 |
| The Meeting at the Golden Gate From an Hours of the Virgin French (Paris), c. 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, The Meeting at the Golden Gate Italian, c. 1304-1306 Padua, Arena Chapel |
 |
| Benozzo Gozzoli, The Meeting at the Golden Gate Italian, 1491 Castelfiorentino, Biblioteca Comunale |
 |
| Filippo Lippi, The Meeting at the Golden Gate Italian, c. 1445 Oxford, Ashmolean Museum |
Bartolomeo Vivarini
 |
| Bartolomeo Vivarini, The Meeting at the Golden Gate Italian, c. 1473 Venice, Church of Santa Maria Formosa |
Dürer
 |
| Albrecht Dürer, The Meeting at the Golden Gate from Life of the Virgin German, 1504 |
and Boccaccino
 |
| Boccaccio Boccaccino, The Meeting at the Golden Gate Italian, c. 1514-1515 Cremona, Cathedral |
and various illuminators have been inspired by the evident warmth of the meeting.
 |
| The Meeting at the Golden Gate From a Breviary French (Paris), c. 1350 New York, Pierpont Morgan Library MS M 75, fol. 573r |
 |
| The Meeting at the Golden Gate From a Fleur de Victoires by Jean Mansel France, c. 1450-1475 Paris, Bibliotheque nationale de France MS Francais 56, fol. 6r |
One illuminator summed the entire story up on one sheet. This painter offers the Meeting at the Golden Gate as the central image being venerated by the family of the English king, Henry VII.
 |
| Workshop of the Master of the Speculum humanae salvationis, The Meeting at the Golden Gate Venerated by King Henry VII and His Family From Ordinances of the Confraternity of the Immaculate Conception English, 1503 Oxford, The Bodleian Libraries, Christ Church College Library MS Christ Church 179, fol. 1v |
The choice of image is appropriate, given that the union of Henry VII, the first Tudor monarch, with his wife, Elizabeth of York, the daughter of the next-to-last Yorkist king, Edward IV, symbolized the end of the period of civil war known as the Wars of the Roses. Surrounding the central image are four other images which tell the story of Joachim and Anne, from the rejection of Joachim’s offering (upper left) to the separate announcements by the angel to Joachim and Anne (bottom corners) to the conception of Mary (upper right). Between the images are images of the red rose of Lancaster and white flowers reflecting the white rose of York, the symbols from which the term “Wars of the Roses” is derived, as well as the portcullis, also used as a badge by Henry VII. The page may be dated as early as 1503 or as late as 1517. It comes from the Ordinances of the Confraternity of the Immaculate Conception which was founded in 1503. However, the last entry dates to 1517. Queen Elizabeth died in 1503 and King Henry in 1509. All but three of their children had predeceased their mother by 1503, so the image could be a memorial, looking backward from either late 1503 or 1517, rather than a recording document as of the foundation date.
The tale of Joachim and Anne's meeting has also been a source of inspiration to sculptors.
 |
| Benedikt Dreyer, The Meeting at the Golden Gate German, c. 1515-1520 New York, Metropolitan Museum |
 |
| Master of the Thomas Altar, The Meeting at the Golden Gate German, c. 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.
___________________________________
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, Images refreshed 2022.
No comments:
Post a Comment