Margaret of Cortona and the Lorenzetti: Sienese Art and the Cult of a Holy Woman in Medieval Tuscany (review)

Abstract

186 Reviews instrumentality of publishers in this change, or the novelty of Restoration class anxiety. Sasha Roberts attributes the successively chastened text of Shakespeare's Lucrece to an increasingly polite society's anxiety about growing libertinism and sexuality in general, but since this was the England of the early Stuarts rather than the early Hanoverians this is hard to accept, particularly since she does not explain h o w this all fits with an increasing concern for the integrity of an author's oeuvre. Paulina Kewes seems unwitting that by emphasising the discontinuity between the literary theatrical canon and popular taste she undermines the assumptions of most of her fellow contributors, but this important point is undeveloped. Nor does Paul H a m m o n d prove the existence of the homosexual scandals which allegedly required the textual redefinition of Shakespeare's ambiguous erotic imagination, beyond an arch reading of convenient texts without reference to their contemporary resonances. W h e n forced to view one's neighbours' holiday slides the tedium is sometimes alleviated by moments of recognition, but Early Modern England is almost unrecognisable in this volume. Glyn Parry Department ofHistory Victoria University of Wellingto Cannon, Joanna, and Andre Vauchez, Margaret of Cortona and the Lorenzetti: Sienese Art and the Cult ofa Holy Woman in Medieval Tusc University Park, Pennsylvania State University Press, 1999; cloth; pp. xiv, 275; 3 maps, 26 colour plates, 204 b / w illustrations; R.R.P. US$80.00; ISBN 0271017562. Margherita of Cortona (c. 1247-1297) was regarded by her followers as type of Magdalene, an unmarried mother w h o repented of her immoral ways and retired to a cell to devote the remainder of her life to Christ, whereupon she lived a life of prayer and austerity, serving as a model of lay sanctity to the rest of Cortona, and performing charitable acts. She belonged to the Order of Penitence, which was brought under closer control by the Franciscans in 1289 as the Third Order. In the same way as St Francis was founder and light of the First Order and St Clare Reviews 187 was founder of the Second, female Order, there was agitation after her death for Margherita to be recognised as the light of the largely lay Third Order, but this role was given to St Elizabeth of Hungary. In Cortona she was regarded as a saint. The Legenda compiled by her confessor detailed, in one version, her various miracles. A church was erected in her honour and decorated with murals depicting her deeds. However it would take until 1728 for her official canonisation. Cannon and Vauchez attribute this delay at least in part to conflicting claims on her memory. The Franciscans played up her devotion to Christ. The Commune instead used her as a symbol of Ghibelline independence from Arezzo and the control of the Pope. The mural cycle which might illustrate these latter views was reproduced as a series of watercolours to support the canonisation process in c. 1629, then whitewashed over, and later destroyed. From the watercolours and other fragmentary evidence, Cannon and Vauchez attempt to reconstruct the details of the interior decoration of the Church of St Margherita, and compare the visual to the written evidence. Remarkably, to a considerable degree, they succeed. There is conjecture in their findings, but it is based on painstaking detail and referencing. The attribution of the missing mural cycle is contentious. Vasari mentioned Ambrogio Lorenzetti. The authors report that Vasari thought Pietro Lorenzetti's surname was Laurati, and he was unaware that Pietro was Ambrogio's brother, so he would have taken any reference to a Lorenzetti to refer only to Ambrogio. While they are cautiously equivocal, i t is clear that Cannon and Vauchez lean toward the notion that both brothers took part in the painting. Elsewhere, the authors make tantalising reference to civic religion and the dependence of the Third Order on the C o m m u n e . If Ambrogio was indeed involved in the mural cycle which supposedly illustrates these values, fuller iconological comparison with his masterpiece of civic propaganda, the Buongoverno, would be fruitful. Max Staples School ofHumanities and Social Sciences...