Images from the past

Madonna and the Child at the St Thomas Mount is the oldest Christian painting in India,
reports Hector Choksi

THE earliest remains of painting in India belong to prehistoric times and it has not been possible to ascribe them a precise date. The oldest so far known are the wall paintings of the Yogimara caves of Ramgarh Hill in Madhya Pradesh from second century B.C.

As far as Christianity is concerned, historians aver that the painting of Madonna and the Child in the Church of Our Lady of Expectations in the St Thomas Mount, near Madras, is the oldest.

Christian clergy claim that this painting is almost 2000 years old. It was brought to India by the apostle St Thomas in the first century. According to Christian mythology, St Luke painted the first representation of Madonna and the Child Jesus, and today seven of these paintings are revered in churches all over Europe. Of these seven, the most well known are the three, namely one in the prized possession of the Patriarchate of Constantinople, the second known as the Black Madonna of Czestochowa (blackened due to the centuries of incense burned before the painting), and the third known as the Our Lady of the Great Cave in Greece. To this list, Christian researchers have added the painting of Madonna & the Child Jesus in Madras gifted to apostle St Thomas by the apostle St Luke.

Until carbon dating checks prove this painting to be from the first century A.D, we have to take into consideration, only recorded history of 500 years of this painting, which makes it the oldest Christian painting in India.

Marco Polo, the famous traveller who visited St Thomas Mount in the 13th century A.D, makes no mention of this icon, although he states that he found the tomb of St Thomas there. However, when the Portuguese arrived in Mylapore in 1517, they found the shrine in ruins, except for the small chapel which contained the tomb. They rebuilt the church, but on a small scale in 1523. This church became a parish in 1524 and recorded history of this icon starts from then only. It is stated that the Armenian laymen recovered it from an underground chamber in the mount. It is believed that to safeguard it from the wars that ravaged the vicinity of St Thomas Mount, the small Christian community buried it and later generations forgot to remove it. This sojourn underground has affected the picture and there are many deep smudges/hard spots on it.

In 1558, this picture together with another relic, the China casket containing the bones of St Thomas, figured in the invasion of the St Thomas Mount by King Ramaraya of Vijayanagar. A Christian convert, following a quarrel with his co-religionists in St Thomas Mount, went to King Ramaraya and spread rumours of an opulent Portuguese clergy at the Christian shrine. He further advised the king that the missionaries could very well afford to pay a ransom of one million gold coins.

The potentate came to St Thomas Mount with a huge army but found the Christians to be so poor that he reduced the ransom to 1,00,000 gold coins. Out of this, 50,000 were to be paid immediately and for the rest of the amount, he took away the picture and the China casket as surety. The Christian renegade, who had thus misled the king about the affluence of the clergy, was sentenced to death.

But after reaching the state capital, the Vijayanagar queen had a strange dream in which Virgin Mary commanded her to have the picture and the casket returned to the Christian shrine, failing which the Vijayanagar royal family would be ruined. The frightened queen pleaded with the king and the picture and relics were returned to St Thomas Mount with royal honours.

This event almost ended in the picture and the relics being taken to Goa, then the capital of the Portuguese in India. The viceroy, Dom Constantine, heard of the Vijayanagar invasion and ordered that the picture should be transported to Goa to preserve it from future disaster. At Goa, in the west coast of India, 500 miles from St Thomas Mount, a huge basillica in honour of St Thomas was to be built and the relics and the picture were to be kept in the church.

The Viceroy promised to take all Christians at St Thomas Mount for resettling in Goa. But the Christians at St Thomas Mount refused to hand over their heritage and eventually the plan was abandoned.

Writing in 1726 A.D, Desideri the famous traveller, speaks of the picture as follows: "In addition to the famous cross there in that church, there is another lovely monument, that is the most important and impressive representation of the Holy Virgin and Child Jesus.

There is a continuous tradition that such a picture was painted by the Evangelist St Luke and that St Thomas brought it here with him. Christians have great veneration for it and the idolators hold it with great devotion. Father Hosten in his Antiquities records that the picture at the Mount is one of the oldest and therefore one of the most venerable Christian paintings to be had in India and that "It is mentioned in 1558 and under strange circumstances".

The picture is painted on wood with red blue and gold colours predominating. Attempts made in the previous centuries to touch up the minor smudges and cracks in the picture ended in failure. The first artist, who approached the picture in a spirit of levity found himself blind on touching it and the second artist found that his paint rolled off the picture without sticking to it. Only few decades ago, Madame Margaret Scheidemann, commissioned by the Most Rev.Archbishop of Madras, succeeded in rectifying small cracks in the picture.

Today, in the quiet atmosphere of the small beautiful church at St Thomas Mount, this famous picture constitutes a tourist attraction of Madras. — MF

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