St Giles

Entry

As his legend tells, St Giles (Aegidius) lived at the close of the seventh century as a hermit in the woods near Nîmes, where he survived by drinking the milk of a hind. During a hunting party, Wamba, King of the Visigoths attempts to shoot the deer with an arrow. Instead of hitting the deer, however, he unintentionally wounds the hermit with whom the animal had sought refuge. As penitence, the king founded a Benedictine abbey at the mouth of the Rhône River, where Giles was named abbot. Here the saint is portrayed attired and shorn as a Benedictine monk. At his feet stands the doe in memory of the monk’s legendary act. She gazes up at him, while laying her front left leg against his leg. The arrow wound in Giles’s chest is visible through his habit. In his now missing right hand, he would have held the arrow, as corroborated by the turning of the head in that direction. He holds a folio book clamped between his left arm and upper body, at the same time pinching the skirt of his habit and resulting in a flowing rightward sweep of the folds across his chest and abdomen. The characteristic face and the exquisitely finished play of the drapery – particularly the right sleeve of his habit – point to a distinctive woodcarver. Nevertheless, his identity remains enigmatic. Stylistically, the present St Giles displays an affinity to carved works produced in the Lower Rhine region, with the drapery folds, mannerist pose and positioning of the fingers indicating a dating of circa 1530-40.

In the past, this saintly figure was dated either at the start of the sixteenth century or around 1525, and ascribed to various regions – including the Northern Netherlands,¹ the Lower Rhine region,² Guelders,³ and the Southern Netherlands – without argumentation.⁴ Ostensibly the most tenable attribution is the Southern Netherlands, given St Giles’s tremendous popularity in that region. However, this is contradicted by the figure’s style, as it shows no agreement with Southern Netherlandish woodcarving. Elements such as the dynamic and effusive folds of the drapery, the fleshy facial type, high cheekbones, square jawline and prominent, jutting chin are all characteristics similar to those found on sculptural works produced in the Lower Rhine region. Examples of the same facial type are found in the oeuvres of woodcarvers such as Master Arnt of Kalkar (active c. 1460-d. 1492),⁵ Henrik Douverman (c. 1490-1543/44. cf. BK-NM-11537) and Arnt van Tricht (active c. 1530-d. 1570).⁶ For the ‘fluttering’ drapery folds on Giles’s right sleeve, parallels can be discerned in a number of works by Arnt van Tricht, including a Visitation of circa 1530 preserved in the Kolumba Museum in Cologne, a St Barbara from circa 1530 in the Sankt-Antonius Abbaskirche in Hanselaer, and a St Christopher in the Pfarrkirche Sankt-Peter und Paul in Kranenburg.⁷ Additionally, the mannerist positioning of the fingers on Giles’s left hand are reminiscent of Douverman’s Enthroned Virgin from circa 1540 in Musée Cluny in Paris.⁸ Lastly, the ground on which the saint stands, composed of clumps of earth from which small, flat stones emerge, provides another strong argument for a Lower Rhenish origin. The manner in which the bottom section of the base is carved can be described as a technical distinction, which, as far as can be ascertained, occurs only with figures by Henrik Douverman and other woodcarvers from his circle.⁹

There are no indications that St Giles enjoyed any kind of special veneration in the Lower Rhine region, but this in itself by no means precludes a localization of the sculpture in this region. As one of the Fourteen Holy Helpers, he is certain to have enjoyed ample renown.

Bieke van der Mark, 2024