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Last Judgement Image 91 This miniature is the earliest extant instance in England of the theme of 'The Three Living and the Three Dead', which later became a popular subject for wall-paintings in parish churches and is the theme of one English alliterative poem, 'The Three Dead Kings'. In two panels three young kings - crowned and richly attired - are confronted by the grisly memento mori of three skeletons, two with hanging shreds of graveclothes and the leftmost shown with worms wriggling in his abdomen. The living have plump youthful faces and finely curled hair: one holds a sceptre, emblem of kingly rule, and another a bird, for hawking and hunting can be emblematic of courtly pastimes and worldly pursuits. The kings stand on a grassy ground; the skeletons seem, literally, to be pushing up daisies. Above the miniature are the six short Middle English lines (one for each figure): 'Ich am afert [afraid]. Lo what ich se. Me thinketh hit beth develes thre. Ich wes wel fair. Such scheltou be [shalt thou be]. For godes love be wer [warned] by me'. Below is a dialogue from a 13th-century Anglo-French poem, 'Le dit des trois morts et trois vifs': FIRST LIVING KING (with bird): 'Companions, see what I see... my heart trembles with great fear. See the three dead together - how hideous and diverse they are, putrid and eaten by worms'. FIRST DEAD MAN: 'Young man, don't forget, on account of that bird or those bejewelled robes, that you should obey the laws that Jesus Christ has ordained by his holy will.' SECOND LIVING KING: '...I wish to amend my life...' SECOND DEAD MAN: 'In truth, death has made us as we are, and you will become as we are ... Now prepare yourselves before the end'. THIRD LIVING KING (wringing his hands): 'Tell why was man made, that he should come to such an end?' THIRD DEAD MAN: 'I was the chief of my lineage - princes, kings and constables enjoyed my sumptuous table. Now I am so hideous and denuded that even the worms scorn me'. back to previous page
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| further reading: Binski, P., Medieval Death: Ritual and Representation, London 1996 |
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