Engraving & amuletic shirt for the Christ Child kept by Salzburg nuns.
[Amulet] / [St. Maria Loreto in Salzburg]. [Lorettohemdschen]. S.l. [Salzburg]: s.n., s.a [19th-century]. [6.7 x 6.0 cm], [1] linen shirt hemmed with red thread, with [1] oval engraving on silk of the Salzburg Jesukindl sewn on with thread. Small stain.
[With:]
[Engraving] / [Metric relic]. Wahre Abbildung und Grösse des Heil: Gnaden Kindlein in jenen Häuslein welches des gottseelige P. Ioa. Chrÿso: Capuc: von der hochgräfl. Familia Schenck von Castell beÿ sich getragen und aniezto in dem Closter Maria Loreto zu Salzburg in höchsten Ehren aufbehalten wird. Burghausen: Johann Friedrich Carl (“Carl Sc.”), [second half of 18th century]. [14.6 x 8.7 cm], [1] f. etching. Minor edge wear, very minor toning, remnants of mounting on verso.
$1850
Very rare example of a 19th-century Lorettohemdschen (“little Loreto shirt”) from the Capuchin Convent of St. Maria Loreto in Salzburg, an item likely sewn by the nuns there. These “little Loreto shirts” were produced for pilgrims visiting the much-venerated tiny ivory statuette of the Christ Child (Loretokindlein) tended by the nuns at St. Maria Loreto. This ‘shirt’ is offered here with a very rare 18th-century engraving depicting the Loretokindlein figurine in its actual size.
Lorettohemdschen, also known as Fraisenhemdschen, were especially prized as amulets to be placed under the pillows of infants to protect them from sudden death by Fraisen, a condition variously described as being fevers, epilepsy, or other cramping illnesses (on Lorettohemdschen see especially H. Heres; M. Andree-Eysn; and E. Ettlinger).
Early modern amulets meant to be carried on one’s person were produced in great numbers, but rarely do they survive today due to the wear and tear of daily use. It is obvious why prints on fabric meant to be kept in a baby’s crib would also have very low survival rates.
Note that this Lorettohemdschen, at 6.7 cm in height, is tailored to ‘fit’ the ivory statuette of the Loretokindlein figurine, which is 9 cm tall. The etching offered here is not only an accurate image of the Christ Child housed in its box, but it also is an interesting example of a ‘metric relic,’ given that it depicts the Salzburg Loretokindlein in its actual size (“Wahre Abbildung und Grösse”).
Here is a brief history of the Loretokindlein: A small ivory Christ Child figurine arrived at the Capuchin Convent of St. Maria Loreto in Salzburg in 1651, a gift of Father Johannes Chrysostomus Schenk. Schenk had acquired the figurine from Mother Euphrasia Silberrath von Offenburg, who herself had received the child as a gift from the Countess of Oettingen in 1620. Schenk kept the Child in a small wooden box and communicated with it in various ways. A pilgrimage around the Salzburg Loretokindlein developed from the 1730s. (For a fuller history of the Salzburg Loretokindlein and devotional material related to it, see: B. Rothemund, pp. 98-103; B. Hasslberger, et al., pp. 121-5 & 344-61; and N. Czapka, et al., pp. 56-60.)
The etching offered here was executed in the 18th century by the printmaker Johann Friedrich Carl in Burghausen, located some 30 miles north of Salzburg.
Jesus Christ in his infant form was long invoked for various mystical, visionary, eucharistic, thaumaturgical and even maternal purposes, some of which became concentrated in sculptures/figurines/dolls of the Child kept by nuns in their convents. The daily private practices of nuns caring for the Christ Child in the cloister often ran parallel with a lay interest in the same Christ Child statues, which sometimes developed into popular pilgrimages. Here nuns and their image practice address the greatest fear of mothers: losing a child in infancy to illness.
A copy of the engraving is preserved at Williams College; The ‘shirt’ is not recorded in OCLC, KVK, OMNIA, or Deutschen Digitalen Bibliothek (analogs are, however, known).
*Horst Heres, Das private Andachtsbild: Devotionale, Andenken, Amulett, pp. 98-101; E. Grabner, “Grundzüge einer ostalpinen Volksmedizin,” Mitteilungen des Instituts für Gegenwartsvolkskunde, vol. 16 (1985), pp. 35-62; H. Valentinitsch and I. Schwarzkogler, eds., Hexen und Zauberer: Die große Verfolgung, ein europäisches Phänomen in der Steiermark, p. 84; E. Grabner, Krankheit und Heilen: eine Kulturgeschichte der Volksmedizin in den Ostalpen, p. 61; E. Ettlinger, “The Hildburgh Collection of Austrian and Bavarian Amulets in the Wellcome Historical Medical Museum,” Folklore, vol. 76, no. 2 (1965), pp. 104-117; M. Andree-Eysn, Volkskundliches aus dem bayrisch-österreichischen Alpengebiet, p. 134; B. Rothemund, Gnadenreiche Jesulein: Jesuskindwallfahrtsorte: Entstehung - Geschichte - Brauchtum (1982); N. Czapka, et al., Gnadenreiches Jesulein: Jesusverehrung in der Andachtsgraphik (1998); B. Hasslberger, et al., Seelenkind: Verehrt, Verwöhnt, Verklärt: Das Jesuskind in Bayerns Frauenklöstern (2012).