Davidy Bathsheba, and the Penitential Psalms

Abstract

This essay examines the illustrations that accompanied the seven Penitential Psalms in medieval and Renaissance Books of Hours. Until the end of the fifteenth century, the Penitential Psalms were glossed visually by a wide range of subjects, including the Last Judgment, Christ enthroned, David playing a musical instrument, and (most commonly) David repenting for his sins. But from the beginning of the sixteenth century it became customary to represent the Penitential Psalms with an image of David observing Bathsheba as she bathes. Moreover, the subject of David and Bathsheba rapidly migrated from Books of Hours into a variety of devotional, catechetical, and educational texts. It even crossed the Atlantic to colonial America, where, in The New England Primer, it was used to teach young children how to read. These facts not only suggest a shift in attitudes towards penance and sin at the end of the Middle Ages, but also challenge modern assumptions about the historical relationship between sexuality, catechesis, and literacy.

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