The Botanical Museum of the Polytechnic Institute of Beja, shows up 6 January 2025, open to the community, in the atrium of the Escola Superior Agrária, the BOTANICAL NATISES Exhibition.
The Nativity Scene takes us back to the Birth of Christ, in Belem, and for Epiphany, when Jesus was presented to the Shepherds and the Magi, according to what is written in the Gospels.
According to Catholic tradition, the first nativity scene would have been set up by Saint Francis of Assisi, in the year of 1223, when, instead of celebrating Christmas Eve in church, did this in a forest on the outskirts of the city of Greccio (Lazio, Italy), where he recreated a representation of the birth of Jesus.
During the Late Middle Ages and Renaissance, the tradition of including the nativity scene in Christmas festivities spread throughout European churches and monasteries, starting, also, to be mounted in the homes of nobles and monarchs.
As this tradition was adopted, more figures have been added, some alluding to regional arts and crafts. In Portugal, the tradition also became established and the nativity scenes created during the 18th century are famous, such as the one kept in the Basílica da Estrela and those kept in the National Museum of Ancient Art, in Lisbon.
The Nativity Scene Collection includes nativity scenes built with raw materials of plant origin and fulfills one of the objectives of the Botanical Museum: conserve and study examples of different cultural uses of plants, in Portugal and in the World. The selection presented here includes nativity scenes built with maple, nogueira, cherry, fir, coconut, gourd, cork, pomegranate, casuarina, corn, rush, carvalho, oliveira, cocoa and hazelnut.
This exhibition includes, also, incense, gold and myrrh offered by the Magi, according to the Gospel of Matthew. Frankincense is a gum-oil-resin extracted from the trunk of trees of the genus Boswellia and myrrh is a similar secretion obtained from trees of the genus Commiphora. Since Origins of Alexandria (3rd century AD) proposed, in the work Against Celsus, the meaning of these offers, that it was accepted by the Church. So, the incense alludes to the divine nature of Christ, gold to his regal nature and myrrh to the human condition, since myrrh was a symbol of suffering.
Source: IPBeja
