The image of Our Lady of Częstochowa as a wounded picture

One of the most intriguing and characteristic features of the image of Our Lady of Częstochowa are the dark lines – the scars visible on the right cheek of the Virgin. The scarred face of Our Lady of Częstochowa is a very well known and recognizable religious symbol for Polish Catholics. In the following Chapter, I will present the historical background, as well as contemporary meanings, attached to the scars.

A scientific discussion about the origin of the marks visible on the Jasna Góra picture is strictly connected with research on the genesis and the oldest history of the image and is similarly complex. The oldest written legends recount two events which are to be linked to the appearance of the wounds visible on the picture. The first event is the siege of Bełz, and the second is the attack on Jasna Góra in 1430 (see Table I, points 5 and 7). The stories about the events surrounding the image's scars fall in line with a medieval formula of tales of desecrated pictures. These types of tales were popular in Europe and were strongly rooted especially in the Byzantine tradition. The popularization of legends about the wounding of images was closely connected with a period of iconoclasm.