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Title: The Dance of Death Author: Hans Holbein Commentator: Austin Dobson Release Date: June 10, 2007 [EBook #21790] Language: English Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 *** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE DANCE OF DEATH ***
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
[1] Of this edition Seven hundred
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
and fifty copies have been printed, of which this
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
is Number …71…
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
[2] [3]
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
The
Dance of Death
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
by Hans Holbein, with an introductory note by Austin Dobson
New York Scott-Thaw Company mcmiii
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
[4] Copyright, 1903, by Scott-Thaw Company
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
The
Heintzemann
Press, Boston
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
[5]
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
THE DANCE OF DEATH
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
The Book
"Les
Simulachres
& Historiées Faces de la
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
Mort avtant
elegamtment
pourtraictes,
que
artificiellement
imaginées."
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
This may be Englished as follows: The
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
Images and Storied Aspects of Death, as elegantly
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
delineated as [they are] ingeniously imagined.
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
Such is the literal title of the earliest edition of
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
the famous book now familiarly known as "Holbein’s
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
Dance of Death." It is a small quarto, bearing on
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
its title-page, below the French words
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
above [6] quoted, a nondescript emblem with the
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
legend Vsus me Genuit, and on an open book,
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
Gnothe seauton. Below this comes again, "A
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
Lyon, Soubz l’escu de Coloigne: M. D.
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
XXXVIII," while at the end of the volume is the imprint
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
"Excvdebant Lvgdvni
Melchoir et Gaspar Trechsel fratres: 1538,"—the
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
Trechsels being printers of German origin, who
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
had long been established at Lyons. There is a
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
verbose "Epistre" or Preface in French to the "moult
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
reuerende Abbesse du religieux conuent S. Pierre de
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
Lyon, Madame Iehanne de Touszele," otherwise
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
the Abbess of Saint Pierre les Nonnains, a religious
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
house containing many noble and wealthy
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
ladies, and the [7] words, "Salut d’un vray Zèle,"
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
which conclude the dedicatory heading,
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
are supposed to reveal indirectly the author
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
of the "Epistre" itself, namely, Jean de
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
Vauzelles, Pastor of St. Romain and Prior of Monrottier,
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
one of three famous literary brothers in
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
the city on the Rhone, whose motto was "D’un vray
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
Zelle." After the Preface comes "Diuerses Tables de
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
Mort, non painctes, mais extraictes de
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
l’escripture saincte, colorées par Docteurs
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
Ecclesiastiques,
& umbragées par
Philosophes."
Then follow
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
the cuts, forty-one in number, each having its
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
text from the Latin Bible above it, and below,
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
its quatrain in French, this latter being [8] understood
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
to be from the pen of one Gilles Corozet. To the cuts
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
succeed various makeweight Appendices of a
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
didactic and hortatory character, the whole
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
being wound up by a profitable discourse,
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
De la Necessite de la Mort qui ne laisse riens
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
estre pardurable. Various editions ensued to
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
this first one of 1538, the next or second of
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
1542 (in which Corozet’s verses were
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
translated into Latin by Luther’s
brother-in-law,
George
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
Oemmel or Aemilius), being put forth by Jean and
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
François Frellon, into whose hands the
establishment
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
of the Trechsels had fallen. There were subsequent
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
issues in 1545, 1547, 1549, 1554, and
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
1562. To the [9] issues of 1545 and 1562 a few
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
supplementary
designs were added, some of
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
which have no special bearing upon the general
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
theme, although attempts, more or less
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
ingenious, have been made to connect them with
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
the text. After 1562 no addition was made to the
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
plates.
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
The Artist
From the date of the editio princeps it
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
might be supposed that the designs were
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
executed at or about 1538—the year of its publication.
- 70 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
But this is not the case; and there is good
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
evidence that they were not only designed
- 72 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
but actually cut on the wood some eleven years
- 73 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
before [10] the book itself was published. There are,
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
in fact, several sets of impressions in the
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
British Museum, the Berlin Museum, the Basle
- 76 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
Museum, the Imperial Library at Paris, and
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
the Grand Ducal Cabinet at Carlsruhe, all of which
- 78 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
correspond with each other, and are believed to
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
be engraver’s proofs from the original blocks.
- 80 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
These, which include every cut in the edition
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
of 1538, except "The Astrologer," would
- 82 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
prove little of themselves as to the date of
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
execution. But, luckily, there exists in the Cabinet at
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
Berlin a set of coarse enlarged drawings in Indian ink,
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
on brownish paper, of
twenty-three
of the
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
series. These are in circular form; and were [11]
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
apparently intended as sketches for glass painting.
- 88 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
That they are copied from the woodcuts is
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
demonstrable,
first, because they are not
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
reversed as they would have been if they were the
- 91 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
originals; and, secondly, because one of
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
them, No. 36 ("The Duchess"), repeats the conjoined
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
"H.L." on the bed, which initials are held to be
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
the monogram of the woodcutter, and not to
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
be part of the original design. The Berlin drawings
- 96 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
must therefore have been executed
subsequently
- 97 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
to the woodcuts; and as one of them, that
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
representing
the Emperor, is dated "1527," we
- 99 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
get a date before which both the woodcuts,
- 100 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
and the designs for the woodcuts, [12] must
- 101 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
have been prepared. It is generally held that they were
- 102 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
so prepared circa 1524 and 1525, the date of
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
the Peasants’ War, of the state of feeling
- 104 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
excited by which they exhibit evident traces. In
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
the Preface to this first edition, certain ambiguous
- 106 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
expressions,
to which we shall presently refer, led
- 107 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
some of the earlier writers on the subject to doubt as
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
to the designer of the series. But the later
- 109 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
researches of Wornum and Woltmann, of M. Paul
- 110 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
Mantz and, more recently, of Mr. W. J. Linton
- 111 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
leave no doubt that they were really drawn by
- 112 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
the artist to whom they have always been
- 113 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
traditionally assigned, to wit, Hans Holbein the
- 114 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
younger. He [13] was resident in Basle up to
- 115 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
the autumn of 1526, before which time, according
- 116 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
to the above argument, the drawings
- 117 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
must have been produced; he had already
- 118 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
designed an Alphabet of Death; and, moreover,
- 119 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
on the walls of the cemetery of the Dominican
- 120 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
monastery at Basle there was a famous
wall-painting
- 121 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
of the Dance of Death, which would be a
- 122 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
perpetual stimulus to any resident artist.
- 123 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
Finally, and this is perhaps the most important
- 124 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
consideration
of all, the designs are in Holbein’s manner.
- 125 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
The Woodcutter
But besides revealing an inventor
- 126 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
of the highest order, the Dance [14] of Death
- 127 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
also discloses an interpreter in wood of
- 128 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
signal, and even superlative, ability. The designs are
- 129 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
cut—to use the word which implies the employment
- 130 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
of the knife as opposed to that of the graver—in
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
a manner which has never yet been excelled. In
- 132 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
this matter there could be no better judge than
- 133 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
Mr. W. J. Linton; and he says that nothing,
- 134 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
either by knife or by graver, is of higher quality than
- 135 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
these woodcuts. Yet the
woodcutter’s
very name
- 136 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
was for a long time doubtful, and even now the
- 137 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
particulars which we possess with regard to him are
- 138 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
scanty and
inconclusive.
That he was dead when the
- 139 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
Trechsels published the book in 1538, must [15] be
- 140 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
inferred from the "Epistre" of Jean de Vauzelles,
- 141 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
since that "Epistre" expressly refers to "la mort de
- 142 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
celluy, qui nous en a icy imaginé si elegantes
- 143 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
figures"; and without entering into elaborate
- 144 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
enquiry as to the exact meaning of "imaginer" in
- 145 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
sixteenth-century
French, it is obvious that, although the
- 146 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
deceased is elsewhere loosely called
- 147 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
"painctre," this title cannot refer to Holbein,
- 148 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
who was so far from being dead that he survived
- 149 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
until 1543. The only indication of the
woodcutter’s
- 150 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
name is supplied by the monogram, "HL" upon
- 151 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
the bedstead in No. 36 ("The Duchess");
- 152 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
and these initials have been supposed to indicate
- 153 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
one Hans
Lutzelburger,
or [16] Hans of Luxemburg,
- 154 -
The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Dance of Death, by Hans Holbein.
"otherwise Franck," a form-cutter
("formschneider"),
whose full name is to
- 155 -
The Projec..."
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