Mary and Eve
Maker: Unknown person of the Red X
Mary and Eve Charger, c.1647
English Delftware, tin-glazed earthenware
Museum no: C.17
Religious motifs were commonplace in 17th-century English Delftware, notably that of Adam and Eve. However, this charger is distinctive in its depiction of Mary and Eve.
Patriarchal Puritan projections at the time were fixated on Eve as a figure symbolising all that is corrupt about female sexuality. Eve is disobedient; she has agency, is viewed as a sexual temptress and is, therefore, seen as morally weak – qualities the Puritans actively discouraged in a woman. In comparison, Mary the Virgin is passive and obedient.
Mary is draped in blue, an expensive pigment used only for nobility, synonymous with purity, humility and the divine. Eve is shamelessly naked beside a strategically draped red robe, the colour associated with Mary Magdalene, the patron saint of sexual penitents.
The divisive moral storytelling establishes a damaging split in the feminine, which is still apparent today.
