### DEVOTION TO THE SORROWFUL MOTHER
Devotion to the Sorrowful Mother is a pious practice commemorating the sorrows of the Blessed Virgin Mary during the various events of her earthly life. It has a solid foundation in the Gospel and owes its origin to the contemplation and meditation on the Passion of Christ. However, early Christian documents on this devotion are rare and vague. From Origen onwards (who misinterprets the words of Simeon’s prophecy), most of the Fathers make more or less explicit allusions to Mary’s compassion.
Only towards the end of the 11th century, prepared by ascetical literature, did this devotion begin to take clearer and more distinct shape. Special mention must be made, in this regard, of St. Anselm (cf. A. Wilmart, *Prières de Compassion*, in *Vie Spir.*, Suppl. [March 1928], p. 269; id., *Auteurs spirituels et textes dévots du moyen âge latin*, p. 506), Eadmer of Canterbury, the Blessed Guerric, Abbot of Igny, St. Amadeus of Lausanne, Honorius of Autun, Abbot Oger, Arnauld of Bonval, and St. Bernard (PL 183, 429 sq., 437 sq.). The *Liber de Passione Christi et dolore et plantu Matris eius*, long attributed to St. Bernard, is in fact by another, as yet unknown author. From this time onward, in ritual books, various offices, and collections of prayers, the sorrows of Jesus were increasingly associated in worship with those of Mary. An example of this is found in St. Bonaventure’s *Vitis mystica* (ch. x) and in the various popular *laudi* of the 13th century, especially in Italy and Tuscany. This spontaneous movement of devotion led, in 1233, to the founding of the Order of the Servants of Mary by the Seven Holy Founders, who, according to the *Legenda de origine Ordinis*—a contemporary document—are presented as «Dominae nostrae praecipui amatores» (*Monumenta Ord. Serv. B. M. V.*, I, no. 18, p. 73). The black habit they adopted, according to the cited document, was a mourning garment intended to recall «the sorrow that the Virgin endured in the bitterest passion of her Son» (loc. cit., no. 52, p. 98). While the Franciscan devotional movement preferred to contemplate the Mother rejoicing in the crib, that of the Servites focused on the sorrowing Mary at the foot of her Son’s Cross. It was indeed in the 13th century that the first images of the Sorrowful Mother appeared, and some shrines dedicated to her began to arise, such as that of Marienthal near Haguenau (in Lower Alsace). In that century, numerous compositions in various languages—both prose and verse—entitled *The Weeping of the Virgin* were written. Among these, noteworthy is «the weeping of Mary» contained in the *Stimulus divini amoris* of the Franciscan Fra Girolamo da Milano, falsely attributed to St. Bonaventure.
In the 13th–14th centuries, as attested by the manuscript codex of the *Colloquium* (ms. Garstense, Cod. Lincen C c II 6) and other codices of the time, the determination of the seven principal sorrows of Mary was established, corresponding to the already customary seven principal joys (cf. E. Mâle, *L'art religieux de la fin du moyen âge en France*, Paris 1908, pp. 118–40; A. Wilmart, *op. cit.*, pp. 505–36). According to Benedict XIV and other writers, this would have been due to the Seven Holy Founders of the Order of the Servites.
Hardly worth mentioning is the strange thesis advanced by H. Gaidoz, according to which the Seven Holy Founders drew their inspiration from an Assyrian cylinder (preserved in the British Museum) that passed from the East to the West during the Middle Ages, depicting Ishtar, the goddess of war, seated on a throne surrounded by a trophy of weapons arranged fanwise behind her. This strange thesis was refuted by the Bollandist J. Delehaye (*La Vierge aux sept glaives*, in *Anal. Bolland.*, 12 [1893], pp. 338 ff.). Gaidoz replied in *Mélusine* (6 [1893], pp. 220–75), but without evident success.
Also dating from this period is the extremely popular *Stabat Mater* (q.v.), whose authorship is usually attributed to Jacopone da Todi.
Towards the close of the 15th century, through the efforts of the priest John of Coudenberg, dean of St. Giles in Abbenbroek (Holland) and later secretary to Charles V, the Confraternity of the Seven Sorrows of Mary arose in Flanders. It was approved by the Pope in 1495 (cf. *Anal. Bolland.*, 12 [1893], p. 340) and zealously propagated throughout the world. To further the cult of the Sorrowful Mother, the Servites have promoted many pious practices at various times, such as the Crown of the Seven Sorrows (16th century), the Pious Union of the Perpetual Cult of the Living Crown of the Sorrowful Mother (founded in Florence towards the early 19th century), the pious exercise of the *Via Matris* (originating in Rome, at the church of S. Marcello al Corso, in 1836), the September Month in her honor (arising in the mid-19th century), and the Seven Fridays in preparation for her feast (of recent origin), among others.
The liturgical commemoration of the Virgin’s sorrows was originally observed on Passion Friday, known as the Friday of the Sorrows of Mary. However, in 1688, Innocent XI instituted a second feast of the Sorrowful Mother to be celebrated with greater solemnity outside Lent, fixing it on the third Sunday of September. In 1914, Pius X moved it to the 15th of the same month, in accordance with the well-known prohibition against assigning non-Lord’s feasts to Sundays.
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### ICONOGRAPHY
Depictions of the *Mater Dolorosa* stem from the conception of Mary’s compassion (*compassio Mariae*), understood as in Greek homilies of the 6th and 8th centuries, St. Bonaventure, and other mystics, unfolding alongside Christ’s Passion. Already in miniatures from the late 13th century, the figure of the Virgin appears at the foot of the Cross, her breast pierced by a sword, recalling Simeon’s prophecy (Lk 2:35). After the institution of the liturgical celebration of the Virgin’s sorrows (1423), similar images appear, sometimes with seven swords in her breast, either as independent figures or surrounded by representations of the seven sorrows (e.g., a painting from c. 1500 in Bruges, in *Notre-Dame*). Finally, in the highest spheres of art, statues of the Sorrowful Mother were created by Spanish polychrome sculpture of the Baroque period (Juan de Juni, Herman de Cano [*Soledad* in Granada]).
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