Ars: časopis Ústavu Dejín Umenia Slovenskej Akadémie Vied (48.2015)

Anima viti impij defiderat malum, non miferebitur
proximoTuo. Pr0v.cap.2j.


©k®«(e fwÇMtfofcft roùiifcfjt aiqtë/ wiD ift &ciu
Nctyftm nicfx
Prov.cap. 21.

ASCLE-

Fig. 10: Johann Koch, The Death of a Maiden of O kulani, J. W7.
Valvasor, Theatrum mortis humanae tripartitum, 1682, p. 169.

death stories, such exempláry punishments should
discourage people from crime and vice - potential
offenders can thus be saved from eternal damnation.
In the case of the death of Vojnic, as described by
Valvasor, the count made the brigand’s life a true
“hell on earth”, since slow roasting on a gridiron is
a motif which European culture and art had known
from the ideas of how the damned soûls were tor-
tured in hell. The parallel is even more direct because
in the third part of his Theatrum, i.e. The Torments of
the Damned, Valvasor présents an identical punish-
ment for those who were, when still alive, füll of
vengeance fheatrum mortis, 239).

The Death of a Maiden of Okucani is comparable
only to the worst brutalities reported in criminal
records and told in horror stories known in 16th-
and 17th-century literatuře.43 (Fig. 10) In this sense
it is a true rarity — to use the expression in the spirit
of collectors of morbid narratives — which must
hâve been particularly valuable to Valvasor: it was
not only unique because of the unthinkable human
cruelty it describes, but also because it was true and
because it happened at a familiar place. Besides, it
was quite fresh, since not even five years had elapsed
since the event, as the author of the Theatrum ex-
plains. Valvasor completely refrains from the usual
moralizing note in this case, he does not condemn
the doings of the master nor pity the unfortunate
maiden. From the moralistic viewpoint, which is
otherwise very important to him, it seems surprising
at first sight that he distances himself even from the
question whether the girl did or did not commit the
theft for which she was so sadistically punished by
her master. He indifferendy sldps the key moment of
the story, which drastically heightens the tragédy of
the maiden’s death, and makes a comment: “Whether
she was innocent or guilty, I really cannot tellT The mal-
treatment is described in the manner of a concise,
unconcerned report of how the master punished
his maidservant: in a winter night he roped her to
a pole in front of the house and poured cold water
over her until she froze to death and turned into a
“stalagmite of ice”. And the author of the Theatrum
adds dispassionately: “The death here described indeed
was cold
The today’s reader might be surprised at the lack
of concern and the carefree attitude of Valvasor’s
report on the event, and his cynical remark about
the cold death could today appear to be imprudent.
But the surprise is not really justified. As a matter
of fact it expresses a misunderstanding of the spirit
of the âge which rated human life and death in an
essentially different way than we do today. The con-
clusion of the report about the maiden of Okucani
vividly illustrâtes a characteristic feature of Valvasor’s

43 »Sol nec adhuc cursu, lustrum properante peregit,
Mors quod ad Okitchim édita rara fuit:
Virfuit, hicfamulam furti, insimulaverat unam,
Sive insons fuerit, nescio, sire rea:

Ante domum adpalum banc hyemali nocte ligatam,
In poenam gelida, tarn diu inundat aqua,
Donec eam glacie, concret am herus ille peremit,
Haec merito dici frigida mors potuitM
fTheatrum mortis, p. 168.)

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