“Pillar-Biters” and Beyond

A common motif in late medieval and early modern Northern European art is the “pillar-biter.” Usually, the pillar-biter is depicted as a man who clings to a column while biting into it, but there are also representations of men and women who embrace or kiss columns. In the iconographic literature, the motif is usually linked to religious hypocrisy and the dissimulation of piety. But why did premodern Europeans associate columns and pillars with religious hypocrisy? To answer this question, the essay explores the pillar-biter motif in four different contexts: visual and linguistic traditions; ecclesiastical discourses and theology; popular piety and material religion; and, lastly, the sea change brought about by the Reformation. The column may seem a mere architectural element to the modern eye, but premodern viewers associated it with a host of religious practices and controversies that have fallen into oblivion.