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195. Embroidery with a Church Procession

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195. Embroidery with a Church Procession your humble servant, the prince john Stephan, 195. Embroidery with a Church was the daughter of Prince Stephan of voivod, by God's will lord of Moldavia, and protect Procession Moldavia. Her major political rival was Ivan him in this life and in the future, by the prayers of III's wife, Grand Princess Sophia Palaiologina, the people who honor you, as we glorify you forever, Moscow, Grand Prince's workshops, 1498 a descendant of the Byzantine imperial fam­ amen. This was made in 7008 [1500], the forty-third Taffeta and damask, embroidered with gold and sil­ ily. Dmitrii, crowned coruler on February 4, year of his reign.) verthreads PROVENANCE: Donated by Stephan the Great, 1498, is shown in the embroidery in the pose 93·5 x 98.5 em (363/4 x 38% in.) prince of Moldavia (r. 1457-1504), to the Monastery of one who is about to take communion, INSCRIBED: In Slavonic, ... [MH]XaHJI'b, ... of Zographou, Mount Athos. while the losing party, Sophia Palaiologina, r(a)BpH(H)JI'b (Michael, Gabriel) Muzei National de lstorie a Romaruei, Bucharest appears in the front row (she has a tablion on PROVENANCE: Collection of M. M. Zaitsevskii; her chest). The triumph of Princess Helena collection of P. I. Shchuk.in; entered the State and her son Dmitrii proved short-lived since On this handsome embroidered standard Historical Museum in 1905-11. just a year later, in 1499, they were deprived of Saint George is presented seated on a throne, CoNDITION: There are minor losses of thread in the his feet resting on the crushed body of a ornament and clothing and abrasions of thread on their princely titles. Because the embroidery three-headed dragon with green wings. The the faces. In a 1925 restoration the original lining was glorifies Dmitrii, it must have been commis­ saint is attired in a gray military tunic over a replaced with dark red damask. sioned by Princess Helena (who, owing to her long-sleeved green shirt and sandals with the State Historical Museum, Department of Textiles Moldavian origins, was known in Russia as straps crossed up his legs. His oval face is and Costume, Moscow (15455shch/R.B.-5) Helena "the Vlach"). According to framed by curly hair, and on his head sits a Shchepkina, the bold ornament, unusual crown with nine fleurons adorned with pre­ The multifigural scene in the central field color scheme, and embroidery technique cious stones. The crown is supported by two shows a procession of secular rulers, clergy, betray a Moldavian influence. angels; the one on the left also carries a and other worshipers with an icon of the The embroidery was thus interpreted as a sword, the one on the right, a shield. Saint Vrrgin Hodegetria. The icon is attached to a kind of secular image, comprising portraits of George holds before him the sword with long pole, which is supported on the bearer's known historical figures. Shchepkina also which he killed the dragon, his right hand on chest by two intersecting belts. The wor­ emphasized the Byzantine influence present its hilt and his left near the point. The inscrip­ shipers fall into two symmetrical groups. in it. For instance, the Hodegetria icon carried tion around the border dates the standard to Representatives of the laity can be seen on in the procession was one that the painter the half century after the fall of Constanti­ the left, including the princely court, along Dionysius (ca. 1440-after 1503) had made nople and describes it as a gift of the Moldavian with men and women in elaborate headgear for the Moscow Kremlin Cathedral of the prince Stephan the Great. Zographou was one and long garments typical of early Russia. Resurrection, using the fire-damaged board of the major monasteries at Mount Athos. On the right are the clergy, including four of an older icon brought to Moscow from The image of the victorious Saint George is polystauria-clad bishops. Of these, the first Constantinople, and that copied an original particularly appropriate for such a donation, one on the left has a halo and is probably that was widely venerated throughout since the saint was the patron of the a metropolitan. Among the figures in the Christendom. In particular, Shchepkina noted monastery and the donor an outstanding mil­ front row are church singers in pointed hats, the peculiar way in which the icon is carried. itary ruler of independent Moldavia. monks, and a bearded man dressed in a short According to a 1350 account by Stefan of outlandish tunic. At the top, left and right, Novgorod, it was carried in the same manner AP are two parasols, held above the heads of the in Constantinople, where special servants prince and the metropolitan. Young willow would take it out for veneration every branches complete the ornamentation of this Tuesday. The pole with the icon would be REFERENCES: Nicholascu 1938; Berza 1958, pp. 302-3, section. attached to the chest, and the bearer would fig. 211; Dr~t 1982, p. 201; Musicescu and Dobjan­ The careful representation of numerous spread his arms as on a cross. schi 1982, p. 201; A. P~unescu in Trieste 1999-2000, pp. 54-55, no. 62. details, of clothing and vestments, headgear, This secular interpretation remained headdresses, and liturgical objects, as well as unchallenged2 until 1981, when Andre Grabar the gestures and arrangement of the figures, proposed a liturgical one. He analyzed the has provided fruitful ground for interpreta­ image within the framework of Byzantine tion of the scene. Marfa Shchepkina, who tradition, suggesting that it is based on provided the first detailed description of the the Akathistos Hymn to the Vrrgin (cat. 172) embroidery, concluded that it represented and showed the traditional Tuesday proces­ the power struggle between two court parties sion with the miracle-working icon in during the reign of Grand Prince Ivan III of Constantinople. Grabar cited eyewimess Moscow. 1 According to her, the scene depicts accounts of Stefan of Novgorod and of the Palm Sunday celebration in the Moscow the Spaniard Clavijo (1437-38), both of Kremlin on April 8, 1498. The laity group whom attended such a ceremony.3 includes three crowned men. The white­ More recently, Nataliia Maiasova has bearded, halo-bearing one is Grand Prince written that "just as in medieval art and espe­ Ivan III (1440-1505), the young one with a cially pictorial embroidery in general, so in crown but no halo is his son Basil (1479-1533), this particular embroidery, as well, iconogra­ and next to them, with arms crossed upon the phy reflecting the religious and sociopolitical chest, is Ivan III's young grandson Dmitrii climate of the period was combined with a Ivanovich (1483-1509). Dmitrii's mother, personal iconography reflecting the ambitions Helena Stephanova, Ivan III's daughter-in-law, of the work's patron (the image illustrates the 322 BYZANTIUM: FAITH AND POWER .
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