Marta Poza: "In the Age average, death was lived in a much more everyday way than nowadays".
The expert in medieval art gave the second lecture of the Francisco Calvo Serraller series on the representation of death in works of the time.
"For many years, medieval man tried to avoid death, but it ended up being incorporated into the vital speech and lived on a daily basis". This was stated at the University of Navarra by the historian Marta Poza, second speaker of the lecture series Francisco Calvo Serraller, which the Friends of the Prado Museum Foundation organizes in partnership with the School of Philosophy and Letters.
degree scroll D. in Philosophy and Letters from the Autonomous University of Madrid, where she defends her doctoral thesis , gave a session entitled "Seras a pocos dias deste mundo passada. Images of life and death in medieval art". In her speech, the expert pointed out how our vision of death differs from that of our medieval ancestors. "Nowadays, we have subjected death to an almost aseptic and surgical treatment. People no longer die at home and are quickly taken to mortuaries".
As he recalled in his discussion paper, "knowing when one is going to die seems terrible, but any medieval man or woman would have liked someone to somehow inform them of how their death was going to happen". Thus, as he pointed out, knowledge was an advantage, because it allowed them to design their own funeral scenery and prepare themselves spiritually to face God's judgment. Poza explained that "they used to make a scenographicdesign in which they emulated the death of some character B, usually a saint, because if that sacred character had managed to ascend to glory, they would hope to meet the same fate". In this sense, he cited the death of Ferdinand I of Leon, one of the best documented cases, in which he imitates Saint Isidore.
In his speech, he also explained that at the doors of many churches there was a cinecephalous character waiting for the parishioners. Ancient beliefs said that if after mass, one stood before St. Christopher and said "today you will not take me", they would not die in the next twenty-four hours. "If no one told them how, the men and women of the Middle Ages thought that at least they had a lifetime to aspire to a good death. St. Christopher was the one who helped the transfer of souls, like the Egyptian Anubis, who also had a dog's head," he said.
As she reminded us, in the end, no matter how much one tries to know and plan, no one can escape death. In line with this statement, Marta Poza has projected a page from Anne of France's book of hours that represents a hunting death, with a bundle of arrows and a mischievous grimace. "Notice how he is looking at us, as if to say: you are not going to escape." It is a character that at the end reminds us that "as you were, as you see me you will be", as a memento mori. Because before her, we are all equal.
The next session of the series will take a leap back in time to the Renaissance. David García Cueto, head of department of Italian and French Painting until 1800 at the Prado Museum, will talk about "desire in 17th century painting, between fascination and censorship".
