ABSTRACT
The Virgo Glykophilousa, or the medieval representation of the Virgin and the Christ child showing an intimate tenderness, became, starting in the 1170s–80s, a dominant illustration, if not the main illustration, of the Song of Songs. Four murals devoted to the miracles and relics of the patron saint, Clement, as well as to the life of St Alexis, decorate the lower basilica of San Clemente. Beno de Rapiza, a layman living at the end of the eleventh century, commissioned the set. The stylistic questions that these paintings raise have been debated often and there is no need to cover them again here. However, a few iconographic elements have not, or not sufficiently, captured the attention of scholars. Being the Cappadocian re-elaboration of a model that was probably from Constantinople, the Virgin of Tenderness was widely diffused by the Comneni, during whose era art dedicated itself to the expression of feelings.
