Legendario delle Santissime Vergini, or Legends of the Most Holy Virgins, 1594

Savannah Lake

Virgin martyr narratives within Christianity originated in the fourth century as part of the practice of hagiography, or the writing about saints’ lives.¹ Hagiographic accounts could take the form of art, literature, and plays.² Of this genre, virgin martyrs were a popular subject, with hundreds of different legends created and then continually adopted and revised in the Middle Ages.³ These narratives would tell the story of a female Christian virgin who is tortured and killed because she refuses to lose her virginity by marrying a non-Christian suitor.⁴

Legendario delle Santissime Vergini, or Legends of the Most Holy Virgins, follows in this tradition. Published in Venice in 1594, the book is divided into 34 chapters, each dedicated to the legend of a virgin martyr. Each legend begins with a full-page engraved illustration depicting a portrait of the saint along with smaller images showing in the background her torture and martydom. The engravings, completed by Giacomo Franco (who signed the verso of leaf 61), are incredibly detailed, using shading and various styles of cross-hatching to create depth and detail.⁵ The macabre nature of the illustrations extends to the title page, which features another full-page engraving that frames the publication information with architectural motifs along with images of angels and what appears to be torture.

Other notable features of the book include its woodcut engravings, which can be found in the ornamental initials that begin each chapter. The portraits of the saints are also framed by a woodcut border recalling a floral pattern, and the head pieces feature woodcut engravings with architectural motifs and faces. In addition to the detailed engravings, the typography and layout of the book reflect how advanced the printing industry was in Venice by the late 16th century. The book features a number of fonts, including italic type and Roman capitals.⁶ End pages of chapters are formatted with mathematical precision, often creating triangular tail pieces that are accompanied by a woodcut engraving.

Given the book’s skilled illustrations, typography, and formatting, this is likely an expensive book that would have been treasured and valued. However, features of the book also suggest that this was intended to be used, not just looked at. The table of contents, page numbers, and chapter headers, for example, all facilitate browsing and easier navigation. Further, the book is written in Italian vernacular as opposed to Latin—which suggests that it is very much a book meant to be read and studied by the general public as opposed to recited by the clergy. Such clues into the usability of the book speak to the intentions of hagiography, which recognized “the close connection between discourse and self-understanding.”⁷ As such, hagiographic accounts sought to provide spiritual and moral models for people to read and learn from. In fact, hagiography’s concern with serving as a moral didactic meant that spiritual truth took priority over historical truth; most hagiographic narratives are unreliable historical sources, as they were written several decades or even centuries after when the martyr lived.⁸ Instead of serving as a historical record, hagiography was concerned with conveying religious principles and devotion.

The virgin martyr, in particular, is a contradictory and at times divisive cultural figure. Virgin martyrs did not appear until the fourth century; in the early centuries of Christianity, virginity did not have a role in female martyrdom.⁹ For example, Saints Perpetua and Felicity, who died in 203, both had a child. This focus on achieving martyrdom through virginity suggests a particular understanding of what women can contribute. While male martyrs generally died exclusively for their Christian faith, female martyrs deaths’ revolve around their sexuality.¹⁰ A woman’s worth and capacity to participate within the religious sphere was thus tied to her physical body in a way that her male martyr counterpart’s worth was not. Nevertheless, some scholars view virgin martyrs as empowered figures as they operate within a public sphere, advocating for their beliefs.¹¹ Within the medieval literary tradition, no other genre depicts women as preachers, sovereigns, or social activists.¹² It is possible, then, that virgin martyrs both challenge and uphold patriarchal norms, occupying the role of both victim and agent.¹³ In this way, the narrative of the virgin martyr reinforces gender inequality while also destabilizing gender roles.¹⁴

Legendario delle Santissime Vergini presents a fascinating example of book history, both for its content and aesthetic features. In terms of content, the book contributes to the hagiographic tradition of virgin martyrdom, which is rich for interpretation and speaks to the cultural values and situation of the time. Aesthetically, with its table of contents, page numbering, and formatting, it is an early example of the “modern book” that emerged in the 16th century, which was meant to be used and read by the public.¹⁵

Notes

¹ Perkins, Judith, The Suffering Self: Pain and Narrative Representation in the Early Christian Era, (London: Routledge, 1995), 200.↩

² Cheney, Liana De Girolami, “The Cult of Saint Agatha,” Woman’s Art Journal, 17, 1 (1996): 4.↩

³ Winstead, Karen A., ed., Chaste Passions: Medieval English Virgin Martyr Legends, (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2000), 1.↩

⁴ Constantinou, Stavroula, “Thekla the Virgin: Women’s Sacrifice and the Generic Martyr” In The “Other” Martyrs: Women and the Poetics of Sexuality, Sacrifice, and Death in World Literatures, edited by Alireza Korangy and Leyla Rouhi, 1st ed., (Harrassowitz Verlag, 2019), 74.↩

⁵ UCLA Library Catalog Holdings Information, https://catalog.library.ucla.edu/vwebv/holdingsInfo?&bibId=3748122, (Accessed February 11, 2020).↩

⁶ “Various Typefaces,” n.d., Incunabula - Dawn of Western Printing, https://www.ndl.go.jp/incunabula/e/chapter2/index.html, (Accessed February 17, 2020).↩

⁷ Perkins, The Suffering Self, 201.↩

⁸ Winstead, Chaste Passions, 2.↩

⁹ Pesthy-Simon, Monika, “The Meaning of the Martyr’s Sacrifice” In Isaac, Iphigeneia, and Ignatius: Martyrdom and Human Sacrifice, (Central European University Press, 2017), 185.↩

¹⁰ Constantinou, “Thekla the Virgin: Women’s Sacrifice and the Generic Martyr,” 74.↩

¹¹ Mills, Robert, “Can the Virgin Martyr Speak?” In Medieval Virginities, edited by Anke Bernau, Ruth Evans, and Sarah Salih, (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2003), 187.↩

¹² Winstead, Chaste Passions, 3.↩

¹³ Mills, “Can the Virgin Martyr Speak?”, Medieval Virginities, 201.↩

¹⁴ Dunn, Shannon, “The Female Martyr and the Politics of Death: An Examination of the Martyr Discourses of Vibia Perpetua and Wafa Idris,” Journal of the American Academy of Religion, 78, 1 (2010): 203.↩

¹⁵ Drucker, Johanna, “Chapter 7. Rationalization of Print,” History of the Book, https://hob.gseis.ucla.edu/HoBCoursebook_Ch_7.html, (Accessed February 15, 2020).↩

¹⁶ Drucker, Johanna, “Chapter 4. The Middle Ages in the West and East,” History of the Book, https://hob.gseis.ucla.edu/HoBCoursebook_Ch_4.html, (Accessed March 5, 2020).↩

¹⁷ Legendario Delle Santissime Vergini, (Venice: Heredi di Simon Galignani, 1594), 33.↩

For documentation on this project, personnel, technical information, see Documentation. For contact email: drucker AT gseis.ucla.edu.