Iconography of de Nativity: Childbirth with pain

Abstract

The present work is a continuation of the one published in the previous edition of the magazine Escurialensia, in which we address the first variant on the iconography of the Nativity, which alludes to the birth of Jesus with a natural birth, that is, with pain, a formula that was interpreted from the 4th to the 15th century. After studying the narrative sources of the cycle of Christianity, we continue analyzing the other iconographic variant such as painless childbirth, from the moment in which new considerations are launched at the Council of Trent (1545 and 1563) where the Fathers of the Church will defend the Revelations of Saint Brigid of Sweden and the Pseudo Bonaventure, which will change the iconographic canons of the representations of the Nativity, starting to consider that it is not a birth, but of a birth, in this way the controversy ends as Mary does not suffer human nature.