Prayer nuts or Prayer beads (

Dutch Dutch or Nederlands commonly refers to: * Something of, from, or related to the Netherlands ** Dutch people as an ethnic group () ** Dutch nationality law, history and regulations of Dutch citizenship () ** Dutch language () * In specific terms, i ...

: ''Gebedsnoot'') are very small 16th century

Gothic boxwood miniature Gothic boxwood miniatures are very small Christianity, Christian-themed wood sculptures produced during the 15th and 16th centuries in the Low Countries, at the end of the Gothic period and during the emerging Northern Renaissance.Sharpe, Emily ...

sculptures, mostly originating from the north of today's Holland. They are typically detachable and open into halves of highly detailed and intricate Christian religious scenes. Their size varies between the size of a walnut and a golf ball. They are mostly the same shape, decorated with carved openwork Gothic tracery and flower heads.Braimbridge, Mark.
The Waddesdon Bequest At The British Museum Part 1
. ''Topiarius'', Volume 14, Summer 2010. pp. 15–17. Retrieved 25 February 2017 Most are 2–5 cm in diameter and designed so they could be held in the palm of a hand during personal devotion or hung from necklaces or belts as fashionable accessories. Prayer nuts often contain central scenes depicting episodes from the life of

Mary Mary may refer to: People * Mary (name), a female given name (includes a list of people with the name) Religion * New Testament people named Mary, overview article linking to many of those below * Mary, mother of Jesus, also called the Blesse ...

or the

Passion of Jesus The Passion (from Latin , "to suffer, bear, endure") is the short final period before the death of Jesus, described in the four canonical gospels. It is commemorated in Christianity every year during Holy Week. The ''Passion'' may include, amo ...

.Ellis; Suda (2016), p. 80 Some are single beads; more rare examples consist of up to eleven beads, including the " Chatsworth Rosary" gifted by Henry VIII to Catherine of Aragon,Ellis; Suda (2016), p. 77 which is one of only two surviving boxwood rosaries.Drake Boehm, Barbara; Suda, Alexandra.
Gothic Boxwood Miniatures and Private Prayer
. Art Gallery of Ontario. Retrieved 30 November 2018 The figures are often dressed in fashionable contemporary clothing. The level of detail extends to the figure's shields, jacket buttons, and jewellery.Ellis; Suda (2016), p. 50 In some instances, they contain carved inscriptions usually related to the meaning of the narrative.Ellis; Suda (2016), pp. 78–79

Etymology

The English term ''prayer nut'' is derived from the equivalent Dutch word , and took on common usage in the 18th century. The use of the word "nut" may come from the fact that some of the beads were actually carved from nuts or pits, and although no such miniatures survive, it was a known practice in medieval southern Germany.Scholten (2017), p. 20

Format

Half of a Prayer Bead with the Lamentation

The beads are quite uniform in size and shape, often with a diameter ranging from around 30 to 65 millimetres.Scholten (2017), p. 27 Suda notes how their "spiritual impact... ascuriously...in inverse proportion to their size".Boehm; Suda (2016), p. 352 They were often made as two half-shells that could be opened to reveal intricate interior detail. According to the art historian Dora Thornton, when the prayer nut was opened out, it "revealed the representation of the divine hidden inside."Thornton (1985), p. 162 The interiors range considerably in complexity and detail, with the more simple consisting of a low relief cut into a disc that has been rounded off at the back. At their most detailed and complex, Suda describes how the beads "played out like a grand opera on a miniature stage, complete with exotic costumes, elaborate props and animals large and small" and observes how they have an "

Alice in Wonderland ''Alice's Adventures in Wonderland'' (also known as ''Alice in Wonderland'') is an 1865 English Children's literature, children's novel by Lewis Carroll, a mathematics university don, don at the University of Oxford. It details the story of a ...

" quality, wherein "one tumbles headlong into the tiny world created by the carver...into the world they reveal beyond one's immediate surroundings."Boehm; Suda (2016), p. 355 WB 239 Boxwood

The shape of a prayer nut likely carried deep significance; with the outer sheath representing Christ's human flesh; the bead stand, his cross; and the interior reliefs, his divinity. According to Thornton, "unfolding the nut is in itself an act of prayer, like opening up a personal illuminated prayer book, or watching the leaves of a large scale altarpiece being hinged back in a church service".Thornton (1985), p. 186 However, Scholten questions their use for private religious devotion, noting how their diminutive scale made them impractical for meditation, as their imagery was not discernible without a magnifying glass or strong spectacles.Scholten (2011), p. 338

Production

Many are thought to have come from the workshop of

Adam Dircksz Adam Dircksz (active 1500–1530) is the name ascribed by some art historians to a highly influential Dutch sculptor whose workshop is often attributed with the creation of around 60 of the c. 150 extant Gothic boxwood miniature micro-carvings. O ...

Delft Delft () is a List of cities in the Netherlands by province, city and Municipalities of the Netherlands, municipality in the Provinces of the Netherlands, province of South Holland, Netherlands. It is located between Rotterdam, to the southeast, ...

and were part of a larger tradition of

s. Important examples are held by various museums, most notably the

Rijksmuseum The Rijksmuseum () is the national museum of the Netherlands dedicated to Dutch arts and history and is located in Amsterdam. The museum is located at the Museum Square in the borough of Amsterdam South, close to the Van Gogh Museum, the S ...

, whose conservator Jaap Leeuwenberg in 1968 first traced their origins to Delft, the

Metropolitan Museum of Art The Metropolitan Museum of Art, colloquially referred to as the Met, is an Encyclopedic museum, encyclopedic art museum in New York City. By floor area, it is the List of largest museums, third-largest museum in the world and the List of larg ...

, which has several examples from the

John Pierpont Morgan John Pierpont Morgan Sr. (April 17, 1837 – March 31, 1913) was an American financier and investment banker who dominated corporate finance on Wall Street throughout the Gilded Age and Progressive Era. As the head of the banking firm that ...

bequest, and the

Art Gallery of Ontario The Art Gallery of Ontario (AGO; ) is an art museum in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Located on Dundas Street, Dundas Street West in the Grange Park (neighbourhood), Grange Park neighbourhood of downtown Toronto, the museum complex takes up of phys ...

, with its important Thomson collection. Together, the three museums combined research and held the ''Small Wonders'' exhibition, which they each hosted between 2016 and 2017. Though many are made wholly from wood, others are encased in silver-gilt enclosures which may have made them more suitable for wearing from a belt or being attached to a rosary. Scholten notes that the tracery may have been intended to suggest that the object contained a small

relic In religion, a relic is an object or article of religious significance from the past. It usually consists of the physical remains or personal effects of a saint or other person preserved for the purpose of veneration as a tangible memorial. Reli ...

, "so that the object took on the character of a

talisman A talisman is any object ascribed with religious or magical powers intended to protect, heal, or harm individuals for whom they are made. Talismans are often portable objects carried on someone in a variety of ways, but can also be installed perm ...

and was deemed to have an

apotropaic Apotropaic magic (From ) or protective magic is a type of magic intended to turn away harm or evil influences, as in deflecting misfortune or averting the evil eye. Apotropaic observances may also be practiced out of superstition or out of tr ...

effect".Scholten (2011), p. 323 A number contain a wooden loop in the middle of one half so they could be worn hanging from a belt or carried in a case.Thornton (1985), pp. 167, 187 A fragrant substance was sometimes placed inside the shell, which diffused when the beads were opened, making them comparable to the then fashionable

pomander A pomander, from French language, French ''pomme d'ambre'', i.e., apple of amber, is a ball made for perfumes, such as ambergris (hence the name), musk, or civet (perfumery), civet. The pomander was worn or carried in a case as a protection agai ...

s. In 1910 when

G.C. Williamson George Charles Williamson (1858–1942) was a British art historian, antiquarian, and author of numerous books on European art and artists. He sometimes wrote under the pen name Rowley Cleeve. Biography G. C. Williamson was born in Guildford in ...

wrote his catalogue of the collection for J.P. Morgan, the origin of these prayer nuts was still disputed, but he felt that a portrait painting of an old man in the collection of the Brussels museum that was at that time attributed to

Christoph Amberger Christoph Amberger (c. 1505 – 1562) was a painter of Augsburg in the sixteenth century, a disciple of Hans Holbein the Younger, Hans Holbein, his principal work being the history of Joseph in twelve pictures. Life His father was a stonema ...

showed a prayer nut that looked like the rosary bead in the collection.

Gallery

File:Half of a Prayer Bead with Jesus Carrying the Cross MET DP371980.jpg, "Half of a Prayer Bead with Jesus Carrying the Cross and the Crucifixion", early 16th century, Metropolitan Museum of Art File:Prayer Bead with the Crucifixion and Jesus before Pilate 2.jpg, Detail: "Half of a Prayer Bead with Jesus....". File:Half of a Prayer Bead with Jesus Carrying the Cross MET DP371980 II.jpg, Reverse of "Half of a Prayer Bead with Jesus...", File:Prayer Bead with the Adoration of the Magi and the Crucifixion MET DP371962.jpg, " Prayer Bead with the Adoration of the Magi and the Crucifixion", c. 1500–1510, Metropolitan Museum of Art File:Rosary bead.jpg, Detail: "Prayer Bead with the Adoration of the Magi and the Crucifixion". File:WB 238 prayer nut Magi upper and Pieta lower.jpg, Prayer nut (WB.238) with upper

Magi Magi (), or magus (), is the term for priests in Zoroastrianism and earlier Iranian religions. The earliest known use of the word ''magi'' is in the trilingual inscription written by Darius the Great, known as the Behistun Inscription. Old Per ...

and a lower Pieta with

Saint James the Greater James the Great ( Koinē Greek: Ἰάκωβος, romanized: ''Iákōbos''; Aramaic: ܝܥܩܘܒ, romanized: ''Yaʿqōḇ''; died AD 44) was one of the Twelve Apostles of Jesus. According to the New Testament, he was the second of the apostles t ...

Saint Ursula Ursula (Latin for 'little she-bear') was a Romano-British virgin and martyr possibly of royal origin. She is venerated as a saint in the Roman Catholic Church, Eastern Orthodox Church and the Anglican Communion. Her feast day in the pre-1970 G ...

and inscriptions, c. 1510–1525,

British Museum The British Museum is a Museum, public museum dedicated to human history, art and culture located in the Bloomsbury area of London. Its permanent collection of eight million works is the largest in the world. It documents the story of human cu ...

File:Kunsthistorisches Museum 09 04 2013 Prayer nut.jpg, Rosary bead with the Passion of Christ. Netherlands, early 16th century, boxwood.

Kunsthistorisches Museum The Kunsthistorisches Museum Wien ( "Vienna Museum of art history, Art History", often referred to as the "Museum of Fine Arts, Vienna") is an art museum in Vienna, Austria. Housed in its festive palatial building on the Vienna Ring Road, i ...

, Vienna File:Rosary Bead with the Crucifixion and Resurrection MET sf17-190-304d2.jpg, "Rosary Bead with the Crucifixion and Resurrection", a rare Spanish example, with

Ivory Ivory is a hard, white material from the tusks (traditionally from elephants) and Tooth, teeth of animals, that consists mainly of dentine, one of the physical structures of teeth and tusks. The chemical structure of the teeth and tusks of mamm ...

.Rosary Bead with the Crucifixion and Resurrection c. 1500–1525
. Metropolitan Museum of Art. Retrieved 9 November 2019 Metropolitan Museum of Art

References

Notres

Sources

* Ellis, Lisa; Suda, Alexandra. "Small Wonders: Gothic Boxwood Miniatures".

, 2016. * Scholten, Frits. ''Small Wonders: Late Gothic Boxwood Microcarvings from the Low Countries''. Amsterdam:

, 2017. * Thornton, Dora, ''A Rothschild Renaissance: The Waddesdon Bequest''. London: British Museum Press, 1985.

External links

Frits Scholten
demonstrates opening and examining a prayer nut with Wieteke van Zeil for ''Small Wonders'' at the Rijksmuseum, on Canvas
The Boxwood Project
Art Gallery of Ontario {{Authority control Gothic boxwood miniature