Hans Holbein the Younger, Volume 1 (of 2) by Arthur B. Chamberlain

Roundel PROVINZIAL MUSEUM, HANOVER ] The little roundel in the Basel Gallery (No. 324) (Pl. 58 (1)),[413] which is about four inches in diameter, forms part of the Amerbach Collection, and, no doubt, came into the possession of Bonifacius on the death of Erasmus. It agrees in all respects with the Greystoke portrait, though only the head and shoulders are shown, and it is not quite so masterly in its execution. It is very possibly the original study made by Holbein in Freiburg, upon which the Greystoke and other portraits were based. It has a plain blue-green background, and is perhaps not quite in its original state. There is a third “Erasmus” at Basel, the small panel in the Faesch Collection (No. 356),[414] a good old copy of the roundel in the Amerbach Collection. All three are mentioned by Patin. It would serve no useful purpose to enumerate and describe the many other versions of the roundel, the Greystoke, and the Longford portraits, which exist in various European collections at St. Petersburg,[415] Cassel, Karlsruhe, Vienna, Turin,[416] Rotterdam, Lausanne,[417] and elsewhere. As already stated, they were in great demand among the admirers of Erasmus, so that numerous copies must have been made. In the lifetime of Amerbach’s son Basilius there were no less than five in Basel, and when Richard Strein of Vienna wrote to him asking him to procure him a portrait of the great humanist, Amerbach, in reply, wanted to know which of the five he would like copied. The copy by Pencz, already described, may have been taken from one of these later portraits rather than from the Longford portrait of 1523. The copy at Rotterdam is said to have been presented by the Basel Council to the Rotterdam Council in 1532. [Sidenote: WOODCUTS PORTRAIT OF ERASMUS] Two other portraits of Erasmus by Holbein cannot be overlooked. These are the two beautiful woodcuts from his designs, which, from the fineness and accuracy of their execution, must have been cut by Hans Lützelburger. The first is a small round portrait,[418] showing the head and shoulders only, in profile, turned to the spectator’s right, seen against a plain background, and inscribed round the plain circular framework “Erasmus Roterodam.” It is evidently of about the same date as the Louvre portrait, and may have been one of the first of Holbein’s designs engraved by Lützelburger, who settled in Basel about 1523. The delicate and rather emaciated features of the scholar have been reproduced with wonderful skill. It was first used on the back of the title-page of the _Adagiorum opus Des. Erasmi Roterodami_, published by Froben in 1533, and again in _Des. Erasmi Rot. Ecclesiastæ sive de ratione concionandi libri quatuor_ (1535). The second,[419] and still more beautiful, woodcut is considerably larger, being 11¼ inches high by 9 inches wide (Pl. 59). In his catalogue Amerbach calls it “Erasmus Rotterdamus in eim Ghüs.” Erasmus is represented at full length, standing, turned three-quarters to the right, in his doctor’s cap and furred gown, his right hand resting on the head of a truncated figure of Terminus, towards which he points with his other hand. The framework or “ghüs” within which he is placed shows to the fullest advantage Holbein’s complete mastery of Renaissance design, and is equal to the finest contemporary Italian work of the kind. It is purer in style, and lighter and more elegant in effect, than the greater number of his earlier designs for woodcuts. Two pillars with caryatid figures, with long beards and folded arms, and baskets of fruit on their heads, support a round arch above which on either side are nude figures with cornucopiæ, from which hang long wreaths of fruit and foliage. The whole is surmounted by a winged cherub above a lion’s head, from the mouth of which hangs a tablet inscribed “ER. ROT.” At the base a larger tablet is supported by two fish-tailed female figures. As a portrait this engraving is as fine as either the Longford or the Louvre pictures. The small head is full of force and character; and equally fine is the expression on the smiling face of the Terminus, while the treatment of the draperies is just as admirable. It is difficult to know which to admire the most, the beauty of the artist’s design and draughtsmanship, or the wonderful fidelity of the engraver, who in cutting it has lost little or nothing of the delicacy of Holbein’s touch, for both are masterly. The original pear-wood block is in the Basel Gallery. Early proof impressions of it are in the British Museum, the Berlin and Munich Print Rooms, and elsewhere. These have a two-lined Latin inscription on the tablet at the base— “Corporis effigiem si quis non vidit Erasmi, Hanc scite ad vivum picta tabella dabit.” (If anyone has not seen Erasmus in his bodily shape, this cut, drawn from life, will give his counterfeit.) The design was evidently made for a complete edition of the works of Erasmus, but no such publication has been met with in which this impression with the single distich appears. The woodcut is first encountered in the complete edition of his writings published by Froben’s son, Hieronymus, and Nic. Episcopius in 1540, with a four-lined inscription, in which Holbein’s name is coupled with that of Erasmus in terms of high praise— “Pallas Apellæam nuper mirata tabellam, Hanc ait, æternum Bibliotheca colat. Dædaleam monstrat Musis Holbeinnius artem, Et summi Ingenii Magnus Erasmus opes.” No one but Lützelburger can have cut it, so that the design must have been made before Holbein’s first visit to England. Why Froben made no earlier use of it, it is impossible to say. VOL. I., PLATE 59. [Illustration: ERASMUS _From a woodcut in the British Museum_ ] [Sidenote: PORTRAITS OF FROBEN] The history of the double portrait of Erasmus and Froben, as far as it is known, has been already given. The version of Froben, at Hampton Court[420]—No. 603 (323)—is a drawing on parchment, afterwards fastened down on a panel, and roughly finished as a picture, and has little of the careful elaboration of Holbein’s painted portraits. It is a half-length figure, less than life-size, turned to the right, the face seen almost in profile. The arms are folded, and the hands, thrust within the sleeves of his brown cloak, which is lined with fur at the neck, are not seen. He wears no cap, and his straight hair is growing thin. The head is seen against what now appears to be a window or opening, sea-green in colour, which is part of the original plain background, afterwards repainted by Von Steenwyck with various pillars and mouldings. In front is a narrow stone ledge, over the greater part of which hangs what appears to be a white cloth, on which is inscribed, “IOANNES FROBENIUS TYP. HHOLBEIN P.” which is not the original handiwork of the painter. The face is a kindly but ugly one, and bears out the character given to him by Erasmus, who was overcome with grief at his sudden death. “All the friends of the belles lettres,” he wrote to a friend, “should put on mourning attire and shed tears at the death of this man, and should wreath his grave with ivy and flowers. Never before have I felt how great is the power of sincere friendship. I bore with moderation the death of my own brother; but what I cannot endure is the longing for Froben. So simple and sincere was his nature that he could not have dissembled had he wished. To show kindness to everyone was his greatest delight, and even if the unworthy received his benefits, he was glad. His fidelity was immovable, and as he himself never had evil in his mind, he was never able to cherish suspicion of others.” There is a similar portrait of Froben in the Basel Gallery (No. 357),[421] an old copy, which was presented to the Basel University by Christian von Mechel, who acquired it as an original work by Holbein from the publisher Enschede at Haarlem in 1792, and was transferred to the Gallery in 1811. In the letter making the gift he speaks of it as softer, richer, and more powerful than the usual Holbein style. A third, and inferior, example was lent to the Tudor Exhibition in 1890 by Sir Henry B. St. John Mildmay, Bt. (No. 134), which is perhaps identical with the small portrait in oil which belonged to Walpole and was sold in 1842 at the Strawberry Hill sale for 19 guineas. The genuineness of the Hampton Court portrait of Froben has been often disputed, and to-day the consensus of opinion is not in its favour. Both Waagen and Woltmann regarded it as a copy, and more recent writers, among them Dr. Ganz, hold the same view. Even those who consider it to be a genuine work by Holbein are forced to own that it is by no means a fine example of his portraiture. The head, however, has more character than is usually found in a copy, and, no doubt, its present condition is due to some extent to the mishandling it received from Von Steenwyck, who probably did not confine his attentions solely to the background. It is possible, therefore, to regard it as an original study by Holbein, which has suffered somewhat severely in the course of years. Mr. Ernest Law speaks of it as a genuine though not first-class example, and refers to the version at Basel as “little more than a clumsy imitation” of it.[422] The Basel Catalogue, on the other hand, says that the latter portrait, which is an old copy or else an original which has suffered severely from repainting, is “incomparably better than the seventeenth-century replica at Hampton Court.” Woltmann considered the Basel version to be merely a late Netherlandish copy,[423] while Knackfuss says that it is “very bad as regards colouring.”[424] [Sidenote: ROUNDEL OF MELANCHTHON] Another friend and correspondent of Erasmus, Philip Melanchthon, was painted by Holbein, though there is no evidence to show when or how they met. The small roundel in oils of the young German scholar in the Provinzial Museum at Hanover (Pl. 58 (2))[425] may perhaps have been done as a pendant to the circular “Erasmus” at Basel. It is almost exactly the same size, about four inches in diameter, and is carried out with an almost equal delicacy and freedom of touch, as though it were a study direct from nature. Melanchthon is shown nearly in full profile to the right, with dark smooth hair falling on his ears, and a scanty beard and moustache. His coat and plain white shirt are open in front, showing the bare chest. The background is grey, but may possibly have been at one time blue. The head itself is not free from retouching. It is preserved in its original circular box, the inner side of the cover being decorated in grey monochrome with a very beautiful design of foliage and fruit intermingled with the heads and figures of satyrs in the Renaissance style from Holbein’s own hand, and across the centre a cartouche with the following inscription in gold: “Qui cernis tantum non, viva Melanthonis ora, Holbinus rara dexteritate dedit,”[426] which is perhaps the sitter’s own personal tribute to the skill of the painter. The style of the Renaissance decoration indicates that in all probability the portrait was painted during Holbein’s third stay in Basel (1528-32).[427] Melanchthon attended the Imperial Diet at Speier in 1529,[428] and a little later visited his mother in Bretten, and it is by no means impossible that he also went to Freiburg to see Erasmus, and that while there, some time during 1530, Holbein painted the roundels of both friends. A second version of this portrait was in the possession of Horace Walpole, in which the inscription runs round the outer edge. It fetched fifteen guineas at the Strawberry Hill sale in 1842, and is now in the collection of Sir William van Horne in Montreal. With these portraits of Erasmus and some of his most intimate friends may be placed Holbein’s own portrait of himself (_Frontispiece_), the very exquisite drawing in the Basel Gallery (No. 320),[429] in which he is represented almost full face, wearing a large red hat, a brown-grey cloak or overcoat with bands of black velvet, and a white shirt tied with strings at the neck. He is beardless, with short dark-brown hair, and brown eyes. The study is on paper, and is drawn in Indian ink and coloured chalks, and washed with water-colour which has faded in parts. This drawing, like the portrait of Holbein’s wife and children, and the one of Von Rüdiswiler of Lucerne by Ambrosius Holbein, has been at some time cut out round the outlines, and afterwards mounted on a greyish paper, which produces the slight effect of hardness which must certainly have been missing in its untouched state.[430] In 1907 the plain blue background was carefully renewed from an old example. Some writers have held that it is not absolutely certain that this drawing really represents the painter. In the Amerbach inventory of 1586 it is described as, “Item ein tafelen gehort darin ein conterfehung Holbeins mit trocken farben (a counterfeit of Holbein in dry colours, _i.e._ crayons), so im grossen kasten vnder Holbeins kunst ligt”; and in the later inventories it is described in much the same way. Knackfuss, among others, says that from these words it is not positively to be concluded that the “counterfeit” was of Holbein himself. There can be little doubt, however, that Amerbach intended to describe it as a portrait of Holbein by himself; if it had been a drawing of some unknown sitter he would have so described it. As far back as 1676 it was published by Patin in his edition of the _Praise of Folly_ as Holbein’s portrait from his own hand. It bears, too, a strong likeness to the portraits of Holbein as a boy by the elder Hans, both in the “St. Paul” picture and in the drawing of 1511 of the two brothers at Berlin. There is the same massive head, with its fine forehead, breadth of cheek-bones, strong chin, and firm mouth. It has great resemblance, too, when due allowance has been made for the passing of twenty years or so, to the miniature portraits of himself which he painted at the end of his life. It may be accepted, indeed, without reservation as a genuine portrait of Holbein, of about the date 1523-5, when he was some twenty-six years old.[431] As a portrait it is a magnificent study. The face is a strong one, of a somewhat serious cast, but with a suggestion of humour about the finely shaped mobile mouth and in the clear brown eyes. The broadly built head with its high forehead indicates strength of character and intellectual capacity, and there is a quiet dignity and a sense of power in the whole countenance and in the carriage of the youthful figure, which one would expect to find in the likeness of a painter possessed, as Holbein was, of such brilliant technical abilities and so wonderful a creative genius.[432] ------------------------------------------------------------------------