Carved in high relief and originally polychromed. Gregory’s separately carved head was joined to his body with a dowel.Carved in high relief and originally polychromed. Gregory’s separately carved head was joined to his body with a dowel.

Christ’s and Gregory’s heads are missing, as are Christ’s left arm, the left forearm of the acolyte, and other numerous details. A hole has been made at the top. 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-2494

During a legendary mass celebrated by Pope Gregory the Great (540-604), a witness voices his doubt regarding the doctrine of transubstantiation, which prescribes that the bread and wine transform into the flesh and blood of Christ during the Eucharist. In response, Gregory prays before the altar for a sign from God. Depicted on this carved relief is the moment that follows: Christ, standing in his tomb, appears as the Man of Sorrows, with the blood that flows from his wounds filling a (now largely missing) chalice on the altar. On the rear wall to the right, the Arma Christi (instruments of Christ’s Passion) can be seen. Holding Gregory’s chasuble is an acolyte. The praying man front left is a donor, while a nun prays at the rear right.

From the early fifteenth century through the third quarter of the sixteenth century, the iconography of the Mass of St Gregory was extremely popular, though primarily in northern Europe and especially during the Counterreformation.¹¹For the Mass of St Gregory, see U. Westfehling, Die Messe Gregors des Grossen: Vision, Kunst, Realität, exh. cat. Cologne (Museum Schnütgen) 1982. Retable groups bearing depictions of this scene were most commonly located beneath the main scene (typically a Calvary), but there are also known cases where the Mass of St Gregory held the most prominent position.²²For example, the retable of Averbode in Musée de Cluny, Paris, see L.F. Jacobs, Early Netherlandish Carved Altarpieces 1380-1550: Medieval Mass Marketing, Cambridge 1998, fig. 44 and Henning van der Heide’s Fronleichnamsaltar in the St. Annen-Museum, Lübeck, see U. Westfehling, Die Messe Gregors des Grossen: Vision, Kunst, Realität, exh. cat. Cologne (Schnütgen-Museum) 1982, fig. 16.

Leeuwenberg catalogued the highly damaged piece as ‘Netherlands, early sixteenth century’, indeed a plausible determination when observing the realistic rendering of the figures, the placid treatment of the drapery folds and the type of wood (oak) employed.³³J. Leeuwenberg with the assistance of W. Halsema-Kubes, Beeldhouwkunst in het Rijksmuseum, coll. cat. Amsterdam 1973, p. 503. At the present time, the absence of other stylistically similar works prohibits a more precise localization within the Low Countries.

Bieke van der Mark, 2024

J. Leeuwenberg with the assistance of W. Halsema-Kubes, Beeldhouwkunst in het Rijksmuseum, coll. cat. Amsterdam 1973, no. 897

B. van der Mark, 2024, 'anonymous, The Mass of St Gregory, Low Countries, c. 1500 - c. 1525', in F. Scholten and B. van der Mark (eds.), European Sculpture in the Rijksmuseum, online coll. cat. Amsterdam: https://data.rijksmuseum.nl/20036333