Theotokos icons

The Mother of God and Ever-Virgin Mary has long been regarded as the patroness and protector of Orthodox Rus’. She is surrounded by special reverence and the love of believers. In depicting the Virgin Mary, icon painters created the image of a Mother who, knowing of the future suffering of her Son, gives the Divine Infant to people for their salvation from the moment of His birth.

The Orthodox iconography of the Theotokos is quite varied; the main types of her image are:

• Orans
• Hodegetria
• Eleousa
• Panachranta
• Agiosoritissa

The collection of icons of the Most Holy Theotokos in the M. F. Sumtsov Kharkiv Historical Museum consists of almost 30 museum objects. Among them the Theotokos appears mostly as the Hodegetria — the Guide, the one who shows the way. This image is among the most venerated and widespread of the Theotokos icons in Ukraine. At the centre of the Hodegetria composition are Christ, who gives a blessing, and the Theotokos, who holds the Divine Child on her left arm and points to Him with her right hand. Jesus Christ and the Mother of God are most often shown frontally, in calm concentration, their heads not touching. The essence of the image is to show the world the Son, who will become the “heavenly king and judge”, and to show all humankind that the way to Christ and the worship of the royal Infant is the way to eternal salvation.

The iconography of the Theotokos includes a great many icons that go beyond the generally accepted typology. One example is the Okhtyrka icon of the Most Holy Theotokos, which symbolises deep maternal grief and compassion at the foot of the Cross. Its iconography is distinctive: the Theotokos is shown not with the Infant in her arms but as a bareheaded young woman with her hands folded in prayer before the Crucifixion of Christ.