The Meeting at the Golden Gate from Hours of the Virgin French (Paris), 1490-1500 The Hague, Koninklijk Bibliothek, MS KB 76 F14 fol.29r detail |
According to the story in the Golden Legend, an angel announced to Anne and Joachim separately that God had heard their prayers for the gift of a child and that the child they would have would be “full of the Holy Ghost”1 and he gave each of them a sign. The sign was that they would meet each other at the Golden Gate of Jerusalem.
They each went to Jerusalem, to the Golden Gate, where they did meet “and glad to see each other… returned home, abiding joyously the promise divine. And Anne conceived and brought forth a daughter, and named her Mary.”2
After the Nativity of Mary the Meeting at the Golden Gate is the principal subject of the iconography of the couple, Joachim and Anne.
In all of the images there is a touching display of joy and real affection that is quite unusual in art.
Artists as diverse as Giotto
Giotto, Meeting at the Golden Gate Italian, 1304-1306 Padua, Arena Chapel |
Benozzo Gozzoli, Meeting at the Golden Gate Italian, 1491 Castelfiorentino, Biblioteca Comunale |
Filippo Lippi, Meeting at the Golden Gate Italian, c. 1445 Oxford, Ashmolean Museum |
Bartolomeo Vivarini
Bartolomeo Vivarini, Meeting at the Golden Gate Italian, c. 1473 Venice, Church of Santa Maria Formosa |
Dürer
Albrecht Dürer, Meeting at the Golden Gate from Life of the Virgin German, 1504 |
and Boccaccino
Boccaccio Boccaccino, Meeting at the Golden Gate Italian, 1514-1515 Cremona, Cathedral |
and various illuminators have been inspired by the evident warmth of the meeting.
Meeting at the Golden Gate from a Breviary French (Paris), ca. 1350 New York, Pierpont Morgan Library MS M 75, fol. 573r |
Meeting at the Golden Gate from Fleur de Victoires by Jean Mansel France, 1450-1475 Paris, Bibliotheque nationale de France MS Francais 56, fol. 6 |
The tale of Joachim and Anne's meeting has also been a source of inspiration to sculptors.
Benedikt Dreyer, Meeting at the Golden Gate German, ca. 1515-1520 New York, Metropolitan Museum |
Master of the Thomas Altar, The Meeting at the Golden Gate German, ca. 1520 Lübeck, Sankt-Annen Museum |
Each image, in its different way, conveys a sense of the love of these two for each other and of their trust in the promise of God.
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1. The Golden Legend or Lives of the Saints. Compiled by Jacobus de Voragine, Archbishop of Genoa, 1275. First Edition Published 1470. Englished by William Caxton, First Edition 1483, Edited by F.S. Ellis, Temple Classics, 1900 (Reprinted 1922, 1931.), Vol. 5, pp. 47-54.
© M. Duffy, 2011/2012
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