Carved in the round and originally polychromed. The working block is composed of two planks (wainscots?) joined with glue and nails. Dendrochronological analysis has pointed out that the outermost growth ring in the main wood block dates to the year 1446. Given that sapwood is absent, the felling of the tree has been estimated to have occurred after 1452. The timber originates from the eastern Baltic region (likely from the northwest of current Lithuania).

George’s right forearm with sword is missing, as are his right foot and the plume of his helmet. The horse’s tail, left rump, ears and several tassels of the caparison are missing, as are the dragon’s forelegs, snout and a section of the ears. A spear once penetrated the dragon’s neck. The right section of the base is missing. The polychromy has been removed with a caustic.

…; from the collection A.P. Hermans-Smits (1822-1897), Eindhoven, with numerous other objects (BK-NM-2001 to -2800), fl. 14,000 for all, to the Nederlandsch Museum voor Geschiedenis en Kunst, The Hague, 1875; transferred to the museum, 1885

Object number: BK-NM-2501

St George was said to be a high-ranking commander in the Roman army who was beheaded on the orders of Emperor Diocletian (c. 240-c. 316) for protesting against the persecution of Christians. Depicted here is the apocryphal legend with the dragon, a theme that became immensely popular in the thirteenth century after its inclusion in the Legenda Aurea. Inspiring countless numbers of images, the story symbolized the defence of one’s faith in God, but also the triumph over evil, and in more specific terms, over paganism. As a symbol of militancy and heroic conduct, St George was a much-beloved patron saint among the military guilds that emerged in the fifteenth century. The present statuette, with its reverse side finished only schematically, perhaps once belonged to a small altar dedicated to the saint.

This devotional statuette, from which the polychromy has been removed with a caustic, is related to two Mechelen St George sculptures approximately 50 centimetres in height. The first comes from the Sint-Genovevakerk in Oplinter, dated circa 1500-10.¹¹On loan to Museum M, Leuven, inv. no. C/62, see KIK-IRPA, object no. 7387; M. Debaene, K. Goubert and E. Sciot (eds.), M collecties beeldhouwkunst, coll. cat. Leuven (Museum M), 2014, pp. 64-65; L. Busine and M. Sellink (eds.), De man, de draak en de dood: De glorie van Sint-Joris, exh. cat. Mons (Musée des Arts Contemporains in Le Grand-Hornu) 2015-16, no. 36. No fewer than four quality marks (three certifying wood quality, the fourth for the polychromy) confirm the provenance of this walnut sculpture – with its original polychromy and socle still intact – as Mechelen. The second statuette, preserved in the Sint-Odulfuskerk in Borgloon,²²See KIK-IRPA, object no. 80528; C. Ceulemans et al., Laat-gotische beeldsnijkunst uit Limburg en grensland, exh. cat. Sint-Truiden (Provinciaal Museum voor Religieuze Kunst) 1990, no. 34. is less sweet in appearance and accompanied by a far less amicable dragon. It is likely to have been carved somewhat later, around 1520.³³Didier (C. Ceulemans et al., Laat-gotische beeldsnijkunst uit Limburg en grensland, exh. cat. Sint-Truiden (Provinciaal Museum voor Religieuze Kunst) 1990, p. II.24 under no. 34) enquired whether this group might partly have been inspired by an engraving of c. 1470-80 by Master AG. Excepting the dragon’s pointed head, the resemblance is minimal: the poses of St George, the horse and the dragon are utterly different; in the print, the saint wears no helmet. For the print, see L. Busine and M. Sellink (eds.), De man, de draak en de dood: De glorie van Sint-Joris, exh. cat. Mons (Musée des Arts Contemporains in Le Grand-Hornu) 2015-16, no. 6. The presence of the quality mark for wood – three vertical pales (derived from the Mechelen municipal coat of arms) – likewise points to Mechelen. Also known are a fourth version iin the former collection of Charles de Borchgrave d’Altena,⁴⁴Oak, h. 53 (without socle), see Gids voor de tentoonstelling Luik: Officieele catalogus Nederlandsche afdeeling, exh. cat. Liège (Palais des beaux-arts de Liège) 1905, no. 1391, pl. 73; current whereabouts unknown. and a seventeenth-century or later version of the same composition in the former De Decker collection.⁵⁵See KIK-IRPA, object no. 11007617; current whereabouts unknown. It is not known whether either of these two latter figures were furnished with municipal quality marks.

All five sculptures, though displaying minor differences, are ultimately derived from the same prototype. Dressed in medieval armour and wearing a helmet (with an open visor on the versions in Leuven, the former De Decker collection and Amsterdam), St George sits on a rearing horse wearing a two- or three-part caparison (on the versions in Borgloon and Amsterdam, adorned with small, hanging tassels or bells). He attacks the dragon, wielding a sword high above his head. The dragon, lying on the ground below with its head turned upwards, has already been pierced in the neck or opened mouth by George’s lance. Only on the Borgloon and former De Decker groups has the sword or lance remained intact: the Amsterdam and Leuven weapons are missing (as are the right forearm and hand of the Amsterdam figure), though in both cases, the hole arising from its penetration can still be discerned in the neck (the Leuven St George still holds the sheath in his hand). The saint’s pose in the Amsterdam group most closely resembles that of Borgloon, with the figure leaning against the horse’s neck with the left forearm.

Despite the coherence with these two examples from Mechelen, the localization of the Amsterdam work remains problematic, in part stemming from the absence of any quality mark (in its current state). St George’s elongated face with sunken cheeks substantially deviates from the customary egg-shaped heads and sweet facial features one normally associates with Mechelen carvings of the early sixteenth century. Moreover, unlike the walnut typically employed for devotional figurines made in that city (cf. BK-NM-2490), here the figure has been carved from oak. Antwerp is the more likely place of production, where this facial type does occur (cf., for example, the man on the right in the background of the Presentation in the Temple, BK-NM-2510) and where carvers worked almost exclusively in oak. Nevertheless, a superior variant of the same figure from a contemporaneous retable group in the Bollert collection has been localized in the duchy of Cleves on stylistic grounds,⁶⁶Munich, Bayerisches Nationalmuseum, Sammlung Bollert, inv. no. 2004-175, see R. von Eikelmann et al., Die Sammlung Bollert: Bildwerke aus Gotik und Renaissance, coll. cat. Munich (Bayerisches Nationalmuseum) 2005, no. 45. thus confirming that the same composition was also known outside of Brabant.

Bieke van der Mark, 2024

J. Leeuwenberg with the assistance of W. Halsema-Kubes, Beeldhouwkunst in het Rijksmuseum, coll. cat. Amsterdam 1973, no. 167, with earlier literature

B. van der Mark, 2024, 'anonymous, St George, Antwerp, c. 1510 - c. 1525', in F. Scholten and B. van der Mark (eds.), European Sculpture in the Rijksmuseum, online coll. cat. Amsterdam: https://data.rijksmuseum.nl/20035601