Getty Museum

Initial I: The Virgin and Child with the Gentleman from Cologne

Date

about 1500–1510

Medium

Tempera colors, gold, and ink

Culture

Spanish

Department

Manuscripts

Institution

Getty Museum

The unknown illuminator broke open the letter *I* , formed of blue foliage on a gold ground, to reveal the scene of the gentleman of Cologne kneeling before the enthroned Virgin and Child. According to legend, the Virgin saved the gentleman from a murderous attacker, who appears in armor at the right. The Virgin Mary, crowned and seated beneath a large canopy within a stone structure, perhaps a church, is the focus of the scene. A crest with the five wounds of Christ adorns the left border of the page, and the wounds appear again in the lower border. This may be the coat of arms of the family that commissioned the large choir book from which this leaf comes.

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