For whoever does not have knowledge of the two will never know the difference between them, without which one can never apply whatever definition one makes. Monumental sculptures at Magdeburg in Germany , around four feet tall and constructed c. On the right-hand side of the portal stand the wise virgins, resolute and content as they acknowledge their shared fate with an exchange of gazes and lucid body language: they are the elect, and they know it Figure 1.
On the other side stand the foolish Figure 2. However, this is the fate of the damned. We notice their expressive, furrowed brows, their dimpled chins, downturned mouths, and distinctive nasolabial creases. One foolish virgin seems aloof, as if still in slumber Figure 3. Do you not yet realise? We have been locked out! The parable goes that ten virgins went forth to meet Christ, the bridegroom. Whilst five were wise and took oil with them to keep their lamps alight, the other five were foolish and took no oil.
Christ tarried, and all ten virgins slumbered. On the other hand, the foolish could not see, nor could they obtain any oil from the merchants. Finally, when they begged for Christ at the door, not only did he shut them out, but he did not know them Matthew The earliest artistic depictions of the virgins have been discovered in fourth century catacomb programs carved into the stones of subterranean burial spaces , and initially appeared in the Middle Ages in funerary contexts.
Nestled in microarchitectural niches beside the door opening Figure 4a β the wise on the right and the foolish on the left β these relief figures rigidly conform to the bounds of their frame.
The wise hold their vessels upright whilst the foolish hang theirs downwards, establishing a clear binary paradigm: the wise have oil, the foolish have none Figures 4b and 4c. Examples at Amiens and Chartres follow a similar pattern. These virgins are clearly emblematic markers of the Final Judgement scene they accompany: the wise become the saved and the foolish the damned. These early Gothic depictions present the ten virgins as pure allegory for the saved and the damned.
