Symbolica vitae Christi meditatio Tomasza Tretera jako siedemnastowieczna realizacja emblematycznych medytacji: źródła grafi czne i zamysł zbioru
Symbolica vitae Christi meditatio by Tomasz Treter as a 17th-Century Example of Emblematic Meditations. Graphic Sources and the Purpose of the Collection

Summary/Abstract: The aim of this paper is first of all to present graphic sources of Symbolica vitae Christi meditatio by Tomasz Treter in three 16th-century emblematic works from the French and Dutch circles, namely by Junius Hadrianus (Emblemata), Claude Paradin (Devises heroïques), and Aneau Barthélemy (Picta poesis). It also presents an analysis of the composition of Treter’s collection and situates it in the context of emblematic meditations, promoted by Jesuits in the 16th century. The following four emblems are analysed in detail: Nativitas, Manifestata veritas, Circumcisio, and Continentia. Th ey provide both a metacommentary on the role of image in cognition and an illustration of the relationship between pair of emblems throughout whole collection. The first hundred emblems in Treter’s collection are arranged in pairs, in which the first one shows an episode from the life of Christ, while the second one transposes the biblical story into a symbolic language. The quoted fragment of Jesus’ life is each time used to discuss a Christian virtue expressed through an abstract symbol. At the same time, the traditional tripartite construction of the emblem becomes less strict as in Treter’s collection emblems take the form of two icons sharing a single subscription.

• Details
• Contents