Nursing Madonna

Common card · No. 368129

The Nursing Madonna, Virgo Lactans, or Madonna Lactans, is an iconographic type of the Madonna and Child in which the Virgin Mary is shown breastfeeding the Child Jesus. In Italian, it is called the Madonna del Latte ("Madonna of Milk"). It was common in paintings until the change in atmosphere after the Council of Trent, when it was rather discouraged by the Catholic Church, at least in public contexts, on grounds of propriety. The depiction is mentioned by Pope Gregory the Great, and a mosaic depiction probably of the 12th century is on the façade of Santa Maria in Trastevere in Rome, though few other examples date to before the Late Middle Ages. It survived in Eastern Orthodox icons (as Galaktotrophousa in Greek; Mlekopitatelnitsa in Russian), especially in Russia. Usage of the depiction seems to have revived with the Cistercian Order in the 12th century, as part of the general upsurge in Marian theology and devotion. Milk was seen as "processed blood", and the milk of the Virgin to...

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