Triptych painted by Jean Bellegambe c 1516, oil on canvas. The central panel has the Annunciation (Luke 1, 26-38) with a kneeling Benedictine donor abbot placed between Gabriel, his intercessor, and the Virgin to whom he is presented in what is described as 'an iconographical audacity' like the abbess of Flines in the Retable du Cellier in the presentation of Bernard's family (see PA087). He is in fact Guillaume of Bruxelles, a former Cistercian who had been the reformer of Flines and the nuns' confessor under the same abbess. In 1513 he became the 69th abbot of the Benedictine St Amand near Valenciennes, resigned in 1516, moved to St Trond as abbot in 1517 and died in 1532. A portrait of him, also attributed to Bellegambe, is found on a diptych where he is depicted being presented to the Virgin by Bernard (see PA084), the reverse of which has a portrait of Abbess Jeanne de Boubais of Flines. The left wing features St Amand in his episcopal vestments, with crozier and mitre, and carrying a model of the church, behind him, recognizable by his name and crest above, the Cistercian
St William (Guillaume), archbishop of Bourges, with mitre and archbishop's cross, and St Benedict in black cowl and carrying book and crozier. On the right, in a similar chamber, and indicated by their names and crests are Bernard in white carrying book and crozier and St William of Aquitaine in armour and black coat carrying a standard with fleurs de lys corresponding to his crest below. Before them is St Trond in a green chasuble and carrying a model of the church. The reverse of the wings has Bernard in a Lactation scene (see PA108). The triptych celebrates the donor abbot's devotion to Mary, his tenure of the abbacy of the two ancient Benedictine houses, and the appearance of Bernard twice, celebrates his own Cistercian past as well as the veneration of which Bernard was the subject in the late Middle Ages even outside the Cistercian order.
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