Figure of a female saint holding a girdle book, perhaps Saint Barbara
circle of Jan Borman I (Brussels c.1440 - c.1502/1503)
Category
Art / Sculpture
Date
c. 1500 - 1510
Materials
Oak
Measurements
570 mm (H)200 mm (W)165 mm (D)
Place of origin
Brussels
Order this imageCollection
Oxburgh Hall, Norfolk
NT 1209724
Summary
Sculpture, oak; Figure of a female saint holding a girdle book; circle of Jan Borman I (c. 1440-c. 1502/03), Brussels, Belgium, c.. 1500-1510. One of a pair of small oakwood statues of female saints at Oxburgh Hall, probably acquired in the Low Countries (modern Belgium) by Sir Henry Paston-Bedingfeld, 6th Baronet (1800-1862) and his wife Margaret (1808-1887), who lived in Brussels and Bruges for much of the 1830s. The two figures were placed on top of staircase posts as part of the renovations of Oxburgh Hall commissioned by Sir Henry, intended to create interiors that were closer to the house’s original medieval aspect. Since it has lost its attributes, it is not possible now to know which saint this figure was intended to represent. However, the figure includes a rare depiction of a girdle book, books of devotion designed with special covers so they could be hung from a person’s girdle or belt, but easily lifted for reading from.
Full description
An oak figure of a standing female saint. She is dressed in a long dress with a finely decorated belt at her waist, and a large cloak, one end of which the woman gathers up with her left hand, whilst in her right hand she holds a girdle book. She wears on her head a turban, held in place by means of a ribbon around the top of the head and passing under the saint’s chin. Her hair is fashioned at the front into two long braided plaits that descend on either side of the saint’s head. On the back are the remains of two nail holes. A pair to NT 1209723. The sculpture is now mounted on a modern wooden base, and has suffered some damage, including towards the bottom, where there is worm damage towards the front, and further damage on the proper right side, in particular some sections lost from the base. There is evidence at the neck that the head may have been sawn off and put back. There are some large splits in the top of the head, which have been partly filled with inserts, now loose. Modern section of wood at lower right. The saint’s left hand is a crude modern replacement. It is no longer possible to identify the female saint represented in this beautiful figure since her left hand, which may have held an attribute, has been lost and replaced with a crudely carved later hand. She may though have been a representation of Saint Barbara, one of the most popular female saints in northern Europe, whose attribute is a tower. Richly dressed, she holds a girdle book in her right hand. Girdle books were used both by men and by women. They were books with a leather binding that continued loose below the cover of the book, gradually tapering but then expanding at the end into a knot, used to tuck into one’s belt or girdle. The knot was generally made from strips of leather woven together. When worn, the book hung upside down from the girdle, so that it could be picked up and brought upwards, allowing it to be read by its owner. Sometimes the leather formed a kind of wrapper protecting the book from the elements, which seems to be the type seen in this statue. The two figures were at Oxburgh Hall by the 1850s, when one of them featured in a watercolour by Matilda Paston-Bedingfeld of the passage to the King’s Room, standing atop a newel post of the staircase (Wainwright 1993, fig. 7). Both figures were photographed in the same position for an article in Country Life published in 1929 (Tipping 1929). The sculptures were almost certainly acquired by Sir Henry Paston-Bedingfeld, 6th Baronet (1800-1862) who had spent part of his childhood in Belgium, to where his parents had for economic reasons moved after Waterloo, taking the château of Lovendighem near Ghent. Henry Paston-Bedingfeld became a passionate advocate of the medieval revival in Britain. Determined to restore the original spirit of Oxburgh Hall and greatly assisted by the fortune that his wife Margaret brought to the marriage, he employed the architect John Chessell Buckler (1793-1894) to carry out extensive works both outside and inside the house. It was at this time that much old woodwork was incorporated together with more modern elements to create antiquarian rooms such as the Library. Sir Henry and his wife Margaret frequently visited the Continent during the 1830s, mainly the Low Countries and Germany, as we know from Margaret Paston-Bedingfeld’s diary covering the years 1829-1839, recently rediscovered and generously donated to the National Trust for Oxburgh Hall (NT 1211847). In November 1836, she wrote at the end of a long stay in Brussels that ‘Our only amusement at Brussells was visiting the antiquarian shops.’ The couple then took a house in Bruges until their return to England early in 1838. Margaret wrote of the months in Bruges that ‘Here then we began to lead the life of hermits in good earnest, devoting all our money to making purchases for Oxburgh. We were fortunate enough to find a beautiful altar &c for our new Chapel (which Henry arranged out of a Chapelle Gothique) & several other pieces of carving, Cabinets &c. Pere Augustine, the Superior of the Carmes, presented us with various things, amongst others, a well carved Madonna &c in oak.’ So the two figures might have been well bought or presented to the Bedingfelds in the 1830s in the Low Countries, although it is known that Sir Henry continued to buy works of art to embellish the house as did, on a lesser scale, his son and heir the 7th Baronet, also Sir Henry (1830-1902). The two figures were certainly made in Brussels, one of the principal centres for painting and sculpture in the Southern Netherlands. They may originally have formed part of a series of figures of saints, perhaps designed to stand atop wall columns in some chapel or church. The style and the women’s costume would suggest a dating around 1500-1510. The figures are very close in style - the angular deeply-cared drapery, the faces, with their almond-shaped eyes with heavy, half-closed lids, delicate noses and small pursed mouths – to sculptures made in the workshop of Jan Borman I (c. 1440-c. 1502/03), the founder of an extensive and celebrated dynasty of sculptors that included his son Jan Borman II (c. 1460-c. 1520) and continued into the late sixteenth century, working in Leuven (Louvain), Brussels and Antwerp (for the Borman, see recently Debaene 2019). The Saint George Altarpiece , made c. 1490-93 by Jan II and possibly also Jan I, in the Art and History Museum in Brussels, is regarded as one of the great masterpieces of Flemish late Gothic carving and of sculpture in wood in general. The Oxburgh Hall figures are especially close to two oak statues of Mary Magdalene, both attributed to Jan Borman I and dated c. 1480-90. The first is in the Art and History Museum in Brussels (Inv. 2992; Huysmans 2000, pp. 102-03, no. 40; Debaene 2019, p. 188, no. 219) the second in the Musée de Cluny in Paris (Inv. Cl. 1851; Debaene 2019, p. 199, no. 53). The faces, pose and handling of the draperies are all very similar, whilst the turban headdress and long plaits of the Brussels Mary Magdalene are replicated in the figure holding a girdle book. Some elements of the carving are of excellent quality but further research is needed to assess whether the two figures could be products of the Borman workshop. On balance, it is more probable that they were made by another workshop in the circle of the Borman, whose works were highly influential. Jeremy Warren February 2025
Provenance
Probably bought by Sir Henry Paston-Bedngfeld, 6th Baronet (1800-1862), and by descent. Part of the Bedingfeld Collection.
Makers and roles
circle of Jan Borman I (Brussels c.1440 - c.1502/1503), sculptor Flemish School, sculptor
References
Tipping 1929: H Avray Tipping, ‘Country Homes Gardens Old & New. Oxburgh Hall – Norfolk’, Country Life, 10 & 17 August 1929, pp. 194-202 & 224-232, p. 228, fig. 9. Wainwright 1993: Clive Wainwright, “Oxburgh Hall, Norfolk. II.” Country Life 16 December 1993, pp.48-51, p. 51, fig. 7. Woods 2007: Kim Woods, Imported Images: Netherlandish Late Gothic Sculpture in England c.1400-c.1550, Donington, 2007, pp. 462-64, no. 87, Pl. 202. Huysmans 2000: Antoinette Huysmans, ed.: La sculpture des Pays-Bas méridionaux et de la Principauté de Liège. Xve et XVIe siècles, Brussels 2000 Debaene 2019: Marjan Debaene, ed., Borman. A Family of Northern Renaissance Sculptors, London/Turnhout 2019