AHodegetria,[a] orVirgin Hodegetria, is aniconographic depiction of theTheotokos (Virgin Mary) holding theChild Jesus at her side while pointing to him as the source of salvation for humankind. The Virgin's head usually inclines towards the child, who raises his hand in a blessing gesture. Metals are often used to draw attention to young Christ, reflecting light and shining in a way to embody divinity.[1] In theWestern Church this type of icon is sometimes calledOur Lady of the Way.
The most veneratedicon of the Hodegetria type, regarded as the original, was displayed in theMonastery of the Panaghia Hodegetria inConstantinople, which was built specially to contain it. Unlike most later copies it showed the Theotokos standing full-length. It was said to have been brought back from theHoly Land byEudocia, the wife of emperorTheodosius II (408–450), and to have been painted bySaint Luke the evangelist, the attributed author of theGospel of Luke.[2] The icon was double-sided,[3] with acrucifixion on the other side, and was "perhaps the most prominent cult object in Byzantium".[4]
The original icon has probably now been lost, although various traditions claim that it was carried to Russia or Italy. There are a great number of copies of the image, including many of the most venerated of Russian icons, which have themselves acquired their own status and tradition of copying.
There are a number of images showing the icon in its shrine and in the course of being displayed publicly, which happened every Tuesday, and was one of the great sights of Constantinople for visitors. After theFourth Crusade, from 1204 to 1261, it was moved to theMonastery of the Pantocrator, which had become thecathedral of theVenetiansee during the period ofFrankish rule, and since none of the illustrations of the shrine at the Hodegetria Monastery predate this interlude, the shrine may have been created after its return.[5]
There are a number of accounts of the weekly display, the two most detailed by Spaniards:
Every Tuesday twenty men come to the church of Maria Hodegetria; they wear long red linen garments,[6] covering up their heads like stalking clothes […] there is a great procession and the men clad in red go one by one up to the icon; the one with whom the icon is pleased is able to take it up as if it weighed almost nothing. He places it on his shoulder and they go chanting out of the church to a great square, where the bearer of the icon walks with it from one side to the other, going fifty times around the square. When he sets it down then others take it up in turn.[7]
Another account says the bearers staggered around the crowd, the icon seeming to lurch towards onlookers, who were then considered blessed by the Virgin. Clergy touched pieces of cotton-wool to the icon and handed them out to the crowd. A wall-painting in a church near Arta in Greece shows a great crowd watching such a display, whilst a street-market for unconcerned locals continues in the foreground.[8]
TheHamilton Psalter picture of the shrine in the monastery appears to show the icon behind a golden screen of large mesh, mounted on brackets rising from a four-sided pyramidal base, like many large medievallecterns. The heads of the red-robed attendants are level with the bottom frame of the icon.[9]
The icon disappeared during theFall of Constantinople in 1453 when it was deposited at theChora Church. It may have been cut into four pieces.[10]
In the 10th century, after the period oficonoclasm inByzantine art, this image became more widely used, possibly developing from an earlier type where the Virgin's right hand was on Christ's knee.[11] An example of this earlier type is theSalus Populi Romani icon inRome. Many versions carry the inscription "Hodegetria" in the background and in the Byzantine context "only these named versions were understood by their medieval audience as conscious copies of the original Hodegetria in the Hodegon monastery", according to Maria Vasilakē.[12]
Full-length versions, both probably made by Greek artists, appear inmosaic inTorcello Cathedral (12th century) and theCappella Palatina,Palermo (c. 1150), this last with the "Hodegetria" inscription.[13]
From the Hodegetria developed thePanagia Eleousa (Virgin of Tender Mercy), where Mary still indicates Christ, but he is nuzzling her cheek, which she slightly inclines towards him; famous versions include theTheotokos of Vladimir and theTheotokos of St. Theodore. Usually Christ is on the left in these images.
Some Russians, however, believe that after the fall of Constantinople,St. Luke's icon surfaced in Russia, where it was placed in theAssumption Cathedral inSmolensk,Russia. On several occasions, it was brought with great ceremony toMoscow, where theNovodevichy Convent was built in her honour. Her feast day is August 10.
This icon, dated by art historians to the 11th century, is believed to have been destroyed by fire during theGerman occupation of Smolensk in 1941. A number of churches all over Russia are dedicated to the Smolensk Hodegetria, e.g., theSmolensky Cemetery Church inSt. Petersburg and theOdigitrievsky Cathedral inUlan-Ude. They may refer to theTheotokos as "Our Lady of Smolensk."
Byzantine and locally-paintedItalo-Byzantine icons had high prestige in medieval Italy, and a number survive, some later overpainted so that the original condition is hard to discern. A number of paintings, churches and chapels are named forSanta Maria dell'Itria, "Itria" being a corruption of "Hodegetria". Others have names suchSanta Maria di Costantinopoli. The churches are concentrated in the south of Italy andSicily, especially areas once under Byzantine rule, or with significant Greek-speaking populations, but there is, for exampleSanta Maria Odigitria al Tritone in Rome, the "national church" for the Sicilians in Rome. The images now associated with such churches show a variety ofMadonna and Child poses, not just the Hodegetria.
An Italian tradition relates that the original icon of Mary attributed to Luke, sent by Eudocia toPulcheria from Palestine, was a large circular icon only of her head. When the icon arrived in Constantinople, it was fitted in as the head in a very large rectangular icon of Mary holding the Christ child; it is this composite icon that became the one historically known as the Hodegetria. Another tradition states that when the last Latin Emperor of Constantinople,Baldwin II, fled Constantinople in 1261, he took this original circular portion of the icon with him. It remained in the possession of theAngevin dynasty, who likewise had it inserted into a larger image of Mary and the Christ child, which is presently enshrined above the high altar of the Benedictine Abbey church ofMontevergine.[14][15] Unfortunately, over the centuries this icon has been subjected to repeated repainting, so that it is difficult to determine what the original image of Mary's face would have looked like. However, Guarducci also claims that in 1950 an ancient image of Mary[16] at the Church ofSanta Francesca Romana was determined to be a very exact, but reverse mirror image of the original circular icon that was made in the 5th century and brought to Rome, where it has remained until the present.[17]
An Italian "original" icon of the Hodegetria in Rome features in the crime novelDeath and Restoration (1996) byIain Pears, in the Jonathan Argyll series of art history mysteries.
The Italian tradition spread also to Malta in the sixteenth century and theChapel of Our Lady of Itria is dedicated to the Hodegetria.[18]
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