The symbolism of plants in Portuguese Sacred Art in the 16th and 17th centuries: overlooking the collection of the National Museum of Machado de Castro in Coimbra

ABSTRACT: This article presents some contributions for the decoding and interpretation of plants represented in the collection of Portuguese painting from the 16th and 17th centuries of the permanent exhibition of the National Museum of Machado de Castro in Coimbra. For that, Panofsky method of iconographic and iconological analysis was used, resulting in a mapping of the plants represented in five paintings in the collection. The works analyzed were selected, respecting a set of criteria that allowed a standardized reading, naturally considering the technical-stylistic aspects, but prevailing the observation of the symbolic-iconographic character of the elements represented in the painting. Finally, a “conceptual synthesis table” was prepared, gathering, classifying and relating the represented plants, their symbolic meanings and the iconographic and/or biblical references that support this interpretation as paradigms of their symbolism.

Keywords: Plant Symbolism. Iconography and Iconology. National Museum of Machado de Castro.