Peter Vischer knew how to make a thrifty use of accomplished models. Here, as originally at Hechingen, he repeated the symbols of the four Evangelists which he had used for his Magdeburg masterpiece. The tomb stands upon six vigorous and life-like lions, and, says Lübke, among the various saints who are ranged round the sarcophagus is a Madonna pressing to her breast the Holy Child, who is turning with a quick and very natural movement towards the eldest of the three kings who bring gifts. These are all figures quite in the best manner of Peter Vischer’s early style. And several of the other saints are almost equally good. As usual the details are worked with admirable skill.
The following letters are engraved on this tomb: M. F. W. S. 15 C. Döbner was inspired to interpret them thus: “Meister Fischer und Fünf Söhne”; and again with a second effort: “Meister Fischer Waage Sebaldi 15 Centner.” These interpretations, I suppose, carry with them their own refutation. They do not encourage one to make a third attempt.
CHAPTER IV
THE SHRINE OF ST. SEBALD
“In the Church of Sainted Sebald sleeps enshrined his holy dust,
And in bronze the Twelve Apostles guard from age to age their trust.”—Longfellow.
THE Magdeburg monument, whilst it bears obvious traces of the influence of his father Hermann, of the school of Wolgemut, and of Adam Krafft upon the art of Peter Vischer, is an eloquent testimony also to the rapid development which was taking place in the mind and ideas of this eager craftsman. We have now reached the period when the ideals and the lessons of the Renaissance begin to master his imagination and to permeate his art to such a degree and with such success that the work which was next commissioned from him proves to be the first and greatest of Renaissance works in Germany. The shrine of St. Sebald reflects the history of the artist’s mind. Upon a Gothic base and foundation the spirit of Renaissance detail has overwhelmingly impressed itself. Before we consider this work more closely it will be as well to state the sources whence our Nuremberg craftsman drew his new inspirations. How did he learn his lessons in Italian art?
In the first place it would seem probable that Jacopo de’ Barbari lived for some time in Nuremberg during the last years of the fifteenth century. It is at any rate certain that the influence exerted by his drawings upon the Nuremberg artists was strong and lasting. Further, it was only natural that Nuremberg, lying as it did on the direct trade route from east to north, should be in close communication with Venice and the great towns of Northern Italy. Venetians came to Nuremberg; Nuremberg traders and artists, like Dürer, in their Wanderjahre, went to Venice and returned laden with the fruits of their Italian studies, and copies of the works of Italian masters. The Patrician youths of Nuremberg, also, would naturally sojourn at the Italian Universities at Padua, Bologna, and elsewhere, and they would bring home with them Italian books and wood-cuts, examples of the copper-plates of Jacopo de’ Barbari and of the works of Andrea Sansovino.
But we seek for a more direct and personal source of contact to explain the intimate enthusiasm for Italian art displayed by Peter Vischer. And the secret of this source, which had remained hitherto undiscovered, has recently been made public by the elaborate researches of Dr. Georg Seeger.[[3]]
[3]. “Peter Vischer der Jüngere.” Leipzig, 1897.