America

c. 1590/1593, published before 1636

Theodor Galle

Artist, Flemish, c. 1571 - 1633

Philip Galle

Publisher, Netherlandish, 1537 - 1612

Printed with black lines and hatching, a man wearing a cloak and holding an astrolabe and a banner stands in front of a nearly nude woman reclining on a hammock in this horizontal engraving. To our left, the clean-shaven man has a bumped nose and soft jowls. He wears a brimless, high-crowned, floppy hat and a cloak over a tunic and stockings. The banner is long and decorated with a cross, and the staff holding it is topped with a cross. The man holds the astrolabe, a circular navigational instrument about the size of a dessert plate, that hangs from a ring with the other hand. The woman has a short, round nose, full cheeks, and her lips are parted. Long hair falls loosely to her waist under a cap-like headdress, perhaps made of feathers. A ring of feathers is around her hips, and a metal band, presumably gold, encircles one shin. On the hammock, she sits up and holds one hand up toward the man. The hammock hangs from two trees near a rocky coastline, which lies to our left. A masted ship with billowing sails is along the left edge of the sheet, and a rowboat is pulled up to the coastline. Animals, including what might be a tapir and perhaps a monkey or tiny bear in one tree, stand or walk through the landscape. In the background, a nude woman sits with a child near another woman and a nude man who roast a person’s leg, cut off from the waist, on a spit over a fire. Another skewer with another leg lies nearby. Inscriptions under the man in the print read, “Ioan. Stradanus inuent. Theodor Galle Sculp.” Text printed under the image reads, “AMERICA. Americen Americus retexit, &  Semel vocauit inde semper exitam.” The print is numbered 1 under the lower left corner.

Media Options

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Artwork overview

  • Medium

    engraving on laid paper

  • Credit Line

    Rosenwald Collection

  • Dimensions

    plate: 20 × 26.9 cm (7 7/8 × 10 9/16 in.)
    sheet: 26.3 × 34.7 cm (10 3/8 × 13 11/16 in.)

  • Accession

    1964.8.1575

  • Catalogue Raisonné

    New Hollstein, no. 323, State iii/iv


Artwork history & notes

Exhibition History

2007

  • Fabulous Journeys and Faraway Places: Travels on Paper, 1450 - 1700, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 2007

Bibliography

1949

  • Hollstein, F.W.H. et al. Dutch and Flemish etchings, engravings and woodcuts, ca. 1450-1700. 72 vols. Amsterdam: Menno Hertzberger, 1952: Vol. VII, no. 411.

1993

  • The New Hollstein Dutch & Flemish Etchings, Engravings and Woodcuts, 1450-1700. (Johannes Stradanus, Marjolein Leesberg, author). Ouderkerk aan den Ijssel: Sound & Vision Publishers, 2008, no. 323, state i/iv.

Wikidata ID

Q65512211


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