MEDIEVAL IMAGES OF SAINT BERNARD OF CLAIRVAUX - GL78.jpg

Category Glass
Origin: artist/workshop Cologne workshop
Date 16C/1
Reference No
Size 60.5x60.5
Provenance St Apern Nuns' Abbey, Cologne, cloister
Present Location Marston Bigot, Somerset, England - St Leonard's Church
Bibliography VP1:3:7 (PL185:230-1); LA 210

Woodforde 1946, 260
Illustration From photo - Tessa France
Other illustrations

Country
Description:
1525. The third of the 'chastity stories' of an event recorded in the Vita Prima and which took place c 1110. Once Bernard lodged with some companions. The panel records two scenes divided by a pillar. On the left Bernard is seated at table with two companions. He is on the far left with reddish hair, dressed in red and with a red cap. On the right in a doorway is their landlady who lusted after Bernard. At night she approached his bed and, realizing what she was up to, he shouted 'Robbers, robbers' thereby frightening her away and alerting his companions who instigated a search. She repeated this again, and again there was a search but to no avail. It happened a third time and again no one was found. On the right Bernard is shown in bed. The scroll reads 'Latrones, latrones' (Robbers, robbers) and on the far right the woman is seen escaping. When his companions enquired about it the next day after they had left, Bernard confirmed that there had been a robber for 'our hostess was out to deprive me of what is most precious to me in this life, my incomparable treasure, my chastity!'. The inscription refers to the second story: 'When once the saint discovered a girl, who had gone naked into the bed at the instigation of the devil, he yielded to her the part of the bed which he had occupied, and, resting on the other side, went to sleep. After she had made him bleed by worrying him with her nails, and he had continued motionless, she blushed with shame, arose, and fled away'. This follows the description in the Vita Prima, except that in this there is no mention of making Bernard bleed with her nails. The panel is almost identical to one at Altenberg (see GL06).