Attributed to Master of the Saint Godelieve Legend

By tradition acquired by Don Gonzalo de Ulloa y Ortega Montañés, Conde de Adanero;
Thence by descent.

J. Lavalleye, Les Primitifs Flamands, Repertoire des Peintures Flamandes des Quinzième et Seizième Siècles, Collections d'Espagne, Antwerp 1958, vol. II, p. 37, no. 90, reproduced plate XXV (as by an anonymous Flemish master).

"The following condition report has been provided by Sarah Walden, an independent restorer who is not an employee of Sotheby's. This painting is on three thick oak panels. It is remarkably well preserved. The central panel appears to be made up of two wider middle pieces with narrow outer side sections. Old backing strips of canvas run down behind the three joints, or cracks, another short canvas strip crosses horizontally near the base on the left and a diagonal strip runs behind a slanting crack at lower right, near a cluster of old knots apparently cut away behind. There are traces of previous even older webbing and no sign of any more recent movement at all suggesting that the panel has been stable for at least a century or two. The only sign of past cracking on the face of the painting is one short retouched crack running a little way down from the top on the right in what might be an original joint, with the slanting crack near the base below just visible in the lower blue drapery of the standing figure. This has scarcely any retouching although there is some reworking down the side of the figure, possibly a rare pentiment. The brief semi horizontal crack at lower left among the books has narrow retouching. Any other cracks or joints behind have had no effect on the paint surface. In the left wing there is a curving crack near the centre, which is visible behind and in the paint layer, which has perhaps been rather more recently re- retouched. The right wing has two cracks from the base, a short one on the right and a branching crack on the left with a spur crossing into the water by the steps. Apart from these narrow local retouchings there is scarcely any other sign of restoration. Older varnish remains in the crevices of the quite thickly brushed paint, and there is no other damage at all in the exceedingly well preserved surface. This report was not done under laboratory conditions."
"This lot is offered for sale subject to Sotheby's Conditions of Business, which are available on request and printed in Sotheby's sale catalogues. The independent reports contained in this document are provided for prospective bidders' information only and without warranty by Sotheby's or the Seller."

This interesting triptych appears to be by the same hand as a polyptych of twelve panels, also representing scenes from the life of Saint James the Greater, today in the Indianapolis Museum of Art, in which the same compositions recur, although the central panel in the present work is there divided into two sections.

The Indianapolis polyptych has in the past been associated with the so-called Master of the Legend of Saint Godelieve, so named after his eponymous altarpiece illustrating scenes from the life of Saint Godelieve, today in the Metropolitan Museum, New York.¹ Dr. Ronda Kasl, curator of paintings from the Indianapolis Museum of Art, who was first to make the tentative link between the Indianapolis polyptych and the master's eponymous work in New York, now considers the artist responsible for both the present lot and the Indianapolis polyptych to be a separate artistic personality from the Master of the Legend of Saint Godelieve, an artist to whom, nonetheless, his style is extremely close.

Strangely, the narrative here seems to begin in the right wing rather than the left, with the young St. James casting away his worldly possessions. The left hand wing depicts the Miracle of the fowls; a young woman plants a silver goblet in the bag of a handsome young pilgrim as he sleeps (upper right) who had shunned her advances. The girl caused the cup to be found (principal scene) and the pilgrim was tried and hung. When, as his parents passed by, his 'dead' body spoke, bidding them good cheer for St James was at his side, they ran to the judge who happened to be sitting at table and who said to them: "He is no more alive than these fowls on my dish." At which point the birds sprang up and began to crow and the young man was restored to his parents. The narrative continues into the central panel where Hermogenes, a magician, is shown throwing away his books after his conversion by St. James. Immediately above, St. James gives his staff to Philetus to ward off the demons that hound him in the scenes immediately to the left; moving right St. James is shown preaching, probably in Judea, before his arrest and subsequent trial by Herod Agrippa (principal scene).

A note on the Provenance:
This triptych is said to have remained in the same family collection for over two hundred years and has descended to the present owners ultimately from Don Gonzalo de Ulloa y Ortega Montañés, Conde de Adanero, who built one of the most important art collections in Spain during the 18th century. The collection, based in Cordoba, incorporated a large collection of miniatures, Sèvres porcelain and important Old Masters by Velázquez, Goya, El Greco and Zurbarán amongst many others. The collection is today largely dispersed amongst the various houses of the Adanero descendants.

1. See M. Ainsworth, K. Christiansen (eds.), From Van Eyck to Bruegel, Early Netherlandish Painting in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, The Metropolitan Museum, exhibition catalogue, New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art, 22 September 1998 - 3 January 1999, pp. 125-28, reproduced.