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Ever see a medieval painting of baby Jesus

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sitting or standing on his mother's lap

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and wonder why she's so large?

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Paintings like Cimabue's enthroned Madonna with angels

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or Duccio's Maesta

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also appear out of proportion.

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If Mary were to stand up, it seems,

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the angels in the picture would be as tall as her shin bone,

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and her torso would be disproportionately small

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when compared to her legs.

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Maybe you thought the artist simply wasn't skilled enough

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to paint realistically

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or lacked the mathematical skill of perspective.

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But that's not the full story.

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To understand why, we need to go back

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to the late fifth century

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when the city of Rome was attacked by the Goths.

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Rome was built in marble and meant to last forever.

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It represented, for many years,

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the pinnacle of human civilization,

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so its destruction left a huge void.

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Theologians, who preached about a world beyond the physical,

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began attracting an audience as Rome crumbled,

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and Christianity started to fill the void left by the Empire.

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As a replacement for the physical beauty of Rome,

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Christianity offered a metaphysical beauty of virtue

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and an eternal heaven

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that could not be destroyed as Rome had.

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After the fall of Rome,

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early medieval theologians turned away from physical beauty,

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rejecting it in favor of inner-beauty.

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They maintained that while the physical world was temporary,

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virtue and religion were permanent.

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Beautiful objects could lead to a misguided worship of the object

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rather than the worship of goodness.

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It is said that the early sixth century preacher, St. Benedict,

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upon thinking of a beautiful woman,

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threw himself into a thorn patch,

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and through his suffering,

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regained his focus on spiritual beauty.

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He feared his desire for the beautiful woman

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would distract him from his desire to love God.

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As European civilization transitioned away from empires

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and towards religion,

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monasteries became the gatekeepers of knowledge,

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which meant that classical books

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that praised physical pleasures

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were not copied or protected.

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Without protection, they became the victims of natural decay,

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fire,

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flooding,

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or pests.

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And without the help of monks transcribing new copies,

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these texts and the philosophies they carried

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disappeared in Western Europe

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and were replaced by the works of people like St. Benedict,

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which brings us back to these depictions of Jesus and Mary.

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Because Christianity had so fervently rejected physical beauty,

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these medieval artists purposefully avoided

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aesthetically pleasing forms.

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At first, decorations for churches or palaces

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were limited to interesting geometric patterns,

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which could be pleasing

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without inspiring sinful thoughts of physical pleasure.

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As the medieval period progressed,

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depictions of Jesus and Mary were tolerated,

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but the artist clearly made an effort to veil Mary

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and give her disproportionately large legs,

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with those enormous shin bones.

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The fear remained that a beautiful illustration of Mary

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might inspire the viewer to love the painting

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or the physical form of Mary,

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rather than the virtue she's meant to represent.

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So even though it may be fun to think we can paint

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more realistically than Cimabuey or Duccio,

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we need to remember that they had different goals

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when picking up a paintbrush.