The Martyrdom of Saint Lucy

When this panel was painted, around 1505 to 1510, Dutch readers had been able to read the lives of the saints in their own language for about 30 years. A Dutch version of the Golden Legend, the best-known medieval collection of saints' stories, came off a press in Gouda in 1478, and the episodes in this picture are the ones it tells about Lucy of Syracuse. Near the top, men lead Lucy to a brothel, and further along a team of oxen strains and fails to move her. In front she stands untouched in the fire while men work bellows, and a soldier drives a sword through her throat. The legend says she lived on until a priest gave her communion, and that scene sits on the ledge behind her. Farther off, the governor who condemned her, Paschasius, is beheaded in turn.