The Empresses Bag? (Noblet)

It's strange Kwaw, but the more I read and think about this- the more I see Tarot as the 'Penitents Pilgrimage' that barefoot Le Mat I wrote about about somewhere in the galaxy of Tarot, that was blown apart for a super highway.
I can still see a map, and a collection of 'holy pictures' collected along the way- looking like the stars to guide the Penitent.
Well as I think the Papesse is Mary Magdalene at Vezelay who might be this Empress with her shell -as above so below- looking like Venus?
St Genevieve a pilgrimage stop in Paris, where the Saint held a bag on her lap, that within was a gold coin (by tradition)? Echoes of the stars/constellations spoken about by DianaOD in the Empress foundation thread.
Any one of the Marion sites like Rocamadour?
There is a fantastic book calledMedieval France: An encylopedia by William Westcott Kibler that talks about the Pilgrimages throughout Spain and France/Rome (pages 740 +741 are on the web)
Fascinating glimpses Kwaw!
~Rosanne

Milky Way

Yes, and if you look at the list of compass-point stars that I listed here (somewhere) , they are the path-markers for the Milky way - pretty much.

At least people supposed the milky way continued down to the south celestial pole.

I was trying to find images of the Empress Isabella of Castile and found that some people in history have mistakenly named Isabella of Arragon in images as of the Empress.
Now Isabella of Aragon-
She was named after her great-aunt St. Elisabeth of Hungary, but is known in Portuguese by "Isabel". She was a younger sister of Alfonso III of Aragon and James II of Aragon. She was also an older sister of Frederick III of Sicily.
Here is an image of her in a Portuguese stamp with her bag/purse.
http://homepage.mac.com/crowns/p/stisabel.gif
She is often depicted with a bag or her robes caught up like a bag filled with Roses or food for the sick. She is Saint Elizabeth-Elisheva- Isabella- Isis-bella. Her name Elizabeth was given in honour of the Mother of John the Baptist. She was called the 'Great Provider' and the 'Peacemaker'. Isabella of Castile mostly has a book on her lap- This Isabella has a bag mostly of her robes like an apron as I said earlier. This Elizabeth Isabella was on the pilgrimage trail and was canonised about 100 years after her death for miracles for the sick. Empress and Queen mixed up? ~Rosanne

Rosanne said:

I was trying to find images of the Empress Isabella of Castile and found that some people in history have mistakenly named Isabella of Arragon in images as of the Empress.
Now Isabella of Aragon-
She was named after her great-aunt St. Elisabeth of Hungary, but is known in Portuguese by "Isabel". She was a younger sister of Alfonso III of Aragon and James II of Aragon. She was also an older sister of Frederick III of Sicily.
Here is an image of her in a Portuguese stamp with her bag/purse.
http://homepage.mac.com/crowns/p/stisabel.gif
She is often depicted with a bag or her robes caught up like a bag filled with Roses or food for the sick. She is Saint Elizabeth-Elisheva- Isabella- Isis-bella. Her name Elizabeth was given in honour of the Mother of John the Baptist. She was called the 'Great Provider' and the 'Peacemaker'. Isabella of Castile mostly has a book on her lap- This Isabella has a bag mostly of her robes like an apron as I said earlier. This Elizabeth Isabella was on the pilgrimage trail and was canonised about 100 years after her death for miracles for the sick. Empress and Queen mixed up? ~Rosanne

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As usual good research & excellent observations & questions.

Mac22

If read in reformist terms it could be seen as referencing the iconoclastic didactics of Constantine V by reformers opposed to what amounts to the deification of the Virgin Mary:

"Theosterikos said the following about the iconoclast emperor Constantine V: "Taking in his hand a purse full of gold and showing it to all he asked. What is it worth? They replied that it had great value. He then emptied out the gold and asked, What is it worth now? They said, Nothing. So, said he, Mary (for the atheist would not call her Theotokos), while she carried Christ within was to be honoured, but after she was delivered she differed in no way from other women" (Vitae Nicetae, in Acta Sanct., Ap. I, app. 23; cited in Edward Martin, History, p. 62).

From note 154, p.10 of pdf here:
http://www.people.fas.harvard.edu/~mshell/Shell. Children. Chapter 4 Notes.pdf

Kwaw

Among the many epiteths of the Virgin Mary, Gate of Paradise, Queen of Heaven and Lady of the World was also that of Empress:

Quote:
They tell us, that " it is for the ornament of an earthly kingdom, that it should have both a king and a queen: and therefore when any king hath not a wife, his subjects often do request him to take one." Hereupon they say, that " the eternal King and omnipotent Emperor, minding to adorn the kingdom of heaven above, did frame this blessed virgin, to the end he might make her the lady and empress of his kingdom and empire; that the prophecy of David might be verified, saying unto her in the Psalm: Upon thy right hand did stand thy queen in clothing of gold." That "she is an empress, because she is the spouse of the eternal Emperor, of whom it is said: He that hath the bride is the bridegroom:" and that " when God did deliver unto her the empire of the world, and all the things contained therein, he said unto her that which we read in the first of the .AEneids: His ego nee roetas rerum nee tempora pono ; Imperium sine fine dedi." That she is" the empress also " of heaven and earth, because she did bear the heavenly emperor; and therefore that she can ask of him what she will and obtain it." That ' this was figured in the history of the kings, where the mother of Solomon said unto him: " I desire one petition of thee, do not confound my face: for then should he confound her face, if he did deny that which she requested ;" and that, " if in respect of her maternal jurisdiction she hath command of her Son, who was subject unto her: then much more hath she command over all the creatures that are subject to her Son." That this " mighty" God did (as far as he might) make his mother partner of his divine majesty and power: giving unto her of old the sovereignty both of celestial things and mortal: ordering at her pleasure, as the patronage of men did require, the earth, the seas, heaven, and nature ; at her liking, and by her, bestowing upon mortal men his divine treasures and heavenly gifts. So as all might understand, that whatsoever doth flow into the earth from that eternal and glorious fountain of good things, doth flow by MARY."

The Whole Works by James Usher, Charles Richard Elrington. Published 1625 (Whittaker) p.485

In which is also this quote of Bonaventura:
"O imperatrix et Domina nostra benignissima, jure matris impera tuo dilectissimo filio Domino nostro Jesu Christo, ut mentes nostras ab amore terrestrium
ad coelestia desideria erigere dignetur."

" O empress and our most kind lady, by the authority of a mother command thy most beloved Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, that he would vouchsafe to lift up our minds from the love of earthly things unto heavenly desires."

The concept of the mind being lifted up from the contemplation of earthly things to the heavenly is a commonplace convention of medieval christian symbolism. Another example of which we may find expressed "in the lines Abbot Suger had inscribed on the gilded west doors of the twelfth century abbey church of Saint Denis:

quote:
Whoever thou art, if thou seekest to extol the glory of these doors
Marvel not at the gold and the expense but at the craftsmanship of the work.
Bright is the noble work; but, being nobly bright, the work
Should brighten the minds, so that they may travel, through the true lights,
To the True Light where Christ is the true door.
In what manner it be inherent in this world the golden door defines:
The dull mind rises to truth through that which is material
And, in seeing this light, is resurrected from its former submersion.

End quote ~ Panofsky Abbot Suger, on the Abbery Church of St. Denis Princton, 1946; quoted in The elements of Christian Symbolism by John Baldock 1990.

In a 3x7 layout the empress is below the Star, and the scallop patterned ornament / pilgrim star / star in the chair, and the numeration III, also reminds me of the bowls in which three famous pilgrims, magi on the trail of a star, bore gifts as in this byzantine mosaic:



Patrons of Pilgrims and travellors in general they also represented the three ancient continents of the world, Europe, Asia and Africa, as denoted on the globe by the 'T'.

An image of the three magi is embroidered on the hem of the dress of the Empress Theodore in the famous Ravenna mosaic:



The portrayal of the three magi, bringing together here the elements of Empress, Pilgrims, Star, emphasises the theme of offering. Perhaps we could read the three wing like tips as the side of the scallop bowl as cross referenceing the three magi?

Kwaw
Some links on the Magi:

http://www.paradoxplace.com/Perspectives/Venice & N Italy/Ravenna/Ravenna 2004.htm

http://www.paradoxplace.com/Church_Stuff/Christian_Themes/The_Magi.htm

http://gallery.euroweb.hu/tours/gozzoli/2magi/frame23.html

Papesse/Mary/Church & the paps of the father

kwaw said:

"...the Milky Way was also known in southern Europe as 'la vie di San Jacopo' (the way to Santiago), and 'la strada di Roma' (the way to Rome), indicating an international convention of identifying the galactic course of the heavens with the familiar routes of religious pilgrimage on earth."

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"The associaton of Mary's milk with her powers of intercession and healing inspired an extraordinary quantity of relics in Europe. From the thirteenth century, phials in which her milk was preserved were venerated all over Christendom in shrines that attracted pilgrims by the thousand. Walsingham, Chartres, Genoa, Rome, Venice, Avignon, Padua, Aix-en-Provence, Toulon, Paris, Naples, all possessed the precious and efficacious substance...

"...Calvin gave the subject a withering paragraph in his Treatise on Relics: "There is no town so small, nor convent...so mean that it does not display some of the Virgin's milk....There is so much that if the holy Virgin had been a cow, or a wet nurse all her life she would have been hard to put to it to yield such a great quanitity." (Warner, p.200)

As mothers milk is life to the new born infant so water, wine...the blood of christ, is as the milk of spiritual eternal life of the second born in Christian mystical theology... and Jesus / God becomes Mother, as St. Bernard wrote:

"Suck not the wounds, but rather the breasts of the crucified. He shall be as a mother to you, and you as a son to him....So you, Lord God, are the great mother."

This conflation of gender in the stark somatic symbolism of medieval Christianity in which the father is the mother upon whose breasts we suck the milk/blood of eternal life brings to mind a pun Rosanne highlights elsewhere on a possible play between ‘Papesse’ and ‘Paps’. Pope is papa, father, the feminine suffix gives us papesse, female or feminine father...from whose 'pappe' (paps) is sucked the wine, blood, milk of spiritual life. Christ and Mary, father, mother, bride and bridegroom are all conflated in a complex of antithetical associations the paradoxical union of which can only be found in the eternal and infinite. As Mary is the breast or pappe on which Christ sucked human life so the church is the pappe from which the congregation of the faithful suck upon eternal life.

"Christ, my mother, you gather your chickens under your wings; this dead chicken of yours puts himself under your wings."

“With sweetness and much delight, from her sweet bosom she drew forth her breast, so soft and beautiful, and placed it in his mouth… Her milk is truly virginal, the nectar of spiritual life, through which death meets its defeat… "Dear sweet son", she said, "regard the breast, with which I nursed you well…" Hers is the milk of paradise, that sustains the Christian soul, and flows like streams into the mouths of sufferers in purgatory.” (Warner)

Let us embark on a journey of the heart, as pilgrims of love along the milky way.

Kwaw
Ref: see Marina Warner Alone of all her sex. Chapter on ‘The Milk of Paradise’.

Love is the astrolabe of God's Mysteries. (Rumi)

kwaw said:

Let us embark on a journey of the heart, as pilgrims of love along the milky way...

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On pilgrimmage as an imagined journey, with interesting notes also on medieval books of fate and the use of astrolabe like volvelle's in such, see for example 'Imagined Pilgrimage in the Maps of Mathew Paris':

http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1G1-58926046.html

Kwaw

Sounds wonderful

Sounds like a wonderful article.

Dont know why, but when I use the link, the page never gets past the logo-and-ad . Is it a site you have to join first?

PS Kwaw - don't worry about those engraved tablets I mentioned. They were in Tamil, and what's on them is not unexpected, so no fuss there.

kwaw said:

On pilgrimmage as an imagined journey, with interesting notes also on medieval books of fate and the use of astrolabe like volvelle's in such, see for example 'Imagined Pilgrimage in the Maps of Mathew Paris':

http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1G1-58926046.html

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The above link works for me but if you have a problem with it try also:

http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0422/is_4_81/ai_58926046

If you have JSTOR access it is also available through their gateway:

http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0004-3079(199912)81:4<598:IPITIM>2.0.CO;2-0

If there are still problems I can only suggest try a google search ~ the full name of the article is ‘‘Imagined Pilgrimage in the Itinerary Maps of Matthew Paris,’’ by Daniel Connolly.

Kwaw