The Dance of Death / Exhibited in Elegant Engravings on Wood with a Dissertation on the Several Representations of that Subject but More Particularly on Those Ascribed to Macaber and Hans Holbein

by Francis Douce

Among the subjects of tapestry at the Tower of London, the most ancient residence of our kings, was “the Dance of Macabre.” See the inventory of King Henry VIII.’s Guardrobe, &c. in MS. Harl. 1419, fo. 5.

Two panes of glass with a portion of a Dance of Death. 1. Three Deaths, that appear to have been placed at the beginning of the Dance. Over them, in a character of the time of Henry VII. these lines:

... ev’ry man to be contented w^t his chaunce,
And when it shall please God to folowe my daunce.

2. Death and the Pope. No verses. Size, upright, 8½ by 7 inches. In the author’s possession. They have probably belonged to a Macaber Dance in the windows of some church.

---

CHAPTER XVII.

Trois vifs et trois morts.—Negro figure of Death.—Danse aux Avengles.

he first of these subjects, as connected with the Macaber Dance, has been already introduced at p. [31-33]; what is now added will not, it is presumed, be thought unworthy of notice.