The Virgin in the Garden, or Why Flowers Make Better Prayers
2004; Johns Hopkins University Press; Volume: 4; Issue: 1 Linguagem: Inglês
10.1353/scs.2004.0008
ISSN1535-3117
Autores Tópico(s)Medieval Literature and History
ResumoFlowers are some of the most familiar and best-loved symbols of the Virgin Mary. While it may take some effort to see the Virgin in such architectural images as the Ark of the Covenant, the Tower of David or the Temple of Solomon, not to mention such Old Testament typologies as Moses' Burning Bush, Gideon's Fleece, the Closed Door of Ezekiel, or Daniel's Mountain "cut without hands," the rose, the lily, and the violet need little introduction.1 As one twelfth-century preacher put it: "These are [the flowers] with whose sweet perfume you filled the house of God, O Mary: the violet of humility, the lily of chastity, and the rose of love."2 In their beauty and simplicity, the flowers signify Mary's virtues, her virginity, fertility, purity and piety. They may also, however, signify Mary herself. She is the mystic rose (rosa mistica) of the Loretan litany, the lily among thorns (lilium inter spinas) of the Song of Songs (Song 2:2). She is the rose "of swych vertu" because it was she—in the words of one of the most beautiful late medieval carols—"that bare Jesu."3
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