File:Illustration-judgement-of-solomon.jpg

English: In perhaps the most famous illustration of the whole Tripartite Mahzor manuscript, decorating the frontispiece to the Song of Songs, we see King Solomon seated on his throne in the company of his animals with the Queen of Sheba in front of him, whom the artist has portrayed with an animal's head in the upper left-hand compartment. It seems to be no pure coincidence that Solomon and the Queen of Sheba appear together at the head of the Song of Songs: Solomon is indicated as the author in the title of the work itself, consequently the Lover can easily be identified with him, while a widespread, old tradition going back to Philon of Alexandria and eminently maintained by Isidore of Seville among others identifies the Beloved, the Bride, with the Queen of Sheba. This tradition enjoyed considerable popularity in the Middle Ages. The Queen, wearing a crown, appears in the company of another zoocephalic female and “three human-headed hybrid acrobat-musicians playing a pipe and a tambourine and ringing a bell.” In the lower left-hand compartment we see Solomon's judgement (1 Kings 3:16-28) – according to a popular tradition the Queen of Sheba assisted at the judgement. The King, wearing gloves, a purple mantle and a crown on his head, and holding a sword, is sitting cross-legged pointing to the Torah, which is in the right-hand turret of his throne, while in the left-hand turret there is a lamp – the eternal light. Behind him two columns of his Temple can be seen. He is encircled by the Sun, the Moon and the stars. On the steps of his throne sit various animals. There is only one known parallel in the synagogue at Dura Europos to this most unique representation, but the difference of nearly eleven centuries between the two is likely to preclude any direct connection and we must conclude that the two artists created similar works on the basis of the same text. At the same time we cannot completely discount the idea that in mediaeval Jewry there perhaps existed a tradition of the transmission of pictorial representations going back to Antiquity and still active in the Middle Ages. This representation of Solomon is remarkable because it unites in one composition, without chronological order, all the main feats of Solomon's career: the completion of the Temple, the judgement, to which he owes his reputation of the wise king, and the adoration of the Queen of the South, which mirrors the universal radiation of his reign. The stars, the Sun and the Moon echo medieval legends perhaps which attribute cosmic power to Solomon.