The Man of Sorrows and Mater Dolorosa

1512

Wolf Traut

Associated Names
Wolf Traut

Artist, German, c. 1486 - 1520

Hieronymus Höltzel

Publisher, German, 1500 - 1525

The image shows an engraving with two figures depicted from the waist up to the head. On the left is a bearded man with a crown of thorns, appearing topless with visible ribs and blood trickling down from his head and chest. On the right is a woman cloaked in robes with a hood over her head, holding a rod in her right hand which she points towards the man. The background features decorative foliage motifs and various objects hanging from hooks. There is an inset panel with Latin text below the figures, bordered by intricate patterns throughout the design.

Media Options

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Artwork overview

  • Medium

    woodcut with letterpress text, highlighted with red ink, on laid paper

  • Credit Line

    Rosenwald Collection

  • Dimensions

    block (upper): 21.1 × 23.6 cm (8 5/16 × 9 5/16 in.)
    block (lower): 14.7 × 3.7 cm (5 13/16 × 1 7/16 in.)
    overall: 41.6 × 26.5 cm (16 3/8 × 10 7/16 in.)

  • Accession Number

    1952.8.473

  • Catalogue Raisonné

    Hollstein, no. 3, State only

Artwork history & notes

Provenance

(Heinrich Eisemann [1890-1972], London); purchased by Lessing J. Rosenwald [1891-1979], 1951; gift to NGA, 1952.

Associated Names

Exhibition History

1983

  • Nuremberg: A Renaissance City, 1500-1618, Archer M. Huntington Art Gallery, University of Texas at Austin, no. 59, repro.

Bibliography

1949

  • Hollstein's German Engravings, Etchings and Woodcuts, 1400-1700. Vol. XCIV (Wolf Traut, Dieter Beaujean, author). Ouderkerk aan den Ijssel: Sound & Vision Publishers, 2019, no. 3, state only.

1983

  • Smith, J.C. Nuremberg: A Renaissance City, 1500-1618. Austin, 1983: no. 59.

1994

  • Smith, Jeffrey Chipps. German Sculpture of the Later Renaissance, 1520-1580. Princeton, NJ, 1994: no. 2.

Inscriptions

bottom of central woodcut, in the block: ASPICE QVI TRANSIS QVIA TV MIHI CAVSA DOLORIS (Behold [you] who pass by because you [are] the cause of my sorrow); in letterpress type, in two columns below central woodcut: [Sebastian Brant's sixty-eight-line poetic dialogue "Querulosa Christi consolatio ad dolorosam virginis Marie compassionem"]; in letterpress type, below Brant's text: [dedication to Hieronymus Ebner]; in letterpress type, with dedication at the bottom of broadsheet: Impressum Nurermbergeper / Hieronymus Holtzel. Anno.12.; in letterpress type, at the bottom of broadsheet: [2 line indulgence]

Watermarks

bull's head with eyes, nostrils, and the letter T above (similar to Briquet 15172-15178)

Wikidata ID

Q65369192

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