Shower of Coins Pillow

Get cozy with this medieval pillow! This colorful canvas pillow features a detail from a Book of Hours in the Morgan Library & Museum’s collection. The image is printed on both sides and comes with a removable polyfill insert.

The image on this pillow is only a part of a narrative told in this Book of Hours. On one page there is a sacred scene known as the Visitation where the Virgin Mary greets her cousin Elizabeth. Mary is pregnant with Jesus, and Elizabeth, with John the Baptist. The adjacent border image, depicted on this pillow, provides a striking contrast. Two youths scramble on the ground, and a man raises his cupped hands to grasp the gold coins thrown down from above, over the jewel-studded wall. The fertility of the saintly figures is contrasted with the sterility of coins. Many medieval thinkers, inspired by the Greek philosopher Aristotle, maintained that money was sterile since it could not reproduce naturally like plants or animals. They condemned usurers and investors who made money multiply “against nature” and hoarded earnings rather than recirculating them and benefiting others.

This pillow is a product made to complement the exhibition Medieval Money, Merchants and Morality on view at the Morgan Library & Museum November 10, 2023 through March 10, 2024.