Frames and supports in 15th and 16th-century Southern Netherlandish painting

ANTWERP, MAYER VAN DEN BERGH MUSEUM 297 5. Anonymous, Triptych of the Nativity with Gideon . Closed: St Catherine ; St Nicholas with Donor . Open: wings: Annunciation ; Gideon and the miracle of the fleece , last quarter 15th century Inv. no. 0011 Provenance: in the Carlo Micheli Collection (no. 286), Paris, until 1898, when it was purchased from the collector’s heir, Marie Micheli, by Fritz Mayer van den Bergh. Bibliography: De Coo 1978, 130-131; Mund et al. 2003, 304-321. Panels: central panel: two boards, ± 1 cm thick; the wings consisting of single boards, ± 0.6 cm thick. All parts were painted in their grooved frames. The head of the donor was painted separately on metal leaf, and glued on the support. On the reverse of the central panel, one can observe that the left board was split and sawn. The right board carries three oblique marks carved with a marking iron; this board is damaged by woodworm. The edges have been tongued on the four sides and slotted into the frame. There is a narrow bevel at the centre of the top and of the bottom. Frames: through mortise and tenon joints at the bottom (tenon on the stiles), slotted joints at the top of the wings, the joints at the top of the central panel are hidden by a modern slat, and could be either slotted joints or dovetails. On the closed triptych, the joints of the frames are cut square. In the inside, the joints are mitred at the top, and mixed at the bottom where the mouldings rest on the inclined sill, and square for the flat part. One peg reinforces the joints at the bottom, two pegs the joints at the top. The polychromy is recent, overpainting the original black and gold.