July 24, 2005

Catholic dissent over mystery of the pregnant Madonnas - Italian architect and author Renzo Manetti has a theory connecting a mysterious symbolic theme in western art to the suppression of the secretive Knights Templar order, the implications stirring criticism from a sensitive Roman Catholic church.
posted by Chyren 18 years ago
  • Go Chy go!! Wearing plaid helps, it seems.
  • Could it be pregnant madonnas represent - Mary when she was preganant? Or is that just too outlandish to believe. "Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar" - S Freud.
  • Very likely, but in this case the theory is somewhat believable since symbolism was integral to religious art at the time, in fact it is impossible to study art of the era without understanding the use of symbolic lexicon.
  • Hmmmm. The Knights Templar were suppressed by the church because they got too powerful, and Simon Templar is the Saint. Coincidence? I think not.
  • But, great post Chy. We scoped out several churches in and around Arezzo and Cortona and between there and Perugia, and everyone of them had both histories and stories about the frescoes (for ones that had them). The intrigue and chicanery of the medieval peoples was rampant.
  • I don't remember Chy posting this.
  • That jerk. He was probably drunk!
  • Yeah, 2005. He was drunk that whole year!