Hierarchical cosmos and social structures result in hierarchical (superior/inferior) sense of self.

soul (spiritual) -- superior

body (sensual) -- inferior

 

man -- superior

woman-- inferior

This tendency to see everything in terms of superior/inferior relationships intensifies the inequality between man and wife.Anti-feminist sentiment is at its highest during the Middle Ages.

The idea that the body is inferior is reflected in sculpture and painting. Notice the stiffly clothed, bodiless portrayals of Mary and the saints. This denial of the flesh in painting persists in the Middle Ages until the work of Giotto. Notice the emergence of breasts in Giotto's "Madonna Enthroned."Giotto signalled the beginning of the Renaissance in Italy.

• France, Chartres
• France, Chartres, c. 1150
• France, Moissac, c. 1120
• France, Autun, 1120-1132
• Example of Byzantine painting
• Cione
• Daddi, Madonna
• St. John the Baptist
• Duccio de Buoninsegna, Opera del Duomo, Sien
• Duccio de Buoninsegna,Triptych: The Virgin and Child . . .
• Follower of Duccio, The Virgin and Child . . .
• Detail of Annunciation of Two Saints, 1333, Simone Marini and Lippo Memmi
• Giusto de' Menabuoi, Triptych: The Coronation of the Virgin
• Giotto, Madonna Enthroned, Uffizi, Florence, c. 1311
• Detail of Lamentation, Giotto, Scrogni Chapel, Padua, c. 1306
• Ascribed to Giotto, Pentecost
• Ugolino de Nerio, The Ascent to Calvary
• Ugolino de Nerio, The Deposition

   

  Illustrations and information on the Unicorn Tapestries at Cloisters Museum, Paris

  Compare Medieval painting to Renaissance painting. In the Renaissance (14th century in Italy) the body was celebrated, not denied.