This Art Guide video is to be used at Step 3: Contemplation of Columban Visio Divina - A resource to help you pray using the images and Art Guide of the 2022 Columban Art Calendar.
The charity of St Elizabeth of Hungary, Oil on canvas (detail), 1915 by Edmund Leighton (Private Collection)
The English painter Edmund Leighton (1852–1922) is acclaimed for his historical genre scenes and specialisation in subjects that evoke the medieval era in Europe. This historical painting of the charitable works of St Elizabeth of Hungary is a fine example, particularly in its recalling of both the saint’s noble actions and the romantic appeal of medieval architecture and costume.
St Elizabeth of Hungary, also known as Elizabeth of Thuringia, was born of royal ancestry in the year 1207 in Thuringia, Germany and was the princess of the Kingdom of Hungary. Leighton depicts St Elizabeth wearing a lavishly brocaded red dress that befits her royal status. By contrast, the peasants she serves with donations of bread are draped in the dull and colourless robes of poverty. Elizabeth, who died at the age of 24, is also portrayed as a very young and fragile woman. By contrast, her generosity is enacted before a timeless bluestone structure and beneath a Romanesque portal with relief carving on the supporting pillar, suggestive of a medieval church rather than a palace residence. This austere and solid building also alludes to the veneration of St Elizabeth as an early member of the Third Order of St Francis (a lay branch of the Franciscan Order), for which she worked tirelessly to distribute her family wealth to the poor. Upon her canonisation in May 1235, Elizabeth was declared the patron saint of the Third Order of St Francis, becoming a symbol of Christian charity among women.
