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Afterlife

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 November 2019

Erin Kathleen Rowe
Affiliation:
The Johns Hopkins University, Maryland
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Summary

The memory of black confraternities has faded into obscurity in both Spain and Portugal. The surviving images, like the history of peninsular slavery itself, have gone largely unseen and unevenly studied, particularly in Portugal; parishioners worshipping in churches containing black sculptures often do not see them, let alone venerate them. Even when an image is recognized as being black, local traditions sometimes emerged to explain away the saint’s blackness. In northern Portugal, for example, a church in the town of Fão houses a sculpture of Efigenia in a small museum, which also sold a guide to the church’s sacred art. The author of this guide knew nothing about the saint – even misspelling her name (“Frigénia”) – so he appealed to local residents for information, which resulted in the following account: The saint had been a beautiful young woman, pursued by many men, but she wanted to become a nun instead of getting married.

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Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2019

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  • Afterlife
  • Erin Kathleen Rowe, The Johns Hopkins University, Maryland
  • Book: Black Saints in Early Modern Global Catholicism
  • Online publication: 25 November 2019
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108367578.008
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  • Afterlife
  • Erin Kathleen Rowe, The Johns Hopkins University, Maryland
  • Book: Black Saints in Early Modern Global Catholicism
  • Online publication: 25 November 2019
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108367578.008
Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

  • Afterlife
  • Erin Kathleen Rowe, The Johns Hopkins University, Maryland
  • Book: Black Saints in Early Modern Global Catholicism
  • Online publication: 25 November 2019
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108367578.008
Available formats
×