Jacques Bellange (c. 1575-1616) The Three Holy... Lot 5

Jacques Bellange (c. 1575-1616) The Three Holy Women, or The Three Marys. Circa 1610. etching. 193x316. Robert-Dumesnil 13; Walch 22; Griffiths-Hartley 13. Superb proof on thin laid paper (watermark: grappe, conforming to Griffiths-Hartley 11, seen on a proof of the same subject), trimmed to square line but well complete with tablet. A spot of rust visible in the center on verso, barely perceptible on recto. Initialed by Ch. Lenormant du Coudray (Lugt 1705) in pen and sepia ink. Although they evoke the three Marys at the tomb, also engraved by Bellange, the identification of the three holy women, reputed to be two saints and a martyr, remains uncertain in the literature devoted to this engraving. "Thuillier may well be right when he proposes that the women are Christian equivalents of the three Graces of antiquity, ideals of spiritual beauty clothed in courtly refinement, linked in a ring by the gestures of their arms and hands." (A. Griffiths and C. Hartley, Jacques Bellange, Printmaker of Lorraine, London, British Museum Press, 1997, p. 73).