Mystic Marriage of St. Catherine of Alexandria Car Card

A Mystic Marriage is a visionary, spiritual wedding ceremony whereby a female saint consecrates her virginity to Christ. The focal point of this detail is the bestowal by the infant Jesus of a gold wedding ring on St. Catherine of Alexandria (died c. 305). St. Catherine was a princess, a noted scholar, and a Christian virgin martyr. She is readily identifiable by the ornamentation of her rich garments. Like the other figures present, however, St. Catherine is fashionably but ahistorically dressed for the 15th not the early 4th century. St. Catherine's red ermine-trimmed sideless surcoat is embroidered in silver thread with broken, spiked wheels (or Catherine wheels). Among the tortures to which she was subjected, St. Catherine was condemned to death on a spiked breaking wheel, but it shattered at her touch. She was later beheaded. Looking on is St. Mary Magdalene who holds a gold unguent container. + Feast of St. Catherine of Alexandria: November 25; Feast of St. Mary Magdalene: July 22 + Image Credit (M 070): Detail of Virgo inter Virgines [in Latin; La Vierge parmi les vierges in French; The (Blessed) Virgin among Virgins in English], by The Master of the Legend of St. Lucy (fl. c. 1435-1506/1509), oil on oak panel, 67.3"x42.5" (171 cm x 108 cm), c. 1488, Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium, Brussels, inv. 2576. From Wikimedia Commons {PD-Art|PD-Old-100}. The image file has been identified as being free of known restrictions under copyright law, including all related and neighbouring rights.