Nature, represented as a female personification, works diligently in the forge. She swings the hammer again and again, shaping animals and people on her anvil. Her craftsmanship marks her as an artist, but at the same time she is a creator in the service of God. These book illuminations are in an early modern manuscript of the Roman de la Rose and refer to a text that was written in the 13th century and deals with the relationship between nature and art in the Middle Ages.
fol. 156r
fol. 187r
Her tool? The hammer.
Her task? The creation of new life.
A decisive mention of Natura appears in the second half of the novel. She complains that humans are no longer adequately fulfilling the task of reproduction. As penance, the priest Genius then orders her to continue her previous work in the forge for an indefinite period. The picture presents two different creative processes: the painting on fol. 156r visualises the creation of humans. Five small people are already lying on the floor, completed, while the tireless Natura forges another. Fol. 187r, on the other hand, shows Natura creating animals; here she is making a lamb. Seven more animals have already been completed. The personification holds the creature by the foot with one hand and with the other hand she holds the hammer, ready to strike. The hammer, a symbol of enormous power, illustrates Natura’s important role: in her hands lies the potential to create new life. Humans and animals are designed with a different hand, clearly differentiating the method of one’s production from that of the other. Natura persistently and continuously creates one creature after the other, resembling batch production. The fact that she uses handcraft to do this can also be understood as an appreciation of the arts, which are said to have such creative power.
Children on the anvil, with a hammer crashing down on them? Without prior knowledge, the depiction initially seems brutal and strange. The context, i.e. the Roman de la Rose, provides clarification: the hammer is a tool of creation and not destruction. The forge is therefore a place of new beginnings, in which nature and art are allegorically combined.
Even in ancient times, there are depictions that show gods doing manual work in the workshop: Minerva, goddess of wisdom and the arts, can be seen forging helmets and Hephaestus, god of arts and crafts, forges high-quality weapons and equipment for the other gods. Although the ancient depictions can be seen as models, Natura’s work stands out clearly from them: she creates living beings and not lifeless things.
Natura has an opponent in her creative process: Death. This spurs her on to a relentless competition:
“But when gentle and merciful Nature
sees how the envious Death
and Decay, together with him,
come to destroy
everything they find in her forge,
then she hammers, then she forges again and again
and ceaselessly renews her individual beings
through new creation...”
(V. 16005-16012, translation according to Ott)
“There Nature was, thinking of the things
that are enclosed under heaven,
entered her forge,
where she directed all her spirits
to forging individual beings
in order to continue the species;”
(V. 15893-15898, translation according to Ott)
Natura and the animals have a good relationship with each other. They obediently fulfil their expectations and continue to reproduce as desired:
“They know well how to keep my rules,
and are such good students
that they all walk in my harness;
all produce offspring in their own way
and pay honour to their race.”
(V. 18992-96, translation by Ott)
