The Basilisk, a legendary creature whose origins lie in the naturalistic traditions of Antiquity, particularly in the writings of Plinio il Vecchio and Greek-Roman naturalists, was typically depicted as a small snake capable of killing with its gaze or breath. The Basilisk represented the extreme personification of the danger inherent in the wild nature and the idea that it could be born from a cock’s egg, hatched by a snake or a toad, soon added an aura of wonder and unnaturalness.

 

Basilisk, Bestiary by Ann Walsh (manuscript GKS 1633 4°), 1400-1425, Kongelige Bibliotek, Copenaghen

 

During the transition from Antiquity to the Middle Ages, this creature was partly redefined and ultimately depicted as a hybrid monster, often with the head of a rooster, the legs and wings of an eagle, and the tail of a snake, acquiring new symbolic meanings. In medieval bestiaries, the Basilisk became an emblem of sin, pride and spiritual corruption, while its presence in the collective imagination was consolidated thanks to moralising tales that exalted its lethality, contrasting it with the purifying virtue of the weasel, the only animal able to defeat it.

 

 Basilisk, Blumen der Tugen, Hans Vintler, end of 15th century, Forschungsbibliothek Gotha, Gotha, Germany

 

By 1200 AD, the Basilisk had become a recurring figure in encyclopaedic works and illuminated manuscripts. Some miniatures, especially in Anglo-Norman and French areas, depict it in dynamic poses, with bright colours and sinuous lines, accentuating its ambiguous and terrifying character but also its allegorical value. These portrayals were therefore aimed not so much at realism as at conveying moral meanings, helping to establish the unmistakable image of the monster with deadly power. Among the most famous miniatures depicting a Basilisk is the one in Ann Walsh’s English Bestiary and the one painted by the German artist Hans Vintler in Blumen der Tugen, which portrays the animal according to iconographic characteristics very similar to those of the work presented here.

 

 

The French panel under examination here shows the powerful figure of a Basilisk carved in high relief from a single block of stone of considerable size, in accordance with canonical medieval iconography: a rooster’s head, eagle’s legs and wings, and a snake’s tail. Similar representations of the Basilisk recur in the decorative elements of numerous European Romanesque and Gothic buildings on capitals, corbels and lintels, with an obvious apotropaic meaning. Among the examples closest to our work, the following are certainly worth mentioning: the Capital decorated with a Basilisk preserved in the Musée du Louvre and the Capital on the side portal of the Cathedral of San Ciriaco in Ancona.

 

Left: Capital decorated with a Basilisk, limestone, France, first quarter 12th century, 63 x 56 x 63.5 cm, Musée du Louvre, Paris.
Right: Capital on the side portal of the Cathedral of San Ciriaco, 13th century, Ancona

 

The Basilisk is therefore variously present in medieval Western art, from miniatures in the margins of manuscripts to ornamental religious sculpture and the panel here shown, with its magnetic force and mystery, is certainly a precious testimony to this iconographic tradition.

 

 

BASILISK

Limestone

France

First half 13th century

51 cm x 31 cm x 16 cm