The Virgin of Expectation

The sculpted image of the Virgin depicted as pregnant, with her hand resting on her belly and her arm raised, announces the birth of the son of God, according to the Portuguese medieval iconography, which is a realistic interpretation of the line Expectans expectavi Dominum from Psalm 39: 7 (“And now, Lord, what wait I for? My hope is in thee”). These devotional sculptures had been popularised since the Early Middle Ages as representations of “Our Lady of O”, so-called because of the interjection “O” that is recited at the beginning of the seven antiphons chanted during Vespers in the liturgy of Advent. They were the subject of an intense cult centred around the protection of motherhood. This piece was purchased by the collector Ernesto de Vilhena in Ansião.