In the latest and best edition of some new designs for a Dance of Death, by Salomon Van Rusting, published by John George Meintel at Nuremberg, 1736, 8vo. there is an elaborate preface by him, with a greater portion of verbosity than information. He has placed undue confidence in his predecessor, Paul Christian Hilscher, whose work, printed at Dresden in 1705, had probably misled the truly learned Fabricius in what he has said concerning Macaber in his valuable work, the “Bibliotheca mediæ et infimæ ætatis.” Meintel confesses his inability to point out the origin or the inventor of the subject. The last and completest work on the Dance, or Dances of Death, is that of the ingenious M. Peignot, so well and deservedly known by his numerous and useful books on bibliography. To this gentleman the present Essay has been occasionally indebted. He will, probably, at some future opportunity, remove the whimsical misnomer in his engraving of Death and the Ideot.
The usual title, “The Dance of Death,” which accompanies most of the printed works, is not altogether appropriate. It may indeed belong to the old Macaber painting and other similar works where Death is represented in a sort of dancing and grotesque attitude in the act of leading a single character; but where the subject consists of several figures, yet still with occasional exception, they are rather to be regarded as elegant emblems of human mortality in the premature intrusion of an unwelcome and inexorable visitor.
It must not be supposed that the republication of this singular work is intended to excite the lugubrious sensations of sanctified devotees, or of terrified sinners; for, awful and impressive as must ever be the contemplation of our mortality in the mind of the philosopher and practiser of true religion, the mere sight of a skeleton cannot, as to them, excite any alarming sensation whatever. It is chiefly addressed to the ardent admirers of ancient art and pictorial invention; but nevertheless with a hope that it may excite a portion of that general attention to the labours of past ages, which reflects so much credit on the times in which we live.
The widely scattered materials relating to the subject of the Dance of Death, and the difficulty of reconciling much discordant information, must apologize for a few repetitions in the course of this Essay, the regular progress of which has been too often interrupted by the manner in which matter of importance is so obscurely and defectively recorded; instances of which are, the omission of the name of the painter in the otherwise important dedication to the first edition of the engravings on wood of the Dance of Death that was published at Lyons; the uncertainty as to locality in some complimentary lines to Holbein by his friend Borbonius, and the want of more particulars in the account by Nieuhoff of Holbein’s painting at Whitehall.
The designs for the Dance of Death, published at Lyons in 1538, and hitherto regarded as the invention of Holbein, are, in the course of this Dissertation, referred to under the appellation of the Lyons wood-cuts; and with respect to the term Macaber, which has been so mistakenly used as the name of a real author, it has been nevertheless preserved on the same principle that the word Gothic has been so generally adopted for the purpose of designating the pointed style of architecture in the middle ages.
F. D.
CONTENTS.
| Page | |
| [Chapter I.] | |
| Personification of Death, and other modes of representing it among the Ancients.—Same subject during theMiddle Ages.—Erroneous notions respecting Death.—Monumental absurdities.—Allegorical pageant of theDance of Death represented in early times by living persons in churches and cemeteries.—Some of thesedances described.—Not unknown to the Ancients.—Introduction of the infernal, or dance of Macaber | [1] |
| [Chapter II.] | |
| Places where the Dance of Death was sculptured or depicted.—Usually accompanied by verses describingthe several characters.—Other metrical compositions on the Dance | [17] |
| [Chapter III.] | |
| Macaber not a German or any other poet, but a nonentity.—Corruption and confusion respecting thisword.—Etymological errors concerning it.—How connected with the Dance.—Trois mors et trois vifs.—Orgagna’spainting in the Campo Santo at Pisa.—Its connection with the trois mors et trois vifs, as wellas with the Macaber Dance.—Saint Macarius the real Macaber.—Paintings of this dance in various places.—AtMinden; Church-yard of the Innocents at Paris; Dijon; Basle; Klingenthal; Lubeck; Leipsic; Anneberg;Dresden; Erfurth; Nuremberg; Berne; Lucerne; Amiens; Rouen; Fescamp; Blois; Strasburg; Berlin; Vienna; Holland; Italy; Spain | [28] |
| [Chapter IV.] | |
| Macaber Dance in England.—St. Paul’s.—Salisbury.—Wortley-hall.—Hexham.—Croydon.—Towerof London.—Lines in Pierce Plowman’s Vision supposed to refer to it | [51] |
| [Chapter V.] | |
| List of editions of the Macaber Dance.—Printed Horæ that contain it.—Manuscript Horæ.—Other Manuscriptsin which it occurs.—Various articles with letter-press, not being single prints, but connected with it | [55] |
| [Chapter VI.] | |
| Hans Holbein’s connection with the Dance of Death.—A dance of peasants at Basle.—Lyons edition of theDance of Death, 1538.—Doubts as to any prior edition.—Dedication to the edition of 1538.—Mr. Ottley’sopinion of it examined.—Artists supposed to have been connected with this work.—Holbein’s namein none of the old editions.—Reperdius | [78] |
| [Chapter VII.] | |
| Holbein’s Bible cuts.—Examination of the claim of Hans Lutzenberger as to the design or execution ofthe Lyons engravings of the Dance of Death.—Other works by him | [94] |
| [Chapter VIII.] | |
| List of several editions of the Lyons work on the Dance of Death with the mark of Lutzenberger.—Copies ofthem on wood.—Copies on copper by anonymous artists.—By Wenceslaus Hollar.—Other anonymousartists.—Nieuhoff Picard.—Rusting.—Mechel.—Crozat’s drawings.—Deuchar.—Imitations of some of the subjects | [103] |
| [Chapter IX.] | |
| Further examination of Holbein’s title.—Borbonius.—Biographicalnotice of Holbein.—Painting of a Dance of Death at Whitehall by him | [138] |
| [Chapter X.] | |
| Other Dances of Death | [146] |
| [Chapter XI.] | |
| Dances of Death, with such text only as describes the subjects | [160] |
| [Chapter XII.] | |
| Books in which the subject is occasionally introduced | [168] |
| [Chapter XIII.] | |
| Books of emblems and fables.—Frontispieces and title-pages in some degree connected with the Dance of Death | [179] |
| [Chapter XIV.] | |
| Single prints connected with the Dance of Death | [188] |
| [Chapter XV.] | |
| Initial or capital Letters with the Dance of Death | [213] |
| [Chapter XVI.] | |
| Paintings.—Drawings.—Miscellaneous | [221] |
| [Chapter XVII.] | |
| Trois vifs et trois morts.—Negro figure of Death.—Danse aux Aveugles | [228] |
| [Chapter XVIII.] | |
| Errors of various writers who have introduced the subject of the Dance of Death | [233] |