Rome

As detailed in the previous installment, the probable originator of the Inmaculada Romana was the Roman painter Carlo Maratta as the earliest depictions were painted by either him or his students. It was definitely a favorite of his, also being employed as an element in other commissions. Various Roman artists were inspired to imitate his style, leading to its popularization.

North of Rome

Upon entering Western Europe the Germans take up the mantle of furthering this subject, with some help later on by the French. The skilled engraver Johann Baptist Klauber in his Litaniæ Lauretanæ ad Beatæ Virginis (“Litany of Loreto to the Blessed Virgin”) utilizes the Inmaculada Romana in his plate for Mater Intemerata (“Mother Undefiled”), coupling it with the following verse from Scripture:

Portæ inferi non prævalebunt adversus eam.

The gates of hell shall not prevail against it.—Matthew xvi. 18.

East of Rome

Paintings in Eastern Europe pay a heavy homage to the Maratta originals, while its sculptures and icons demonstrate a Flemish influence (to be detailed later).

England

Here is as good a place as any to showcase two unexpected finds across the English Channel. The first statue is housed in the SSPX Church of Saints Peter & Paul in Liverpool, and the second statue is at the Anglican Parish of All Saints’ in Benhilton. As there is no further information nor native examples, these appear to be recent transplants from the Mainland.

Spain

The Hispanic take on this subject, promoted by Franciscans at home and abroad, was characteristically more experimental and gave rise to the additional title of Inmaculada Franciscana. In Spanish art we are more likely to see unconventional attributes like angels spearing the serpent and callbacks to the Tota Pulchra subject, where the Immaculate Conception had its start.

West of Spain

In the New World, creative freedom flourished as artists took examples from Europe more as springboards than as templates. The American approach seemed to have an aversion to “whitespace,” opting for as much symbolic ornamentality as could be fit into a work.

East of Spain

In Brussels, Belgium, the former capital of the Spanish Netherlands, the Cathedral of St. Michael and St. Gudula houses a Baroque pulpit of unparalleled craftmanship, the Chaire de Vérité, the Pulpit of Truth sculpted out of oak by Hendrik Franz Verbruggen.

Arresting from first glance, the viewer’s eyes are directed straightaway from the detailed scene of the Expulsion from Eden at the base of the pulpit to its canopy where the beginning of our Redemption is wrought. In this superb scene, the majestic figures of Our Lord and Our Lady atop both the hideous Enemy and a crescent moon forcefully thrust the tip of a golden cross through the Dragon’s ineffectual jaws.

If it can be believed, this whole series of articles started as a way to find the proper title for what is on top of Verbruggen’s pulpit. After having said so much to this point, the image speaks for itself. What we are seeing is nothing more and nothing less than the Immaculate Conception, being also the paragon of the Inmaculada Franciscana.

It is fitting to end this journey in the Flemish region as it seems to have become over time the headquarters of this artistic movement. Not only is it centrally located relative to the other countries discussed in this post:

• North of Rome, Germany and France

• South of England

• West of Slovenia and Belarus

• East of Spain, Mexico and Peru

the fact also remains that Flanders had been a cultural hub since the Renaissance era. As it was a veritable melting pot of languages and art forms, barriers were low for assimilating artistic traditions from various European sources. Notwithstanding periods of political and religious upheaval, especially in the late 17th century, the subject of the Inmaculada Franciscana was able to thrive here and be communicated worldwide. A prime example of this is the print below by the Flemish engraver Peter Balthasar Bouttats, which was adapted into the Belarusian icons and Cuzco paintings we saw above.

The style persisted well into the 19th century, as can be attested to by this trio of Belgian statues.

At this juncture I am tempted to say that the two statues presented in the England section above are also Flemish productions, but it suffices to leave some mysteries unsolved and simply enjoy this gallery as a whole, appreciating the pains that artists across space and time have taken to beautifully depict this unique genre of the Immaculate Conception.

In the sub-chapter titled “Inmaculada Romana o Franciscana,”1 Héctor H. Schenone presents the following defining paragraph:

The Spanish were not fond of this style, and the mosaic sent from Italy to the Toledo Cathedral—a replica of Carlo Maratta’s painting—gained little popularity, as it was rarely reproduced in paintings and engravings, and even less so by sculptors. This type is known as the “Inmaculada Romana” [“Roman Immaculate”] because it originated and spread from works created in the Eternal City; and in Spain, as the “Inmaculada franciscana” [“Franciscan Immaculate”], perhaps because it appears on the medal that the Conceptionist nuns wore and still wear over their habits.

This passage acted as both a missing link and secret decoder ring to my research, as now I had a focal point from which to characterize the variations I found of this peculiar artistic subject in which Our Lady as the Immaculate Conception and Our Lord as the Divine Child defeat the Serpent with the spear tip of the Resurrection standard. In this article I will focus on the original Inmaculadas hailing from Rome and how the Hispanic and Franciscan artists outside of the Sevillian School made it their own.

Inmaculada Romana

By far the most popular, and likely the earliest, examples of this unique take on the Immaculate Conception were painted by Italian artist Carlo Maratta. At least three variations can be tied to him, all painted around 1660–1665. Of the one that served as the basis for the mosaic in the Toledo Cathedral, Wikipedia says:

In the early 1660s he worked on the decoration of the Cappella de’ Sylva in the Roman church of Sant'Isidoro, a project directed by Bernini; Maratti contributed the oval canvas of the Immaculate Conception over the main altar. This picture shows the Virgin with the Christ Child in her arms, helping her to kill the serpent of heresy; it became widely known through copies and engravings, and its iconography was immensely influential.

Copies and engravings of these were indeed plentiful in continental Europe. The Swiss Johann Jakob Frey the Elder, a student of Maratta, and the Parisian Étienne Picart, often called “Le Romain,” were two prolific engravers among many who helped to popularize this style in portable woodcuts.

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Inmaculada Franciscana

A la religión sagrada
de San Francisco debemos
que en alta voz os cantemos
el blasón de Inmaculada.

Pues veros así ensalzada
es su gloria principal;
sois concebida, María,
sin pecado original.

It is thanks to the sacred religion
of Saint Francis
that we sing aloud to you
the praises of the Immaculate.

For to see you thus exalted
is his greatest glory;
you were conceived, Mary,
without original sin.

—Traditional Franciscan hymn, translated using DeepL

The above image comes from the cover of a rosary devotional compiled by the SSPX Sisters, whose Our Lady of Fatima Correspondence Catechism my family uses for homeschool religious education. In searching for this image on the Internet I landed on a French translation of a Spanish article by the Franciscans of Valencia which served as my introduction to the phrase Inmaculada franciscana, helping to classify paintings of the Tota Pulchra or Immaculate Conception with the simple addition of the Serpent pierced by a spear.

When this motif is incorporated into allegories, the intensity is notched up considerably. In his article “‘Virgo Potens’. La Inmaculada Concepción o los imaginarios del mundo hispánico,”2 Jaime Cuadriello writes:

From that time on, some kingdoms hastened to stamp their coats of arms on the pedestals or the outlines of the images of the Immaculate Conception, in order to visually and legally recognize this de jure status, solemnized both collectively and individually by each one. The Virgin responded, as protector, to this offering, henceforth forming an indissoluble whole adorned with heraldry and insignia. Also during those years, it was customary to accompany the Virgin with the territorial and political personifications of the monarchy, on her flanks or at the base, forming an eminently political and unifying allegory. For example, the image signed by Juan Miranda y Cejas in 1778, in the parish church of Nuestra Señora de la Concepción in Tenerife [Alegoría de la Inmaculada con el Niño y España], stands out not only for the combative spirit of the Virgin in her identity as an apocalyptic woman but also for the grateful personification of Spain, seated on the leo fortis and embracing her coat of arms. This matron, with her hand in the jure in pectore gesture, sees herself protected by the mantle of a Virgin who gazes intently at the viewer. The action of the Inmaculada “franciscana” draws attention: spear in hand, she annihilates the beast while the Child restrains it, thus fulfilling her role as the conqueror or the alpha and omega of revealed scripture. What is most notable is that she is dressed in the Conceptionist monastic habit and that the figure of Spain is depicted under her protection beneath this mantle-scapular, following the decrees issued by Pope Clement XIII. It is an iconographic variant closely linked to the Franciscan tradition and in accordance with the visions of the founder, Beatriz de Silva, depicting her holding the Child in her arms (and also subduing the beast) to emphasize her salvific role as Mother of the Incarnate Word and her triumph as Queen of the Universe.

The reader may have noticed the multiple references to the Conceptionist order with regards to this depiction of the Immaculate Conception. It bears recalling the words of Francisco Pacheco from the first article about the order’s foundress, Saint Beatriz de Silva:

She [Our Lady] must be painted wearing a white tunic and blue cloak, as she appeared to Doña Beatriz de Silva, a Portuguese woman who later retired to Santo Domingo el Real in Toledo to found the Order of the Immaculate Conception, which was confirmed by Pope Julius II in 1511.

These visions are further described in the article “La Inmaculada Concepción con el Niño Jesús y España. Simbología, fuentes literarias e iconográficas de un lienzo de Juan de Miranda (1723-1805),”3 wherein José Cesáreo López Plasencia writes:

As for Beatriz de Silva (Campo Maior, Portugal, 1437 – Toledo, 1492), it should be noted that she was the founder of the Conceptionist Order, approved by Innocent VIII through the papal bull Inter Universa (1489), thereby fulfilling the wishes of the Virgin Mary, who appeared to her in 1450 with the Child on three occasions, while Beatriz was confined in a chest in the castle of Tordesillas (Valladolid), by order of Queen Isabella. The Virgin Mary, in these three apparitions, always wore a blue and white habit, and for this reason the laity began to wear pieces of blue cloth bearing the image of the Immaculate Virgin. This is how the sky-blue scapular of the Immaculate Conception came into being, its use and benefits later spreading thanks to the work of the Venerable Mother Ursula Benincasa (Naples, 1547–1618), who founded the Congregation of the Theatine Sisters of the Immaculate Conception of Mary in 1583.

While Our Lady appearing to Saint Beatriz is not contested, that she appeared spearing the Serpent is very likely an anachronism.4 This privilege was instead reserved for one of her spiritual daughters, Mariana de Jesús Torres, who is better known for having witnessed the apparitions of Our Lady of the Good Event. Dr. Franco Adessa recounts in his article “Our Lady of Good Success”5 that in 1576 during a tempest while sailing to Quito, Ecuador, with her aunt Mother Maria de Jesus Taboada to found the first Conceptionist convent in the New World, the two experienced the following:

Then both Mother Maria and Mariana beheld a vision. From out of the ocean, a monstrous serpent with seven heads arose, stirring up the waters of the sea, and attempting to destroy and sink their ship.

Mariana fainted. However Mother Maria continued her entreaties to Heaven and upon completion of her prayer, suddenly, the light of the day made a breach in the darkness and the tempest calmed down. God had answer[ed] her prayer.

When Mariana woke up, she told her aunt that she has seen a serpent larger than the sea and then a Lady of incomparable beauty appeared “clothed in the sun, crowned with stars, carrying a beautiful Child in her arms” and over her heart a monstrance of the Blessed Sacrament. In her hand she carried a large cross of gold, which had a sharp lance at its end. The Lady, with the help of the Blessed Sacrament and the hand of the Child, struck the head of the serpent with the end of this cross so forcefully that the serpent was slashed to pieces.

Two years later, Mother Maria ordered to strike a cloth medallion showing the scene of Mariana’s vision, and since that time the Conceptionists wear it on the breast of their habit.

One might be tempted to ask whether Sister Mariana’s vision or Carlo Maratta’s painting served as the primary source of inspiration for Baroque artists approaching this subject. It would be better to admit, in my opinion, that both streams of inspiration were happily married in the Portuguese and Spanish-Franciscan art that has survived from the 17th century onwards.

How this motif was diffused into other countries will be the subject of the next post in this series. To close out this installment and to demonstrate that this traditional depiction of Our Lady is alive and well in our day, attention should be given to the altarpiece by Raúl Berzosa. The words of his contemporary Giovanni Gasparro ring true for his and all these depictions:

Perché i dipinti non sono oggetti d’arredamento ma opere dell’intelletto.

Because paintings are not decorative objects but works of the intellect.

Madonna and Child

Though the earliest renditions of Our Lady in art depict her as a solitary intercessor, by far the most popular subject representing her is that which has her holding the Divine Infant, also known as Madonna and Child. There are thousands of such depictions throughout the centuries, with plentiful variations of setting and supporting cast. Sometimes the pair are in a quiet room, sometimes outside and sometimes on a throne. Sometimes they are joined by Saint John the Baptist, Saint Joseph, the parents of the Virgin or poor anonymous children begging for alms. There is one particular character which I’d like to highlight that makes a rare appearance for highly symbolic purposes.

Inimicitias ponam inter te et mulierem, et semen tuum et semen illius: ipsa conteret caput tuum, et tu insidiaberis calcaneo ejus.

I will put enmities between thee and the woman, and thy seed and her seed: she shall crush thy head, and thou shalt lie in wait for her heel.

—Genesis iii. 15.

It has been detailed previously regarding paintings of the Immaculate Conception, specifically in Pacheco’s instructions, that the ancient serpent should make an appearance under Our Lady’s heel if the artist feels up to the task.

The Dragon, the common enemy, had been forgotten by us, whose head was crushed by the Virgin, triumphing over original sin; it was always to be forgotten by us. The truth is that I never paint it willingly, and I will excuse it as much as I can, so as not to burden my painting with it: But in all that has been said, painters have license to improve upon it.

The Baroque Madonna and Child paintings below showcase a plethora of approaches to the handling of the serpent. The enemy is depicted anywhere between a simple snake to a Lilithian chimera (EDIT: More examples of the latter can be found on Wikimedia). Either Mary or Jesus or both together step on the serpent, giving credence to the varied valid opinions on who does the crushing while still maintaining Our Lady’s co-redemptive involvement.

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Passion, Death and Resurrection of Our Lord

Though not as closely tied with depictions of the Immaculate Conception, it would be advantageous here to bring awareness of Our Lord as an adult crushing the serpent in His Saving Act on the Cross. The most common subject where this can be seen is that of the Crucifixion where serpent wrapped around a skull, symbolizing death through Adam’s sin, at the base of the Cross.

The German version of the Pietà, called Vesperbild, is typically much more graphic than its Italian counterpart and in at least one case, that of the walnut sculpture by Lorenzo di Pietro (il Vecchietta), shows a woman-headed snake under Christ’s foot.

Rarer still are images of Christ crushing the serpent after His Resurrection. The sole example I found was by the Flemish engraver Hieronymus Wierix, executed during his stint as a Lutheran, having a strange title which translates to “It soothes the fire of the divine wrath; after various trials, you rise from death.”

Postscript: Mary, Queen of the Universe

A few weeks ago, my family assisted at a Confirmation ceremony in Sanford, FL. I saw it as an apt opportunity to visit the Basilica of the National Shrine of Mary, Queen of the Universe which was roughly a half-hour drive from where we were staying. At the rear right of the church, immediately before exiting into the nave, I found what I was looking for: a 9-foot full-size copy of Murillo’s La Inmaculada Concepción de los Venerables.

Though the Shrine’s Museum has been closed since 2020, I was happy for my family’s sake that they kept this available for public view. My joy was heavily tempered, however, when I read the placards underneath the painting.

It boggled my mind that a copy of THE MOST FAMOUS of Murillo’s 20-odd Immaculate Conceptions, the original of which has been housed for the last 170+ years in either the Louvre in Paris (1852–1941) or the Museo del Prado in Madrid (1941–present), could have been mistaken as a picture of the Assumption. I mean, we’re not talking about Murillo’s Walpole Immaculate Conception where the mistake could honestly be made. From the Museo’s own article on the painting:

In the present work, the absence of the Virgin’s traditional attributes -the tower of David, the sealed fountain or the palm and cypress trees- may have to do with their presence in the frame described by Torre Farfán, which is still at the Hospital. They may have been included in the frame to provide the symbolism lacking in the painting (Text drawn from Cenalmor, E. in: Murillo y Justino de Neve. El arte de la amistad, Museo Nacional del Prado, 2012, pp. 114-117).

In the aforementioned 2012 exhibition Murillo y Justino de Neve: El arte de la amistad the painting was reunited with its frame, replete with Tota Pulchra imagery, for the first time since its looting in 1813 nearly two centuries prior. Gabriele Finaldi discussed some of these points in both his Introductory and Conference lectures.

(EDIT: Added new links above and video below.)

And yet this misattribution, “supported by recent scholarship,” has been continually perpetrated by the Shrine since they acquired the painting in 1998.

Even Pacheco addresses the Assumption separately, citing Jerónimo Nadal as a prime artist to model. Among the hundreds of Assumption paintings out there, I would also recommend the multiple versions by Guido Reni, Peter Paul Rubens and Juan de Valdés Leal. I hope one day the correction is made ensuring both the staff and visitors of the Shrine can truly appreciate the treasure they have in their midst.

For centuries prior to this point in history, the Dominicans were pushing the conservative thesis of the “Sanctification of the Blessed Virgin Mary” while the majority opinion, voiced best by the Franciscans and their luminary Duns Scotus, were clamoring for the definition of the Immaculate Conception. In 1571 the revision to the Roman Breviary included the Feast of the Immaculate Conception for December 8 and in 1661 Alexander VII promulgated Sollicitudo omnium ecclesiarum laying out the doctrine of the same, but it would not be until 1854 for Pius IX to declare this a dogma in Ineffabilis Deus. More information surrounding this debate and development can be assessed in this article from the Angelus, this article from the New Liturgical Movement and this episode from the Square Notes podcast.

In this post I’d like to present the standard principles artists employed in representing the Immaculate Conception during the Baroque period alongside recognizable depictions. In two subsequent posts I’ll explore areas of experimentation which led to a surprising and arresting variation on this theme.

Tota Pulchra

In the late Middle Ages an artistic motif began to circulate portraying the Blessed Virgin Mary surrounded by types attributed to her from the Old Testament. These symbols included Porta Caeli (“Gate of Heaven”, Gen. 28:17), Turris Davidica (“Tower of David”, Cant. 4:4), Civitas Dei (“City of God”, Ps. 86:3), Ortus Conclusus (“Enclosed Garden”, Cant. 4:12) and Speculum Sine Macula (“Spotless Mirror”, Wis. 7:26) to name a few. The top of the picture would usually be draped with a banner inscribed with a declaration from God:

Tota pulchra es, amica mea, et macula non est in te.

Thou art all fair, O my love, and there is not a spot in thee.

—Canticle of Canticles iv. 7.

Many will recognize some of these phrases from the Litany of Loreto which was officially promulgated in 1587 by Sixtus V in Reddituri. The title Regina sine labe originali concepta (“Queen conceived without original sin”) was not included until after the 1854 declaration of the dogma, though some local concessions were granted 15 years prior. The Tota Pulchra continued into the Baroque era and its constituent elements would be recycled in what would eventually become the Immaculate Conception.

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Immaculate Conception

As Mrs. Henry Jenner writes in Our Lady in Art (1910), pp. 5–10:

By the early seventeenth century we get the old idea of the sanctification of Mary fully developed into the complete acceptance of the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception, and a wholly new class of pictures arose. […]

The idea expressed in the pictures of the Immaculate Conception is, so to speak, Mary as she existed from all ages in the mind of the Eternal Father. She is the supreme excellence of Humanity, the highest point touched by the human race. As there is no question of age in eternities such as souls, Mary is represented at the perfection of bodily age, that condition in which it is permissible to believe our glorified bodies will exist after the Resurrection, when growth has ceased, and no decay set in, that one moment of perfect poise between advance and retrogression.

Pacheco, who was art censor for the Inquisition in 1649, laid down rules in his Arte della Pintura for painters to follow. […]

The best artists have represented Mary in the first bloom of young womanhood, occasionally as a child, but this is not so orthodox a conception. The description in the Apocalypse of the woman clothed with the sun and having the moon under her feet and a crown of stars, is held to be a description of what might be called the essence of Mary, the consummation of the second Eve, who undoes the work of the first Eve.

Idealism can go no farther in art than the portraying of this mystery, for the pictures are not of Mary as she was at any one moment of her beautiful girlhood, but Mary, as God’s perfected work, as it exists in His Eternal Conception.

Murillo is the painter par excellence of these highly idealistic pictures. The doctrine has ever been a favourite one in Spain, and its great painter placed no fewer than twenty-five different versions of his vision on canvas. In his great picture at Madrid [La Inmaculada Concepción de El Escorial], where Mary is upborne by angels, she really seems to float above the world and to be rising up to that Beatific Vision, towards which her lovely face is set. […]

It is in Spanish art we find the most beautiful, intelligible, and attractive pictures of this mystery, and the most theologically correct. At the time when this doctrine was most popular the decline of religious feeling in Italy produced pictures more sentimental than devotional, and more concerned with the problems of foreshortening and anatomy than with doctrinal significance.

For further reading, Omnes Magazine has an excellent article on this artistic movement in general and SmartHistory has a spectacular lesson diving deep into Murillo’s most famous Immaculate Conception, Los Venerables. Hopefully, too, a full-size copy of the latter is still on display for tourists at Mary, Queen of the Universe in Orlando, Florida.

I’ll close this first part with a selection of paintings from the nearly 150 Immaculate Conceptions in Wikidata followed by, if I can be indulged, an English translation of Francisco Pacheco’s influential chapter on guidelines for painting this august subject.

The Painting of the Most Pure Conception of Our Lady

Selection from El Arte de la Pintura (1649) by Francisco Pacheco, pp. 481–484.
Translated from this transcription with DeepL.com.

A few days after the previous story, the blessed day of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin arrived. It should be noted that some people want her to be painted with the baby Jesus in her arms, as some ancient images depict her this way: perhaps based (as a scholar of the Society pointed out)1 on the fact that this Lady enjoyed original purity at that first moment, by virtue of her dignity as Mother of God, even though the time had not yet come for her to conceive the eternal Word in her most pure womb. And so from that moment (as the saints feel)2 she was the Mother of God, and at no time did she cease to be so, and such that it was not possible to be better, just as it was not possible to have a better son. But in order to avoid controversy over the painting of the child in her arms (for those who have a devotion to painting her this way), we will settle for the painting that does not have a child, because this is the most common, as shown by the medals that, at the request of the Holy Order of St. Francis (ancient defender of this Mystery), Leo X3 blessed, granting them many graces and indulgences: she has no child in her arms, but rather her hands, surrounded by the sun, crowned with stars, and the moon at her feet, with the cord of St. Francis around her. And this opinion is further reinforced by the fact that (in our Military Religion of this Mystery, instituted in Rome with the authority of His Holiness Urban VIII) Don Enrique de Guzmán, a knight from Seville, was sent on July 22, 1626, with the title of Ambassador to His Catholic Majesty. The stage with the habit, which is a very elegant Cross, and in the middle the image of Our Lady, with the baby Jesus in her arms. And then he stamped another second one without it, reforming the first one, which I can show you: something that makes a great impression on me, because it was sent at such a significant time. This painting (as scholars know) is taken from the Mysterious Woman that Saint John saw4 in heaven, with all those signs. And so the painting I mention is the one that most closely conforms to this sacred revelation of the Evangelist, and is approved by the Catholic Church with the authority of the saints and sacred interpreters: and there she is not only without the child in her arms, but even without having given birth to him, and we, having just conceived, give her a son. In accordance with this, the gifted Bernard,5 moistening his lips with sweet virginal milk, calls the Virgin a Miraculous Sign because she was so at the first moment of her Conception; for in her the Majesty of God displayed the infinite power of his ardent love and profound wisdom, not allowing original sin to enter. This miracle astonished the angelic spirits and confounded hell itself.

This Lady must therefore be painted in this most beautiful Mystery in the prime of her youth, aged twelve or thirteen, a most beautiful girl, with lovely, serious eyes, a perfect nose and mouth, and rosy cheeks, her beautiful hair spread out like gold, in short, as much as human brushes could possibly achieve. There are two kinds of beauty in man, namely of body and soul, and the Virgin possessed both incomparably: for her bodily appearance was a miracle (as St. Dionysius judged),6 and there was no creature more like her son, who was the model of all perfection. Other children are assimilated to their father and mother, as if from different principles, but Christ our Lord, having no father on earth, took after his Mother in everything, who after her son was the most beautiful creature that God created. And so the Holy Ghost praises her, whose words always apply to this painting: Tota pulchra es amica mea.7 She must be painted wearing a white tunic and blue cloak, as she appeared to Doña Beatriz de Silva, a Portuguese woman who later retired to Santo Domingo el Real in Toledo to found the Order of the Immaculate Conception, which was confirmed by Pope Julius II in 1511.8 Dressed in the Sun, an oval Sun of ochre and white, which surrounds the entire image, gently merging with the sky; crowned with stars. Twelve stars shared in a clear circle among rays of light, serving as a point on the sacred forehead, the stars on clear spots formed in pure white, which stand out above all the rays. It was painted better than any other by Don Luis Pascual,9 a monk, in the story of Saint Bruno for the great Carthusian monastery.10 An imperial crown adorns her head, which does not cover the stars. Beneath her feet is the Moon, which, although it is a solid globe (I took the liberty of doing so), is clear and transparent above her feet, while above, the crescent Moon is clearer and more vivid, with its points facing downwards. Unless I am mistaken, I believe he was the first to give these adornments greater Majesty, and the others have followed suit. In the Moon, I have especially followed the learned opinion of Father Luis del Alcázar, illustrious son of Seville, whose words are these:11 Painters usually place the moon at the feet of this Woman facing upwards, but it is evident among learned Mathematicians that if the Sun and Moon face each other, both points of the Moon must be seen facing downwards, so that the Woman was not on the concave side but on the convex side. This was necessary in order for the Moon to shine on the Woman who was above it, receiving the light of the Sun. And planted in a solid body, as has been said, although it had to be placed on the outer surface. God the Father, or the Holy Ghost, or both, are usually placed at the top of the painting, with the words of the Bridegroom, already mentioned. The attributes of the earth are appropriately arranged by landscape, and those of heaven, if desired, among clouds. It is adorned with Seraphim and whole Angels who have some of the attributes. The Dragon, the common enemy, had been forgotten by us, whose head was crushed by the Virgin, triumphing over original sin; it was always to be forgotten by us. The truth is that I never paint it willingly, and I will excuse it as much as I can, so as not to burden my painting with it: But in all that has been said, painters have license to improve upon it.12