1. Van Gogh must be referring to the café proprietor Joseph Ginoux and his wife, Marie, who were friends of his. Ginoux had not signed the petition, but the statement he made to the police confirmed the neighbours’ complaints about Van Gogh’s indecent behaviour. See letter 750, nn. 2 and 3, Documentation, shortly before 27 February 1889, and Ill. 2278 [2278]-2280 [2280].
[2278] [2280]
2. Regarding Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s cabin, see letter 152, n. 9.
3. Charles Dickens’s Christmas books (1843-1845) contained five Christmas stories: ‘A Christmas carol’, ‘The chimes’, ‘The cricket on the hearth’, ‘The battle of life’ and ‘The haunted man’. The book was published in French as Contes de Noël. Traduits de l’anglais avec l’autorisation de l’auteur sous la direction de P. Lorain. Paris n.d.
4. For Edmond and Jules de Goncourt’s Germinie Lacerteux, see letter 574, n. 5.
5. Preceding his hospitalization on 26 February, Van Gogh had painted four versions of Augustine Roulin (‘La berceuse’): F 508 / JH 1671 [2775], F 505 / JH 1669 [2773], F 506 / JH 1670 [2774] and F 507 / JH 1672 [2776]. See letter 748, n. 2. The fifth and last version, which is the one discussed here, was F 504 / JH 1655 [2762]. See Hoermann Lister 2001, p. 73.
[2775] [2773] [2774] [2776] [2762]
6. Jet Mauve-Carbentus and Anna Lecomte-Carbentus.
7. Flaubert’s historical novel Salammbô (1863) takes place in ancient Carthage. It is the story of rebellious mercenaries at the end of the First Punic War (264-241 BC). Their indignation at their paltry pay causes them to launch an attack on Carthage. They threaten the capital with the help of African tribes, but ultimately suffer a crushing defeat at the hands of Hamilkar Barkas.
8. This refers to the so-called ‘Pierre de Carpentras’ (Musée de Carpentras), the Carpentras Stele, commemorating Taba, daughter of Tahapi, an Aramaean lady who was a convert to Osiris. The inscription is in Aramaic and is translated into Latin in the Corpus Inscriptionum Semiticarum. Ab academia inscriptionum et litterarum humaniorum conditum atque digestum. Pars 2. Inscriptiones aramaicae. Paris 1889, tab. xiii, no. 141. The stone dates from the period between the end of the 5th century and the 3rd century BC.
The museum provides the following translation: ‘Blessed be you, Taba, daughter of Tahapi, who have achieved perfection with the god Osiris. You have done no evil deed and you have maligned no one on this earth. May Osiris in person bless you. Receive the waters in the house of Osiris. [Be received at the table of Osiris[?]. Pray, my love, and [be perfect[?] among souls dear to the god’. (Bénie sois-tu Taba, fille de Tahapi, parvenue à la perfection auprès du dieu Osiris. Tu n’as accompli aucune mauvaise action et tu n’as jamais calomnié personne sur cette terre. Qu’Osiris en personne te bénisse. Reçois les eaux chez Osiris. [Sois reçue à la table d’Osiris[?]. Prie, mon amour, et [sois parfaite[?] parmi les âmes chères au dieu).
Van Gogh probably copied the deviant spellings of the names from the untraced ‘old newspaper’ in which he read about this. He mentions the inscription again in letters 764 and 785.
9. This is possibly Portrait of a woman (F 357 / JH 1216). It is not known who the woman was, but she was also the model for the nude studies F 1404 / JH 1213, F 329 / JH 1215 and F 330 / JH 1214, and possibly F 328 / JH 1212. See cat. Amsterdam 2001, pp. 252-253 and cat. Otterlo 2003, pp. 165-167. According to Bernard, this lady was a ‘pierreuse’ (streetwalker) ‘picked up by Vincent, and who was very willing to agree to pose for him’ (récoltée par Vincent qui voulut bien consentir à poser pour lui). See Paul Gachet, Souvenirs de Cézanne et de Van Gogh. Auvers 1873-1890. Paris 1928, unpaginated.
[803] [971]
10. On this subject, see letter 752.
top