The Dyrham Triptych (The Nativity by Night with Shepherds, The Adoration of the Magi and The Flight into Egypt)
attributed to Jan Mertens van Dornicke (c.1470 - c.1527)
Category
Art / Oil paintings
Date
circa 1530
Materials
Oil on panel
Measurements
1180 x 1710 mm
Place of origin
Antwerp
Order this imageCollection
Dyrham, Gloucestershire
NT 453820
Summary
Oil painting on panel, The Dyrham Triptych, The Adoration of the Magi in the centre, with The Nativity by Night with Shepherds on the left wing, and The Flight into Egypt on the right wing, attributed to Jan van Doornik (active 1474-1511), circa 1530. See also NT 732308 at Stourhead. In the Adoration of the Magi, the Virgin, under a cloth of state, as the Queen of Heaven, sits on the left with the Christ Child in her lap, who extends his right arm to bless the kneeling Caspar in the centre. Behind him stands Balthasar, with a solider in armour behind him, and, further back, Melchior, who raises his hat in the air. Further back still, on the right, a rather rustic Joseph touches his cap as a mark of respect. The foreground architecture is more like that of a Renaissance palace than a stable; through a wide doorway at the back a half-ruined castle, houses, and a mountain, are seen. In the semi-nocturnal Nativity, two kneeling angels join with the Virgin and St Joseph in adoring the Christ Child, and a third does so in the air above. Underneath him on the right are two diminutive shepherds, whilst the head of an ox, and just the ears of an ass, can be seen on the left-hand side of a pillar supporting a pair of arches. In the Flight into Egypt a be-hatted St Joseph stands on the far side of the Virgin and Child advancing to the right on the ass. In the middle ground, a brazen statue on a tapering column resting upon a sphere, has lost its upper half.
Provenance
Recorded at Dyrham Park since at least 1710; Indigenous purchased by the Ministry of Works in 1956 and given to Dyrham Park in 1961
Credit line
Dyrham Park, The Blathwayt Collection (acquired by the Ministry of Works via the National Land Fund in 1956, and transferred to the National Trust)
Makers and roles
attributed to Jan Mertens van Dornicke (c.1470 - c.1527), artist previously catalogued as attributed to Flemish School, artist previously catalogued as by Jan Gossaert (c.1472 - 1532), artist
References
Grössinger 1992 Christa Grössinger, North European Panel Paintings: A Catalogue of Netherlandish and German Paintings before 1600 in English Churches and Colleges, London 1992, no.25, pp.106–7, fig.79