Nature at Work

        Here’s a cool illustration from a medieval French manuscript.  Don’t worry, this is not an image of animal abuse; it portrays Nature, personified as a woman, sculpting a bird on her anvil.  She has already created several other animals and birds and even a man, who will be brought to life by the divine breath when she’s finished making them.  I love that Nature is dressed so elegantly (if perhaps not very practically).  I love the beautiful blue sky and the details of the smith’s tools and forge.  I love the very plain, dull earth, as if Nature’s work is only just beginning.  I also appreciate that this personification of Nature is a woman, giving some recognition and scope for female power and creativity in a culture that didn’t usually allow much.  It’s a beautiful little painting, finely detailed, luxuriantly colored, and edged with shining gold illumination.

        The illustration appears in a French manuscript from about 1405, of Le Roman de la Rose, a poem about the art of courtly love.  The Romance of the Rose was one of the most widely read books of the middle ages, especially for a secular work.  I haven’t read it, so I can’t tell you anything about how our image of Nature fits into it, but it seems to come from the second section of the poem, wherein various allegorical personages hold forth on Love.  Just for fun, here’s also a wood block print of the same scene from an edition printed in 1503.  This Nature looks less aristocratic and more like a hard-working craftswoman as she hammers her little doll-like human.  However, it makes a good demonstration of why manuscript books were considered higher quality and higher prestige than early printed books: the hand-painted illustration is clearly a much more beautiful work of art than the rather crude wood block print.

[Pictures: Personification of Nature making a bird, painting by anonymous artist from Le Roman de la Rose, 1405 (Image from The J. Paul Getty Museum);

Personification of Nature making a man, wood block print by anonymous artist from Le Roman de la Rose, 1503 (Image from Digital Library of Medieval Manuscripts).]