DOI issue:
II: Z zagadnień historii sztuki
DOI article:Kępiński, Zdzisław: Jan van Eyck: "Małżeństwo Arnolfinich" czy "Dawid i Betsabe"
DOI Page / Citation link:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.14269#0160
154
ZDZISŁAW KĘPIŃSKI
of the former van der Gheest Collection, a rather serious one (but as we shall see untenablc one, because of examples that con-
tradict it), namely that David is missing in the apocryphical picture by van Eyck25. "The iconographically indispensable figure
of David" was dispensable for Rembrandt's Bethsheba in the Louvre and that picture is not devoid of remarkable associations
with the discussed apocrypbial picture, although it is characterised by such a différent formula of the movements of the,figures
represented. The maid-servant in the Rembrandt picture washes Bethsheba's body in the basin, inside a room. Bethsheba holds
a sheet of paper in her hand — the letter summoning her to the king's apartments. There is no other trace of David. And now
we can note that on the chest near the basin there is a distinctly represented rectangular piece of paper! It replaces in van Eyck's
picture, like in Rembrandt's picture, the représentation of the on-looking David. We can suppose that this theatrical producer's
method might have been adapted by Rembrandt after John van Eyck, who more than once put pièces of paper into his models'
hands26.
We can also see a piece of paper (a letter) lying on a window sili and not held in hand in a picture by Tintoretto, where
it is sufficient for deciphering the situation represented there as that of Bethsheba's toilet, and not Venus's toilet, as it is supposed27.
But the motif of David peeping from afar is not completely missing in our picture. The motif is recalled to mind by the
large window, near which, in spite of modest caution the naked woman is washing herself. This thème of a large window is
repetitious and it is given a complète meaning by Memling in whose picture there is a silhouette of the king and his page28.
On the window, the painter of the Toilet under discussion from the former Van der Gheest Collection, placed two smali
objects: a smali fruit on the window sili and a mirror hanging on the frame which has a elear shape of a cross. Together with
the window thèse are symbols29, successively of the chastity of Mary (spéculum sine macula)30; her being a mother to the new
Adam (the new fruit of Paradise opening the lights ofheaven)31, and his redeeming passion (the cross of the window
frame)32 and the heaven that is in store for mankind (the window).
We must remember that Bethsheba is the ancestress of Mary and she is sometimes her préfiguration33.
25 Held, o.c, p. 84.
26 Concerning Rembrandt's attitude towards the art of John van Eyck cf: F. Schmidt-Degener, Rembrandt imitateur
de Claus Sluter et de Jean van Eyck, "Gazette des Beaux Arts", XXVI, 1906, p. 89, many examples of Bethsheba being represented
with a latter from David which she received during her toilet, in Kunot-Leifels, o.c, passim.
28 Miinchen, Sammlung Julius Bohler, as Venus's Toilet quoted by G.F. Hartlaub, Zauher des Spiegels, Miïnchen 1951,
pp. 80 and 108.
28 Cut out of the picture in Stuttgart Muséum (Inw. No 111) the fragment David and his page now in the Epstein Collection
in Chicago. Cf. M.J. Friedlander, o.c, VI, No 25, p. 121 and No 97, p. 132 (vielleicht das aus der Bathseha-Tafel in Stuttgart
heraus-geschnittene Stiick). David holds in his hand a ring he took off his finger in order to give it to his page as a credential to
his mission. This is also emphasized by Kunoth-Leifels, o.c., p. 29.
29 We présent them at the very outset as symbols referring to Mary and Jesus and not to the physical person of Bethsheba,
because this is indicated by their significance as a set and only as fuli set and not as singular éléments should they be taken into
considération, and interpreted.
30 We can find the fullest discussion of the Marian symbolism of the mirror against the background of its posible symbolic
significances in H. Schwarz's, The Mirror and the Artist and the Mirror and the Devout, "Studies in Honor of W.E. Suida", Lon-
don 1959, pp. 90—105. This author also noted the awareness of the Marian symbol with John van Eyck: "as the symbol of the
Virgin whose purity is suggested by the unspotted mirror, the spéculum immaculatum, one of the most fréquent médiéval epi-
thets of the Virgin, derived from the Book of Wisdom" (VII, 26). This connotation appears on paintings or their fram.es (Berlin
ca. 1425; Ghent 1432; Dresden 1430—1434; Bruges 1436), o.c, p. 99. When referring to our Lady atthe ToiletH. Schwarz accepted
J.S. Held's opinion that this is "purification of the bride" (o.c, p. 94 and 98), because it coincides with the symbolism of purity
indicated by the mirror. If we assume that the picture represents Bethsheba's toilet, then, of course, the emphasis of the symbolical
character of the bath during which she was visited by David will have to be connected not with that very moment, but to the
"prefiguative" significance of it — to Mary, Bethsheba being her ancestress in the royal family of David, or to the Church,
which, like Mary, is Sponsa Christi.
31 The fruit is lying on the window sill exactly at the foot of the cross of the window frame. It occupies the same place
in the so called "Arnolfini" portrait in the National Gallery. That is why we connect it with the cross-symbolism of the window
frame (cf. note 29), together with which it is clearly characterised by symbolical eschatological qualities and combines the idea
of Paradise lost with Paradise promised, Adam with Jesus. Cf. note 39.
32 For gênerai discussion of this symbol cf. C. Gottlieb, The Mystical Window in Paintings of the Salvador Mundi, "Gazette
des Beaux-Arts", LXI, 1960, pp. 313—332, p. 329: La fenêtre est tréflé, symbole de Salut: comme lumière, comme fenêtre ouverte vers
le Paradis, et comme Croix, and p. 315: "As an opening, as a source of light, as holding a cross, the window is in fact a triple ré-
férence to rédemption: A fenestra paradisi, lux mundi, and cross conjoined".
33 As Solomon's mother, Bethsheba belongs in a direct line of succession to the ancestors of Mary and Christ. Her typolo-
gical bond with Mary through Bethsheba's coronation by Salomon, as a préfiguration to Mary's coronation by Christ was popularised
by the Biblia Pauperum and this bond is the best known and explored one by scholarship. D. Frey, Ein neu entdecktes romanisches
Tympanonrelief „Zeitschrift des deutschen Vereins fur Kunstwisscnschaft", II, 1935, pp. 496—518, pointed out to the hitherto
unknown symbolical connections of the Bethsheba-Ecclesia ideas. This theory was universally accepted, cf. Haeberlein, s.v. Ba-
thseba..., col. 1518: Betsabe significat sanctam ecclesiam according to Bible moralisée, the thirteenth century; R.L.Wyss, s.v. David,
,,Reallexikon zur deutschen Kunstgeschichte", III, Stuttgart 1954, col. 1103 : Vorbilderfur das Brautverhàltnis der Kirche zu Christus
werden die in Christ Geschlechtsregister genannten ait testamentlichen Paare, David-Bethseba, Juda-Tamar und Boas-Ruth. Similarly
ZDZISŁAW KĘPIŃSKI
of the former van der Gheest Collection, a rather serious one (but as we shall see untenablc one, because of examples that con-
tradict it), namely that David is missing in the apocryphical picture by van Eyck25. "The iconographically indispensable figure
of David" was dispensable for Rembrandt's Bethsheba in the Louvre and that picture is not devoid of remarkable associations
with the discussed apocrypbial picture, although it is characterised by such a différent formula of the movements of the,figures
represented. The maid-servant in the Rembrandt picture washes Bethsheba's body in the basin, inside a room. Bethsheba holds
a sheet of paper in her hand — the letter summoning her to the king's apartments. There is no other trace of David. And now
we can note that on the chest near the basin there is a distinctly represented rectangular piece of paper! It replaces in van Eyck's
picture, like in Rembrandt's picture, the représentation of the on-looking David. We can suppose that this theatrical producer's
method might have been adapted by Rembrandt after John van Eyck, who more than once put pièces of paper into his models'
hands26.
We can also see a piece of paper (a letter) lying on a window sili and not held in hand in a picture by Tintoretto, where
it is sufficient for deciphering the situation represented there as that of Bethsheba's toilet, and not Venus's toilet, as it is supposed27.
But the motif of David peeping from afar is not completely missing in our picture. The motif is recalled to mind by the
large window, near which, in spite of modest caution the naked woman is washing herself. This thème of a large window is
repetitious and it is given a complète meaning by Memling in whose picture there is a silhouette of the king and his page28.
On the window, the painter of the Toilet under discussion from the former Van der Gheest Collection, placed two smali
objects: a smali fruit on the window sili and a mirror hanging on the frame which has a elear shape of a cross. Together with
the window thèse are symbols29, successively of the chastity of Mary (spéculum sine macula)30; her being a mother to the new
Adam (the new fruit of Paradise opening the lights ofheaven)31, and his redeeming passion (the cross of the window
frame)32 and the heaven that is in store for mankind (the window).
We must remember that Bethsheba is the ancestress of Mary and she is sometimes her préfiguration33.
25 Held, o.c, p. 84.
26 Concerning Rembrandt's attitude towards the art of John van Eyck cf: F. Schmidt-Degener, Rembrandt imitateur
de Claus Sluter et de Jean van Eyck, "Gazette des Beaux Arts", XXVI, 1906, p. 89, many examples of Bethsheba being represented
with a latter from David which she received during her toilet, in Kunot-Leifels, o.c, passim.
28 Miinchen, Sammlung Julius Bohler, as Venus's Toilet quoted by G.F. Hartlaub, Zauher des Spiegels, Miïnchen 1951,
pp. 80 and 108.
28 Cut out of the picture in Stuttgart Muséum (Inw. No 111) the fragment David and his page now in the Epstein Collection
in Chicago. Cf. M.J. Friedlander, o.c, VI, No 25, p. 121 and No 97, p. 132 (vielleicht das aus der Bathseha-Tafel in Stuttgart
heraus-geschnittene Stiick). David holds in his hand a ring he took off his finger in order to give it to his page as a credential to
his mission. This is also emphasized by Kunoth-Leifels, o.c., p. 29.
29 We présent them at the very outset as symbols referring to Mary and Jesus and not to the physical person of Bethsheba,
because this is indicated by their significance as a set and only as fuli set and not as singular éléments should they be taken into
considération, and interpreted.
30 We can find the fullest discussion of the Marian symbolism of the mirror against the background of its posible symbolic
significances in H. Schwarz's, The Mirror and the Artist and the Mirror and the Devout, "Studies in Honor of W.E. Suida", Lon-
don 1959, pp. 90—105. This author also noted the awareness of the Marian symbol with John van Eyck: "as the symbol of the
Virgin whose purity is suggested by the unspotted mirror, the spéculum immaculatum, one of the most fréquent médiéval epi-
thets of the Virgin, derived from the Book of Wisdom" (VII, 26). This connotation appears on paintings or their fram.es (Berlin
ca. 1425; Ghent 1432; Dresden 1430—1434; Bruges 1436), o.c, p. 99. When referring to our Lady atthe ToiletH. Schwarz accepted
J.S. Held's opinion that this is "purification of the bride" (o.c, p. 94 and 98), because it coincides with the symbolism of purity
indicated by the mirror. If we assume that the picture represents Bethsheba's toilet, then, of course, the emphasis of the symbolical
character of the bath during which she was visited by David will have to be connected not with that very moment, but to the
"prefiguative" significance of it — to Mary, Bethsheba being her ancestress in the royal family of David, or to the Church,
which, like Mary, is Sponsa Christi.
31 The fruit is lying on the window sill exactly at the foot of the cross of the window frame. It occupies the same place
in the so called "Arnolfini" portrait in the National Gallery. That is why we connect it with the cross-symbolism of the window
frame (cf. note 29), together with which it is clearly characterised by symbolical eschatological qualities and combines the idea
of Paradise lost with Paradise promised, Adam with Jesus. Cf. note 39.
32 For gênerai discussion of this symbol cf. C. Gottlieb, The Mystical Window in Paintings of the Salvador Mundi, "Gazette
des Beaux-Arts", LXI, 1960, pp. 313—332, p. 329: La fenêtre est tréflé, symbole de Salut: comme lumière, comme fenêtre ouverte vers
le Paradis, et comme Croix, and p. 315: "As an opening, as a source of light, as holding a cross, the window is in fact a triple ré-
férence to rédemption: A fenestra paradisi, lux mundi, and cross conjoined".
33 As Solomon's mother, Bethsheba belongs in a direct line of succession to the ancestors of Mary and Christ. Her typolo-
gical bond with Mary through Bethsheba's coronation by Salomon, as a préfiguration to Mary's coronation by Christ was popularised
by the Biblia Pauperum and this bond is the best known and explored one by scholarship. D. Frey, Ein neu entdecktes romanisches
Tympanonrelief „Zeitschrift des deutschen Vereins fur Kunstwisscnschaft", II, 1935, pp. 496—518, pointed out to the hitherto
unknown symbolical connections of the Bethsheba-Ecclesia ideas. This theory was universally accepted, cf. Haeberlein, s.v. Ba-
thseba..., col. 1518: Betsabe significat sanctam ecclesiam according to Bible moralisée, the thirteenth century; R.L.Wyss, s.v. David,
,,Reallexikon zur deutschen Kunstgeschichte", III, Stuttgart 1954, col. 1103 : Vorbilderfur das Brautverhàltnis der Kirche zu Christus
werden die in Christ Geschlechtsregister genannten ait testamentlichen Paare, David-Bethseba, Juda-Tamar und Boas-Ruth. Similarly