Master of Saint Veronica, 'Saint Veronica with the Sudarium', about 1420

Saint Veronica with the Sudarium

Master of Saint Veronica

Not on display

About the work

Overview

According to her legend, Saint Veronica saw Christ fall as he carried his Cross to the site of his crucifixion. Taking pity on him, she offered her linen handkerchief (called a sudarium) to wipe the sweat from his face. When he returned it, an image of his face was imprinted upon it.

The legend inspired paintings like this, where Veronica holds up the miraculously imprinted cloth. This picture is very similar to one in the Alte Pinakothek, Munich, which gives the anonymous painter his identity as the Master of Saint Veronica. The Munich painting is more elaborate and includes groups of angels with colourful wings seated on the ground. There are traces of the draperies and wings of flying angels here, not painted but punched with little dots into the gold on either side of Veronica’s head, but they are now so worn they are barely visible.

In-depth

The sudarium, thought to be the only true portrait of Christ, became one of the holiest relics in the Catholic Church – Veronica’s name actually derives from the Latin phrase vera icon, meaning ‘true image’. A sudarium thought to be Veronica’s is conserved in St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome. The legend of the sudarium inspired paintings like this, where Veronica holds up the miraculously imprinted cloth. This picture is very similar to one in the Alte Pinakothek, Munich that gives the anonymous painter his identity as the Master of Saint Veronica.

The Munich painting is more elaborate and includes groups of angels with colourful wings seated on the ground. There are traces of the draperies and the wings of flying angels here, not painted but punched with little dots into the gold on either side of Veronica’s head, but they are now so worn they are barely visible. The Munich painting shows Christ with darker skin, common for images of this kind, but wearing a crown of thorns, which was borrowed from images of the Man of Sorrows that, by the fifteenth century, had begun to replace the more simple image of Christ depicted here.

The design of the decorated border–created by indenting the gold leaf background with shaped tools – is the same in both paintings, which were probably made at around the same time in the 1420s. In our panel both Christ and Veronica have gold haloes inscribed with their names in Latin, whereas in the Munich panel Christ’s head is surrounded by a gilded cross. The surrounding decoration – most clearly visible in Christ’s halo – is detailed and delicate. This sensitivity to symmetry and graceful lines also features in the fine draping folds of Veronica’s mantle as it falls over her head, and in the gathered fabric at her neck, fastened with a pin.

Key facts

Details

Full title: Saint Veronica with the Sudarium
Artist: Master of Saint Veronica
Artist dates: active early 15th century
Date made: about 1420
Medium and support: oil on wood
Dimensions: 44.2 × 33.7 cm
Acquisition credit: Bought, 1862
Inventory number: NG687
Location: Not on display
Collection: Main Collection
Frame: 20th-century Replica Frame

Provenance

The painting is first recorded in 1851 in the collection of the architect Johann Peter Weyer (1794–1864) in Cologne. The Cologne art historian and collector Johann Jacob Merlo (1810–1890) stated that Weyer acquired NG 687 in 1849 from a local antique dealer. According to the Cologne historian Ernst Weyden (1805–1869) in 1851, the painting had languished for some time with the dealer owing to its dirty condition; it was said to have come from the Cologne church of St Lawrence, which was demolished in 1817, following its secularisation in 1803. Weale in 1862 stated that Weyer had acquired the painting for 30 Thaler from the Cologne dealer Spanner, who in turn had received it from a priest, who gave its provenance as from the Cologne church of St Lawrence. Weyer amassed a considerable collection, including many early German and Netherlandish paintings. NG 687 was published in the catalogue of his collection of 1852 and a drawing was made of it; some of the collection was photographed, including NG 687. It was displayed in the third, top-lit antechamber to Weyer’s picture gallery, built at his house at number 1 Rothgerberbach. On 12 August 1857 Sir Charles Eastlake, Director of the National Gallery, noted the picture on a visit to Cologne: he recorded in his Notebooks that ‘The Veronica head by Meister Wilhelm is probably genuine – the same emptiness in the female head as before – the Christ’s head has a Byzantine look in the eyes and altogether the specimen is worth attention’. On 16 November 1857 he reported to the National Gallery Board: ‘A Veronica head called Meister Wilhelm is at all events a good example of the Early Cologne School’. The panel was lot 116 in the Weyer sale on 25 August 1862. Eastlake viewed it once more, along with Memling’s Virgin and Child and Saint George with a Donor, with acquisition in view, noting on 14 August that ‘Both will probably have competition’. Eastlake wrote to the Keeper of the National Gallery, Ralph Wornum (1812–1877), in a letter of 20 August 1862: ‘Another desirable specimen, though (much) less important, is a St Veronica holding the sudarium, her head and hands only seen above it, the head of Christ represented as usual. This is a good specimen of the early Cologne School. It is called Meister Wilhelm, the predecessor of Meister Stephan.’ It was purchased by Otto Mündler, acting for the National Gallery, for 1,000 Thaler or £165 (along with Memling’s The Virgin and Child and Saint George with a Donor, now NG 686).

Additional information

Text extracted from the ‘Provenance’ section of the catalogue entry in Susan Foister, ‘National Gallery Catalogues: The German Paintings before 1800’, London 2024; for further information, see the full catalogue entry.

Exhibition history

2011

Splendour and Glory of the Middle Ages: Cologne masterpieces from the world's great collections

Museum Schnütgen

4 November 2011 - 26 February 2012
2014

Strange Beauty: Masters of the German Renaissance

The National Gallery (London)

19 February 2014 - 11 May 2014

Bibliography

1855

H.G. Hotho, Die Malerschule Huberts Van Eyck, Berlin 1855
1862

W.H.J. Weale, 'Notice sur la collection de tableaux anciens', Messager des sciences historiques, 1862, pp. 334-52
1895

E. Firmenich-Richartz, 'Wilhelm von Herle und Hermann Wynrich von Wesel. Eine Studie zur Geschichte der Altkölnischen Malerschule', Zeitschrift für Christliche Kunst, 1895
1910

E. Firmenich-Richartz, 'Saint Lawrence Master', Zeitschrift für Christliche Kunst, 1910
1925

H. Reiners, Die Kölner Malerschule, Munich 1925
1934

A. Stange, Deutsche Malerei der Gotik, 11 vols, Munich 1934
1935

K.H. Schweitzer, Der Veronikameister und sein Kreis, Disserttion (Bonn, 1933), Würzburg 1935
1959

Levey, Michael, National Gallery Catalogues: The German Schools, London 1959
1967

A. Stange, Der deutschen Tafelbilder vor Dürer. Kritisches Verzeichnis, Munich 1967
1972

G. Goldberg and G. Scheffler, Alte Pinakothek, Munich: Altdeutsche Gemälde Köln und Nordwestdeutschland, Munich 1972
1974

G. von der Osten et al., Vor Stefan Lochner: Die Kölner Maler con 1300 bis 1430 (exh. cat. Wallraf-Richartz-Museum, 29 March - 7 July 1974), Cologne 1974
1974

F.G. Zehnder, 'Der Meister der heiligen Veronika', in G. von der Osten et al., Vor Stefan Lochner: Die Kölner Maler con 1300 bis 1430, Cologne 1974, pp. 36-9
1978

A. Chastel, 'La Véronique', Revue de l'art, 40-41, 1978, pp. 71-82
1981

F.G. Zehnder, Der Meister der Heiligen Veronika, St Augustin 1981
1985

A. Smith, Early Netherlandish and German Paintings, London 1985
1991

J. Dunkerton et al., Giotto to Dürer: Early Renaissance Painting in the National Gallery, New Haven 1991
1993

J.L. Koerner, The Moment of Self-Portraiture in German Renaissance Art, Chicago 1993
1995

H. Kier and F.G. Zehnder, Lust und Verlust. Kölner Sammler zwischen Trikolore und Preußenadler, (exh. cat. Wallraf-Richartz-Museum, 28 October 1995 - 28 January 1996), Cologne 1995
1997

R. Billinge et al., 'Methods and Materials of Northern European Painting in the National Gallery, 1400–1550', National Gallery Technical Bulletin, XVIII, 1997, pp. 6-52
2001

C. Baker and T. Henry, The National Gallery: Complete Illustrated Catalogue, London 2001
2024

S. Foister, National Gallery Catalogues: The German Paintings before 1800, 2 vols, London 2024

About this record

If you know more about this painting or have spotted an error, please contact us. Please note that exhibition histories are listed from 2009 onwards. Bibliographies may not be complete; more comprehensive information is available in the National Gallery Library.