dulce vulnus

Daniel S. Berman (a student at the Graduate Center, CUNY) spoke about this image as one point in his 2026 Kalamazoo paper titled "Fragrance Sweeter than Wine: Sensorial Devotion to Christ’s Side-wound in a Fourteenth-century Cistercian Miscellany." He explained the representation of the dulce vulnus with the text wrapped around it. The Cistercian nuns praying with this manuscript looked at the life-sized image in the course of their spiritual exercises. They even documented medicinal healing which resulted from Sacred Heart devotions. The image is from the "Villers Miscellany" (KBR MS 4459–70, Royal Library of Belgium, Brussels). It was written by various scribes at the monastery of Villers, but was probably used by the nuns at Vrouwenpark.
There are a few articles on this striking image, most notably: Sara Ritchey, "The Wound's Presence and Bodily Absence: Activating the Spiritual Senses in a Fourteenth-Century Manuscript," Sensory Reflections. Traces of Experience in Medieval Artifacts, edt. Fiona Griffiths and Kathryn Starkey, (De Gruyter, 2019) 163-180.