Brotherhood of Our Lady
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"(The) ‘Illustrious Brotherhood of Our Blessed Lady’ (Illustre Lieve Vrouwe Broederschap) was founded in 1318 in 's-Hertogenbosch, as part of a more general effort of the Church to gain control over the worship of the Mother of God.(1) It was organized around a miraculous wooden image of the Virgin preserved in St John’s Cathedral in 's-Hertogenbosch.
The Brotherhood had two types of members: ordinary members and sworn members, also called 'swan-brethren' because they used to donate a swan for the yearly banquet. Sworn members were clerics in principle; in fact they were often chosen among the nobility, the magistrates, etc.(2) As a result, the Brotherhood also functioned as an important social network."
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1 G.C.M. van Dijck, De Bossche Optimaten. Geschiedenis van de Illustre Lieve Vrouwenbroederschap te ’s-Hertogenbosch (Tilburg: Stichting Zuidelijk Historisch Contact, 1973). 193
2 One of the more famous members had been the painter Hieronymus Bosch (c.1450–1516); cf. P. Gerlach, ‘Jheronimus van Aken alias Bosch en de Onze-Lieve-Vrouwe-Broederschap’, in: Jheronimus Bosch: Bijdragen bij gelegenheid van de herdenkingstentoonstelling in ’s-Hertogenbosch 1967 (’s-Hertogenbosch 1967), pp. 48–60; G.C.M. van Dijck, Op zoek naar Jheronimus van Aken alias Bosch (Zaltbommel: Europese Bibliotheek, 2001).
