Saint Antony in walnut - Former Netherlands, 15th century

Popularised by Jacques de Voragine's Golden Legend, Anthony, an Egyptian hermit in the 3rd century, withdrew into the desert to live out his faith in poverty and chastity. After resisting the Devil's attacks, he taught for the rest of his life to disciples who visited him to hear him preach and join in his prayers. When he died, his relics were first transferred to Constantinople, before moving to an abbey in the Dauphiné region in the middle of the 11th century, which became famous under the name of Saint-Antoine-en-Viennois. It was around this place that the Antonine community was organised, established as a religious order of hospitallers in 1289, under the pontificate of Boniface VIII, specialising in the care of the infirm suffering from contagious diseases (plague, leprosy, "le mal des Ardents", etc.).

Dressed in monastic robes, Anthony here sports a long beard and a serene face, reflecting the contemplative and devoted life of the hermit. In his right hand, he holds a Tau, representing the crutch used by patients crippled by the Fiery Sickness, and in his left, a book alluding to the Antonite Rule. Beneath the latter, between his fingers, our protagonist holds a bell, associated in iconographic tradition with the pig hiding at his feet, a well known attribute of the saint, evoking the diabolical wild boar of the desert that, according to legend, Anthony tamed and domesticated, as well as the pigs of his order, which were the only ones allowed to roam freely in the streets, wearing a bell.


Former Southern-Netherlands
15th century