An emblem is a symbolic picture with accompanying text, of a type which developed in the sixteenth century and enjoyed an enormous vogue for the next 200 years or more.

By the end of the sixteenth century, organised collections of emblems were applied to religious purposes and used for catechism, preaching and meditation.

Mythology, the Bible but also daily life objects constituted the sources for the symbolic pictures. The angel’s lathe stands as a good example of such practice.

Three Flemish woodturners (Emiel Pelssers, Willy Magel and Hugo Wahlen) have built a replica of this emblem in oak. It sits on a floor of 180 cm x 240 cm and the highest point is at 280 cm.

The story of this emblem and of its context is written in Dutch by literary historian Prof. Dr. Agnès Guiderdoni in the book "Hout in boeken, houten boeken en de fraaye konst van houtdraayen" (The use of wood in books, wooden books and the beautiful art of woodturning) which will be published in March 2008.

The starting-point of a very special collaboration between the library of the faculty of Theology of the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven (Belgium) and some members of the Guild of Flemisch woodturners is an emblem printed for the first time in Antwerp in 1627.

Indeed this particular emblem shows a symbolic pole lathe operated by an angel representing God's love.

The angel uses the spear that pierced the breast of Christ on the Cross as a gouge in order to reshape the earthly globe by turning several kinds of symbols of authority, idleness and wealth away. Thereby the world should be more equal and the human soul a recipient and instrument of God's love.