marian anniversaries     september

September 23

Lukasbild, Freising, Bavaria, Germany

X-rays have shown the underlying image of the Black Madonna of Freising to have been painted around 1100, although tradition holds it to have been the work of St. Luke the Evangelist ("Lukasbild") or at least a copy of his work. The icon was in Constantinople in 1235, when Manuel II Palaiologos added a silver frame with the title "Hope of the Hopeless." The image was repainted in the early 1300s before coming into possession of the Della Scala family of Milan. On September 23, 1440, Bishop Nicolas Della Scala donated it to his cathedral at Freising, where it was displayed  in a magnificent altarpiece on the four feasts of the Virgin (Purification, February 2; Annunciation, March 25; Assumption, August 15; and Nativity, September 8). The Lukasbild is now in the Diocesan Museum. 

Photo source: the Museum's website, www.dioezesanmuseum-freising.de

Also celebrated this date:

Madonna dei Miracoli, Cantù, Como, Lombardy, Italy. Painting crowned, 1928.
Maria Santissima del Patrocinio, Castelnuovo Berardenga, Siena, Tuscany, Italy. Church consecrated, 1860.
Maria Santissima del Monte Carmelo, Bella, Potenza, Basilicata, Italy. Festa; torchlight procession takes statue from the central church of Sta. Maria delle Grazie, where it moved August 15, to its home church of the Madonna del Carmine. 
Madonna del Mare, Lampedusa, Sicily, Italy (Madonna of the Sea). Statue installed underwater, 1979.
Virgen del Niño Perdido, Caudiel, Castellón, Valencia, Spain (Virgin of the Lost Child). Statue crowned, 1956.
 
 

Where We Walked ~~~ Mary Ann Daly