UntitledTHE ERYTHRAEAN SIBYL
Fresco, 15og
Sistine Ceiling, Vatican, Rorne
As relaxed as Delphica is excited, Erythraea sits quietly contemplating a large book, whose
pages,she holds open with her left hand while her right arm hangs at her side and the fingers
of her right hand are lost in the f olds of her mantle. One of her attendant putti lights a lamp
to help illuminate her pages, while the other, in the shadow, sleepily rubs his eyes.
As we have seen (page ~2), Erythraea was thought to be adaughter-in-law of Noah, and
is thus appropriately represented next the Sacr lice of Noah. Possibly she is the very personage
represented placing the brand in the burning, that brand now used to light her lamp of
prophecy. As has often been noted, her pose repeats almost exactly that of a nude youth in
Signorelh's fresco of the Last Days of Moses on the wall directly below her. The youth sits
enraptured, drinking in the f arewell instructions of Moses about to depart for his final view
of the Promised Land he was never to reach, his secret death and hidden grave. It is note-
worthy that the Lord told Moses to command that the children of Israel bring pure oil for
the light, to cause lamps to burn continually, outside the veil of the temple and in the
tabernacle of the congregation, and that is just where Erythraea's lamp is placed in the
Sistine Chapel.
For the Middle Ages Erythraea was the sibyl, whose prophecy of the Last Judgment is
preserved to this very day in the Dies Irae of the Requiem. Barbieri's little book, of so much
use in f ormulating the program of the Ceiling, speaks at length about Erythraea's book,
which contained apoem oftwenty-seven lines about the Last Judgment, whose initial letters
in Greek spelled out "Jesus Christ, Son of God, Saviour." In the number twenty-seven, the
cube of three, was concealed according to Barbieri, the mystery of the Trinity-three
multiplied by itself three times. In her book were also explicitly foretold the details of the
Passion of Christ, including the smiting, the boxing on the ears, the spitting, the beating
upon the back, the crowning with thorns, the drink of vinegar and gall, the rending of the
veil of the temple, the three hours of darkness, the three days' sleep in death, the Resurrection,
and the descent into Hell. Some of these prophecies, of course, Erythraea shares with Isaiah,
her neighbor across the Chapel. All are doubtless contained in the pages so grandly exposed
bef ore us, on which Michelangelo has not permitted us to read a single letter.
The noble figure, closely connected with the forms of the nude youths, and clearly studied
f rom a male model, is shown in absolute f acial profile, with her crossed legs parallel to the
picture plane in the manner of some of Michelangelo's early Madonnas, but the extension
of her left arm twists her torso so as to expose the beautiful anatomical structure implicit
under the clothing. The drapery shapes have been simplified to eliminate the merely
accidental and to subordinate all to the great, controlling S-curve of the mantle over the
right thigh.
In color this is one of the loveliest of the sibyls, with her rose bodice bordered in the
same incredibly delicate blue (one of the "beautif ul blues" Michelangelo had ordered) used
for the belt, the headdress, and the lectern. Against these tones play the clear green of the
mantle lighted with golden yellow and its lemon-yellow lining.
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