatchable." Just like the bedridden parturient Virgins and the representations of Mary breastfeeding her child. As a result, the sculptures of the Virgins of Waiting were removed from the churches. Destroyed, walled up, hidden, stolen? We don't know. Today, few of these representations of a "too human" Virgin remain. We have to look for them.
The mission is entrusted to Jean-Yves Loude, writer and ethnologist, and Viviane Lièvre, ethnologist and photographer, known for their detective investigations into the consequences of the slave trade and the memories murdered in the wings of history. Very quickly, the pair of investigators associate these disappearances with the logic of a discourse of exclusion developed by religious men at the expense of half of humanity. They decide to investigate along a route to Santiago de Compostela that will not follow any official markers. Their itinerary includes 14 stations, all dedicated to representations of the pregnant Virgin: between Le Puy-en-Velay and Santiago, passing through cathedrals, convents, discreet chapels, museums, remote villages, in the south of France, then in Alentejo, Ribatejo, in the center and north of Portugal, in the Douro, the Minho, the Trás-os-Montes, to finish in Galicia.