Chapter XV: The Return to Basel (1528-1532) (1)

Return to Basel and purchase of a house—Iconoclastic outbreaks in that
city—Destruction of sacred paintings and sculptures—Lack of work, and
death or absence of old patrons—Portrait of his wife and children—His
relationships with his wife—Completion of the wall-paintings in the
Council Chamber of the Town Hall—“Rehoboam rebuking the
Elders”—“Meeting of Samuel and Saul”—Portrait of Erasmus painted in
Freiburg—Book illustrations—Repainting the faces of the clock on the
Rhine Gate—Holbein’s return to England.

UNTIL the discovery in 1870, by Dr. Édouard His-Heusler,[775] that Holbein purchased a house in Basel in August 1528, it was generally supposed that the painter remained in England until the spring or summer of 1529. In September of the latter year Erasmus wrote letters to Sir Thomas More and Margaret Roper thanking them very heartily for the drawing of the family picture which Holbein had brought to him. This was the study now in the Basel Gallery. Erasmus was then living in Freiburg, and it was supposed that the painter halted there on his way home on purpose to deliver this sketch and letters which he was bearing from Chelsea. This supposition has now to be abandoned.

[Sidenote: HOLBEIN’S PURCHASE OF TWO HOUSES]

There is no doubt that Holbein had received a two years’ leave of absence from the Basel Town Council, and that his only reason for leaving England, where he was busily and lucratively occupied, was the fact that he was bound by the laws of his adopted city to return within the stipulated period, or otherwise to run the risk of forfeiting his rights of citizenship, and incurring other punishment, in addition to possible trouble with his own particular guild. By an order of the Council dated 1521, no one subject to the jurisdiction of Basel was allowed to take service with, or receive pension money from, any foreign prince or community; and this law may have been one of the reasons why Holbein did not enter into Henry VIII’s service at this time, as it would be necessary before doing so to obtain the Council’s special permission, as he did later on in his career.

Holbein’s purchase of a house in Basel was made on August 29, 1528, exactly two years after the date of Erasmus’ letter to Ægidius, given to the painter on the eve of his departure for England. The record of the sale is to be found in the “Fertigungsbuch,” and from the entry it appears that both Holbein and his wife were present in person at the completion of the transaction. It was bought from the clothweaver Eucharius Rieher, and the price was 300 gulden or florins, which shows that Holbein had brought home money in his purse, though only one-third of the purchase price was paid, and the remainder secured by a mortgage. It was a two-storeyed house, overlooking the Rhine, in the St. Johann Vorstadt, next door to Froben’s bookstore, and its site is now occupied by No. 22. Within living memory it was still standing, outwardly very little changed since the days in which Holbein and his family lived in it; as also the smaller cottage next door, which the painter purchased some years later, on the 28th March 1531, for 70 gulden, from the fisherman Uly von Rynach, on part of the site of which a factory has since been erected.

[Sidenote: ERASMUS AND MORE FAMILY GROUP]

Here Holbein settled down to work again, but, if one may judge from the few examples of his brush which can be ascribed to this period, he must have found Basel a far less profitable field for his labours than England. During his absence Switzerland had fallen on evil days. At about the date of his return the religious differences had reached their climax, and in Basel violent outbreaks of hostilities were taking place. At Easter, 1528, the Council had been obliged to give way to the extent of allowing divine worship according to the Reformed ritual in some of the churches, and permitting the removal of all sacred pictures from their walls. The Council, indeed, did their best to prevent sedition. Their recommendation that “no man should call another papist or lutheran, heretic, adherent of the new faith or the old, but each should be left unharassed and unscorned in his own belief,” fell on unheeding ears.[776] Such prudent advice was ill-suited to the passions which had been aroused. In the following year all the Catholic members of the Council were forcibly removed by a mob of armed citizens, and this action was followed by a number of excesses. On Shrove Tuesday, 1529, a furious outburst of iconoclasm occurred. The Cathedral was attacked by a crowd of some hundreds of reformers, who broke open the doors, and pulled down and dashed to pieces all the pictures and altars. The Council issued orders and edicts which were powerless to stay the fanaticism of the rioters, who visited in turn the other churches and monasteries in the city, destroying everything that was not hastily hidden from them. On the following day, Ash Wednesday, the destruction continued. Four hundred men, headed by the public executioner, paid a second visit to the Cathedral, broke up everything that still remained, and of the fragments made five large bonfires. Pictures and wooden images were burnt, wall-paintings were whitewashed over; and however beautiful such works of art might be, their merits were insufficient to save them. The reformers’ hearts were hot against what they considered the gross idolatry of their opponents, and nothing was spared from the fire upon which they could lay their furious hands. Here and there a picture or relic was saved, among them at least one work of Holbein’s, the early “Last Supper,” already described, though it appears to have been badly damaged at the time, and restored later on.[777] No doubt more than one of his pictures perished, together with others by such Basel painters as Urs Graf, Niklaus Manuel Deutsch, and Hans Herbster. His beautiful shutters for the Cathedral organ happily escaped; it may be that they were hung too high to be easily reached, and were thus protected from the first outbreak, and afterwards, when the edict was issued forbidding all sacred pictures in the churches, they would be allowed to remain on the walls under the order which permitted the use of all paintings of a character to which no adoration could be shown.[778] Erasmus, in a letter to Pirkheimer, gives a graphic description of what took place on these two days of fanatical destruction. “There was no one,” he says, “who did not fear for himself, when these dregs of the people covered the whole market-place with arms and cannons. Such a mockery was made of the images of the saints, and even of the Crucifixion, that one would have thought that some miracle must have happened. Nothing was left of the sculptures, either in the churches or in the cloisters, in the portals or in the monasteries. Whatever painted pictures remained were daubed over with whitewash, whatever was inflammable was thrown upon the pile, whatever was not was broken to pieces. Neither pecuniary nor artistic value could save anything.”

This tumultuous state of affairs proved too much for Erasmus, who had a detestation of all forms of violence, and only wished for peaceful surroundings in which to pursue his work. More than one of his noble patrons, from whom he received pensions, objected to his continued residence in a city in which the Protestant party were dominant. He had, too, some fear for his own life; for though he was an adherent of neither side, his opinions were not popular with the reformers. So he now turned his back upon the city which he had made his permanent home since 1521, and in which, old and sickly as he was, he had hoped to end his days, and removed to the neighbouring city of Freiburg, where the Catholic party were in the ascendancy. Thither Bonifacius Amerbach accompanied him, and remained with him for some time.

As Holbein found Erasmus still in Basel when he returned there in August 1528, he must have presented Sir Thomas More’s gift to him on his arrival. There could be no reason for delay unless he had in some way mislaid the sketch. Nor is it likely that Erasmus would have waited for thirteen months before writing to More to thank him; if he had done so, he would at least have made some apology for his remissness. Yet in his published works his letter of thanks is dated Freiburg, 5th September 1529, so that the matter is not easy of explanation, unless this again is another mistake in dating on the part of the editor of the letters. If the correct date of the letters to More and his daughter is 1528, not 1529, then Erasmus wasted little time before writing to More to thank him for the drawing. It seems certain that the scholar, highly delighted with the picture of his friends, and the letters from them which accompanied it, would not let many days go past without acknowledging them.

In his letter to Sir Thomas he says: “Oh that it were once more granted me in life to see such dear friends face to face whom I contemplate with the utmost joy imaginable in the picture, which Holbein (Olpeius) has brought me!”[779] On the next day, September 6th, he wrote to Margaret Roper: “I can scarcely express in words, Margaret Roper, thou ornament of thine England, what hearty delight I experienced when the painter Holbein (Olpeinus) presented to my view your whole family in such a successful delineation, that I could scarcely have seen you better had I been myself near you. Constantly do I desire that once more, before my goal is reached, it may be granted me to see this dear family circle, to whom I owe the best part of my outward prosperity, and of my fame, whatever they may be, and would owe them rather than to any other mortal. A fair portion of this wish has now been fulfilled by the gifted hand of the painter. I recognise all, yet none more than thee, and from the beautiful vestment of thy form I feel as if I could see thy still more beautiful mind beaming forth.... Greet thy mother, the honoured Mistress Alice, many times from me; as I could not embrace her myself, I have kissed her picture from my heart.”[780] In the first letter Erasmus writes Holbein’s name as Olpeius, confusing him for the moment with an old “famulus” of his own, Severinus Olpeius. In the second letter, in which he calls him Olpeinus, he gets nearer to the correct name. In her answer to this last letter, dated November 4th, Margaret says: “Quod pictoris tibi adventus tantæ voluptati fuit, illo nomine, quod utriusque mei parentis nostrumque omnium effigiem depictam detulerit, ingentibus cum gratiis libenter agnoscimus.”[781]

Holbein must soon have discovered that his prospects of remunerative employment were far from promising, when compared with the field he had so recently abandoned. Fortunately he had some little money in his pockets when he returned, and perhaps for some months, before the religious dissensions came to so acute a head, he may have found profitable work. But the outburst in the spring of 1529 put an abrupt end to all painting of sacred pictures or work of any kind for the churches. The 18th clause (“upon pictures”) in an order passed by the Reformation party in that year stated: “We have no pictures in our churches, either in the city or country, because they formerly gave much incitement to idolatry, therefore God has so decidedly forbidden them, and has cursed all who make images. Hence, in future, by God’s help, we will set up no pictures, but will seriously reflect how we can provide comfort for the poor needy ones who are the true and living images of God.”[782] For a painter who had to make a living for a wife and family such conditions were serious enough, for they cut off one of his chief sources of employment. Judging from the numerous studies in the Basel Gallery, Holbein, before his first visit to England, must have been frequently engaged on pictures, wall-paintings, and designs for windows for churches, all of which, with few exceptions, such as the Meyer Madonna and one or two others, perished before the fury of the mob. It was natural that he should look forward to a continuance of work of this nature, and however strongly, in his heart, he may have believed in the Reformation itself, he must have been in little accord with it in its treatment of art. Nor was it a time when the leading citizens of Basel had leisure or desire for so peaceful an occupation as sitting for their portraits. The times were far too strenuous. Several of his earlier friends, and patrons, too, were no longer there to help him. Froben had died two years before he got back, and Erasmus was about to wipe the dust of Basel from his feet, while Amerbach was a temporary absentee. His old friend, Jakob Meyer “zum Hasen,” was still a prominent figure among the Catholic minority, and, therefore, had little influence to place at his service. Under such adverse conditions it is, perhaps, not wonderful that only one panel painting of the second Basel period can be pointed to with any certainty—the portrait-group of his wife and two elder children. This, and the remaining wall-paintings in the Council Chamber of the Town Hall, are the only works of importance of which we have any record.

[Sidenote: PORTRAIT OF HIS WIFE AND CHILDREN]

The portrait of his wife and his two elder children, Philip and Katherine, in the Basel Gallery (No. 325) (Pl. 90),[783] was, no doubt, one of the first things he undertook after his arrival. In any case, it was painted in 1528 or 1529. It is in oils on four pieces of paper fastened together, and at some subsequent time has been cut out round the figures and mounted on a panel, thus spoiling the delicacy of the outlines. The figures are life-size, and the wife, who is seated, facing the spectator, is shown at almost three-quarters length. She wears a dark green bodice without ornament, cut very low and straight across the breast, and a dark-brown over-garment trimmed with a thin band of fur. Her light brown hair is covered by a transparent veil which comes low over her forehead, and a small brown cap on the back of her head. On her left knee she supports a red-haired baby, about eighteen months old, born during Holbein’s absence, dressed in a cap and an undyed woollen garment, while her right hand rests on the shoulder of a boy of about six or seven, with long fair hair, wearing a dark blue-green dress above which the white collar of his shirt is visible. The lad, who is shown in profile, is looking upwards to the right, and presses against his mother’s knee. His head and shoulders only are shown.

The picture is dated, but in the cutting out process it underwent prior to its fastening upon the wood panel, which was done before 1586, as is to be gathered from the Amerbach inventory, the last figure has been shorn away, and only “152” remains. It is almost certain that this date was 1528 or 1529, probably the former, for Holbein, once more united with his wife and family, would be likely to give expression to his pleasure by painting their portraits. In the greater energy of its conception and the vigour of its treatment it more closely resembles the portraits painted in England than his earlier Basel work.

VOL. I., PLATE 90.

HOLBEIN’S WIFE AND CHILDREN
1528-9
BASEL GALLERY
]

[Sidenote: PORTRAIT OF HIS WIFE AND CHILDREN]

There are other versions of this picture in existence, among them a good late sixteenth-century copy in the Lille Museum,[784] which has a blue background. Like the Basel example, it is on paper pasted upon wood, but it has not been cut out round the outlines, while on a piece of paper added to the top of the panel there is an inscription in gold, which runs—

“Die Liebe zu Gott heist Charitas,
Wer Liebe hatt der tragtt kein hass,”

thus turning it into a representation of Charity. A second[785] example, though a work of no particular skill, is of interest because it gives what was probably the background of the original work before it was cut down, one of those architectural compositions with pilasters and an ornamental frieze which Holbein so frequently used as a setting for his earlier portraits, part of which forms a high-backed seat in which the wife is placed. This copy, which belongs to Herr E. Trümpy, of Glarus, shows some small differences, in the boy’s hair, the folds of the draperies, &c., but it has suffered so much that it is difficult to pass judgment upon it. It must have been painted before the original work was cut down towards the end of the sixteenth century. That the picture represents the painter’s wife and children is certain, for it was in the possession of Amerbach, whose son entered it in his inventory as “Holbeins fraw vnd zwei kinder von im H. Holbein conterfehet vf papir mit olfarben, vf holtz gezogen.”

This picture is painted with greater breadth and freedom than was his custom. The delicacy of handling which marked almost all that he did has given place to a more rapid but none the less truthful execution. The baby is by no means a beautiful child, and the mother’s plainness of countenance is almost repulsive at the first glance. Her expression is one of deep dejection, her face careworn and unhappy, and her eyes are rimmed with red, suggesting ill-health or sorrow. The grouping is unconventional, and it may be that the artist began to paint them just as he happened to see them, without any elaborate posing or attempt to make a picture of them. The wonderful truth with which he has realised them, however, the fine rich colour, and the luminous painting of the flesh tones, combine to make it one of his greatest works, in the study and appreciation of which the want of physical beauty in the principal sitter and the severe plainness of the costumes are overlooked and forgotten. Though only six years later than the Solothurn Madonna and the portrait at the Hague, Elsbeth Holbein has already lost all appearance of youth, and the cares of life have left heavy traces behind them. Her features are now not merely homely, but heavy and uninteresting, while her figure is solid, ample, and ungraceful. Yet it is still possible to recognise the likeness, no doubt somewhat idealised in the earlier work, but here set down with remorseless truth. The cause of this loss of youth and good looks, due, according to some modern critics, to Holbein’s neglect and his infatuation for Magdalena Offenburg, has been touched upon in an earlier chapter. M. de Wyzewa, who is one of those who hold this theory, regards this Basel family group as one of the few pictures in which Holbein completely reveals his artistic soul. “I doubt,” he says,[786] “if there exists in the world another painting comparable to this for subtle and dolorous beauty of expression.” In its revelation of truth it is an act of accusation against the painter himself, such as is not to be found in any written account of him by his contemporaries, who, it is suggested, influenced by his importance as an artist and by his connection with big and influential people, did not think it wise to speak the truth about him. It was Magdalena who was the chief cause of this domestic misery, we are told. She was “l’odieuse rivale qui l’a dépouillée de sa beauté et de son bonheur, et de toute sa fortune par-dessus le marché, qui a réduit l’exquise jeune femme du portrait de la Haye à devenir le fantôme navrant du portrait de Bâle; voilà peut-être le grief qui aura pesé le plus cruellement sur le cœur ulcéré d’Elisabeth Holbein! Et qui sait si ce remords-là ne s’est point dressé au premier plan dans l’âme du peintre lui-même, lorsqu’en 1529 celui-ci a éprouvé le besoin de nous crier sa confession de mari et de père, en même temps qu’il allait nous révéler la puissante, l’émouvante grandeur de son génie d’artiste?”

The boy in the picture, who appears to be six or seven years old, may well have been the model for the Infant Christ in the Solothurn Madonna. The group has been painted with a speed and spontaneity which is not usual in Holbein’s portraits, with their minute finish and careful elaboration of details. This unwonted vigour of handling, however, gives to it a freedom and a largeness which make it unique among the varied manifestations of his genius. It has many of the qualities of a brilliant sketch, in which both likeness and character have been set down with direct and masterly power.

VOL. I., PLATE 91.

PORTRAIT OF A YOUNG WOMAN
_Unfinished study in oils_
BASEL GALLERY
]

A very remarkable portrait study of a young woman in the Basel Gallery (No. 326) (Pl. 91),[787] which comes from the Faesch Cabinet, bears a close resemblance to the Family Group, and is ascribed by Dr. Ganz to the same year, 1528, to which it undoubtedly belongs. The subject, evidently a woman of Holbein’s own class, is extremely plain, with heavy features, and dark eyes and hair. She is represented to the waist, turned slightly to the spectator’s left, her long hands, with numerous rings, crossed in front of her. It is drawn with the pencil, and coloured with oil colours thinly laid on and mixed with white upon a red-toned ground. The background is a plain, deep blue. It is unfinished, the turban-like cap, and the outer bodice of the dress having the colour only slightly indicated. It is of the utmost interest, as it affords evidence of Holbein’s methods of working at this period, methods which he employed in painting his wife and children, also done in oils on paper; and it is, in addition, a wonderfully powerful study in portraiture, lifelike, vigorous, and subtle.

[Sidenote: RESUMES WORK IN COUNCIL CHAMBER]

Little is known of Holbein’s work in Basel during this period. No other portrait from his brush has been so far discovered; but, happily for him, in the summer of 1530 the Town Council found some employment for him worthy of his great talents, work which occupied him for the remainder of the year. They resolved to finish the internal decoration of their Council Chamber, which Holbein had left incomplete some years earlier, and he was naturally selected as the painter most fitted to do it. For this work he received in all 72 florins, in four separate payments between July 6 and November 18, 1530, a sufficiently modest sum for five months’ work, which included at least two large wall-paintings; but, nevertheless, better pay than he had gained for his earlier frescoes in the same room, for the original arrangement was that he should decorate the whole chamber for the sum of 120 gulden, and for that sum he had covered all but the “back wall” with large pictures.

The new subjects, which may have been selected in 1521, when the work was first begun, were “Rehoboam rebuking the Elders of Israel,” and “The Meeting of Samuel and Saul.” A third subject, “Hezekiah ordering the Idols to be broken in pieces,” was probably only one of the single figures which were placed between the larger compositions. Unlike the earlier wall-paintings, of which the subjects were taken from classical antiquity, the ones upon which Holbein was now occupied were drawn from the Old Testament, and were selected for the purpose of setting forth the evil effects of bad government and the punishment which follows the obstinacy of rulers who oppose their will to the will of God. The “Hezekiah”[788] was chosen, no doubt, as an apt illustration of the wisdom of obeying the commands of God in the sweeping away of all false idols and images, as exemplified in the iconoclastic outbreaks in Basel itself in the previous year, the painting of which Holbein must have undertaken with mixed feelings.

VOL. I., PLATE 92.

“KING REHOBOAM REBUKING THE ELDERS”
Three fragments of the wall-painting formerly in the Basel Town Hall
1530
BASEL GALLERY
]

VOL. I., PLATE 93.

REHOBOAM REBUKING THE ELDERS OF ISRAEL
Study for the wall-painting in the Basel Town Hall, 1530
BASEL GALLERY
]

Two fine preliminary designs for the “Rehoboam” and the “Samuel and Saul” form part of the Amerbach Collection, drawings which may have been made as early as 1521. Among the few fragments of the original wall-paintings preserved in the Basel Gallery, there are two showing the head and the raised hand with pointing little finger of Rehoboam (No. 328) (Pl. 92 (3)),[789] the head being drawn in profile, whereas in the study it is full face, indicating a change in the design when carried out on the wall. In the centre of the composition, as shown in the drawing (Pl. 93),[790] King Rehoboam, seated upon a lofty throne beneath a rich canopy backed by a curtain decorated with a fleur-de-lys device, bends forward, his left hand stretched before him in vehement action, with little finger extended towards the group of Israelitish elders standing below him, some of whom turn away in despair. With his right hand he points to a scourge held by an attendant on the left. The moment depicted is when he cries out in a rage: “My little finger shall be thicker than my father’s loins; my father hath chastised you with whips, but I will chastise you with scorpions.” Behind the throne, within the rails enclosing a large vaulted chamber in the Renaissance style, are a number of figures, on the one side the older councillors who had served his father, Solomon, whose advice he neglected, and on the other the younger courtiers whose bad counsel he followed. On the right of the composition is a glimpse of a hilly landscape, with the Crowning of Jeroboam by the revolted tribes in the middle distance. The drawing is washed in Indian ink, with touches of colour in the sky, in the circular openings at the back of the hall, in the landscape, the faces of the figures, and the rails and the floor. The story is told very simply and clearly, but with considerable dramatic force, such as would make an instant appeal to those for whom the lesson it contained was intended. The figures are rather short and stumpy, a fault to be noticed in many of Holbein’s earlier designs for books, wall-paintings, and painted glass; but the composition is a dignified one, and the large painting based upon it must have been a noble work. As stated above, the fragments of the original painting which have been preserved show that Holbein deviated from the sketch in essential points. The head of Rehoboam, which is a masterpiece of strong expression, is seen in sharp profile. There are also in the same Gallery two fragments containing groups of heads of the Israelite Messengers (No. 329) (Pl. 92 (1 and 2)).[791] Traces of gold are still visible on these remains of the original work, showing that Holbein made use of gilding in wall-paintings as well as in portraits.

[Sidenote: “THE MEETING OF SAMUEL AND SAUL”]

The wall-painting of “Samuel and Saul” was the largest of all the decorations in the Council Chamber, and that it was painted side by side with the “Rehoboam” on the only wall in the room unbroken by door or window is evident from the fact that in the sketches the same dividing column appears in both. It was probably about 7 or 8 feet high by 16 or 17 feet long, and if the same proportion was preserved in both designs, the “Rehoboam” must have been about 13 feet long. The moment chosen for representation is the return of Saul from his conquest of the Amalekites, and his meeting with the Prophet Samuel. Instead of obeying the command of God, and destroying men, women, children, and flocks, he has spared them, and carried them and much spoil away with him. Samuel has come forth in anger, and Saul, perceiving him, has dismounted, and advances to meet him bent in reverence. The prophet heaps reproaches upon him. “Hath the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices as in obeying the voice of the Lord? Because thou hast rejected the word of the Lord, He hath also rejected thee from being king.” The right half of the composition is crowded with foot-soldiers and horsemen, wearing Roman helmets, among whom the conquered King Agag is borne captive. In the distance are seen the captured herds and flocks, and the burning villages on the hillsides. The composition is a finely-balanced one, and the noble, menacing figure of the Prophet is well contrasted with the cringing figure of the King, conscious, now that the flush of victory is passing, that he has failed to fulfil the sacred commands. The army behind him is most effectively grouped, and the soldiers’ lances, seen darkly against the sky, produce much the same effect of grandeur and of numbers as in Velazquez’s great picture. In the left upper corner is a long white tablet—no doubt in the finished painting it was shown hanging from the painted framework surrounding the picture—on which the Latin text, quoted by Tonjola, was inscribed.

The sketch (No. 347) (Pl. 94)[792] has been slightly washed with colour, blue in the sky, the stream in the middle distance, the trees, and the hills, and brown over the landscape, which combines with the blue to produce green in the trees and hillsides, while the flames from the burning villages are bright red. The figures are drawn in brown and shaded with a wash of cool grey. It is not possible from this, however, to gain much idea of the actual colouring of the wall-painting, but, from the darting flames and the volumes of heavy smoke rolling across the sky and blotting out a part of the landscape, it is possible that the general effect attempted was one of strong contrasts of chiaroscuro, such as are to be seen in the Basel Passion picture. Still, the sketch, small as it is, affords ample evidence of the greatness of Holbein’s power of design in large compositions crowded with figures, and emphasizes the seriousness of the loss suffered through the destruction of the whole of his wall-paintings and larger decorative works.

VOL. I., PLATE 94.

SAMUEL AND SAUL
Study for the wall-painting in the Basel Town Hall
_Pen drawing in brown touched with water-colour_
BASEL GALLERY
]

Beyond the Town Hall frescoes, little remains to show in what manner he was employed during the remainder of his stay in Basel. There is a fine design for a dagger-sheath, richly decorated with Renaissance ornament, in the Basel Gallery, dated 1529 (Pl. 45 (1), Vol. ii.);[793] but this is the only work of the kind that can be given definitely to this period, though possibly some of the other designs for dagger-sheaths and bands of ornament in the Basel Gallery, described in a later chapter,[794] were made during these years. He also produced a number of designs for woodcuts, among them a series of illustrations for the _Cosmography_ and several astronomical works by Sebastian Münster of Munich, published by Heinrich Petri. Münster was in Basel in the autumn of 1529, and it is possible, so Dr. Ganz suggests,[795] that his fellow-townsman, Niklaus Kratzer, whose portrait Holbein had so recently painted, drew his attention to the artist’s skill in the delineation of scientific and mathematical instruments, such as Münster required for the illustration of his books. In this way, no doubt, the author and the artist came into personal contact. Holbein drew for him a number of fine designs, such as figures representing the signs of the Zodiac, drawings of sun-dials, and a variety of mathematical and astronomical instruments, and a great astronomical table, first published in 1534, but starting from the year 1530, with ornamental accessories and representations of the four seasons, a work of great beauty.[796]

He also painted a new portrait of Erasmus, most probably in Freiburg, for the portrait at Parma, which is one of the best of various almost contemporary copies, is dated 1530. The small circular picture in the Basel Gallery is very possibly the original study painted directly from the sitter. These portraits and the roundel of Melanchthon in the Provinzial Museum at Hanover, which is probably of the same period, have been described in a previous chapter.[797]

[Sidenote: REPAINTING OF RHINE GATE CLOCK]

There is only one other record to show that he received any further employment from the civic authorities after the completion of the Town Hall paintings. On October 7, 1531, he was paid “17 pfund 10 schilling,” or fourteen gulden, for repainting the two clocks on the Rhine Gate (“von beden Uren am Rinthor zemalen”).[798] This commission was for renovating the two faces of the old clock, which was decorated with the grotesque figure of the “Lallenkönig,” with distorted countenance stretching out his tongue towards Little Basel. This undertaking seems very paltry after the big decorative works upon which he had been occupied twelve months earlier, but was apparently all that the authorities had to give. It is an exaggeration, however, to speak of it, as some writers do, as contemptible work for an artist of his standing. Mrs. Fortescue says of it: “As soon as Holbein got his pay for this disgraceful commission—a pay he was now much too hard pressed to refuse—he quietly slipped away from Basel without taking the Council into his confidence.”[799] To Holbein, who by no means regarded himself as a portrait-painter only, but to whom all decorative work, however large or however small, was equally an occasion for giving of the best that was in him, the ornamentation of a clock face would in no ways appear to be work in any way disgraceful or beneath him; nor is there the slightest evidence to show that he ran away from Basel like a thief in the night. Throughout his life, indeed, his methods were orderly, and such as became a citizen and guildsman of his adopted town. He must, nevertheless, have suffered many anxieties, for times were unpropitious in Basel, and offered few opportunities for the remunerative practice of the fine arts.

Both in 1529 and 1530 great scarcity prevailed. The religious excitement, too, grew in strength, and the Protestant persecutions became as severe as the papal ones which had preceded them. Holbein himself fell under suspicion. On June 18, 1530, just when he was beginning to work on the Town Hall frescoes, he was called upon, together with a number of other citizens, to justify himself for not having taken part in the Communion instituted in the Basel churches after the abolition of the Catholic ritual in 1529. He gave as an answer that he demanded, before approaching the Lord’s Table, that the signification of the holy mystery should be better explained to him. It appears that the information given to him was sufficient to satisfy his conscience, as he did not persist in his refusal. His friend, Bonifacius Amerbach, was more obdurate, and so had the ban passed upon him.

In 1531 open war broke out between the different cantons, through stress of religious differences. This was possibly the last straw in Holbein’s case. Work growing daily more difficult to obtain, his thoughts would naturally turn to the happier fields for his genius which England afforded, and he determined to return there. The exact date of his departure is unknown, but it must have been towards the end of 1531 or in the early spring of 1532; perhaps the latter date is the more probable of the two, as the journey, in the way in which he would be forced to make it, would be an unpleasant, if not a difficult, one in winter.[800]

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POSTSCRIPT TO CHAPTER XIV

A NEWLY DISCOVERED PORTRAIT OF AN UNKNOWN ENGLISH LADY

THE discovery of a new portrait by Holbein must always be a matter of the highest interest to students of the master’s art, and when the panel so discovered is one in practically faultless condition and of exceptional attraction, its importance as an addition to the list of the painter’s works cannot be easily exaggerated. It is pleasant, therefore, to have to record the fact that such a portrait was brought to light for the first time during the present year (1913). The portrait in question formed part of a collection of pictures and engravings removed from Rotherwas House, near Hereford, the seat of the Bodenham family, early in the year, the greater number of which were sold by auction in London last February. The Holbein picture, however, was first heard of at a sale at Messrs. Puttick and Simpson’s rooms in Leicester Square on April 8th. It was in a very dirty state, and its beauty was almost entirely obscured by a thick coat of dark varnish, with which it had been covered some two centuries or more ago. It had also two slight abrasions above and below the right eye. Across the left sleeve was painted in white, in late eighteenth-century lettering, the inscription “Margaret Tudor, Queen of Scotland.” This attribution, however, was changed by the compilers of the sale catalogue to “Mary, Queen of Scots,” and it was described as by an unknown artist of the early English School. The bidding for this picture started at £10, and it was finally acquired for 340 guineas by Mr. Ayerst H. Buttery.

Upon careful cleaning the false inscription at once came away, and after the removal of the varnish the picture was found to be, as already stated, in a practically faultless condition—except for the two small abrasions—and in the original state in which it was left by the artist, thanks, no doubt, to the varnishing process it had undergone. It is unsigned, and has no inscription giving the name and age of the sitter, but in spite of this it is difficult to doubt its authorship. Holbein was the only painter then in England who possessed so fine a technique. It has been carefully examined by several leading authorities on the painter, among them Dr. Friedländer, of the Kaiser Friedrich Museum, Berlin, and all are agreed that it is a splendid example of Holbein. A detailed description of it, with several suggestions toward the solution of the identity of the sitter, was first published by Mr. Maurice W. Brockwell, in the _Morning Post_ of June 28, 1913.

VOL. I., PLATE 95.

PORTRAIT OF AN UNKNOWN ENGLISH LADY
(Formerly in the possession of the Bodenham family, Rotherwas Hall,
Hereford)
_Reproduced by kind permission of Mr. Ayerst H. Buttery_
]

It is on panel, 31 inches high by 23½ inches wide (Pl. 95). The lady is shown full face, and almost three-quarters length, holding with both hands a very small open prayer-book or breviary, which is attached to a ribbon round her waist by a plain chain. The dress is of deep maroon satin, with the upper part of the bodice of black velvet. The latter is open at the throat, the points of the collar being turned back, showing the white lining. This style of collar occurs very rarely in Holbein’s pictures, and is to be seen in only two others of his finished portraits of ladies—those of Catherine Howard and Lady Butts. In these two, however, the “revers” are quite plain, whereas in Mr. Buttery’s picture they are richly embroidered in black with a floral design, suggesting carnations, conventionally treated, while round the edge runs a narrow border with a row of conventionalised flowers of a somewhat similar pattern, which occurs again on the white ruffs at her wrists. Her long and thin arms are encased in tightly fitting sleeves, terminating in the then fashionable “hanging” or “over” sleeves, partly of black velvet, which are exceptionally full and heavy, with slashings filled in with white silk embroidered in black with a design suggesting acorns arranged in groups of four. The skirt, or petticoat, of which little can be seen, shows an elaborate floral pattern. The lady wears no rings, but has a plain gold chain wound twice round her neck. The collar of the bodice is fastened together by a small brooch or pin set with a dark “table” stone, from which is suspended a circular medallion or pendant of gold and enamel, with the figure of a lady in a red dress, seated in a high-backed chair, and playing a lute or viol. Above this figure is a scroll with the legend, “Praise the Lord for evermore.” The whole is enclosed within a border of scroll-work, with a grotesque head in white enamel on either side, green leaves at the bottom and a red rose at the top. The head-dress is of the curved shape introduced from Paris, and not the more customary angular English hood. It has two bands of elaborately wrought goldsmith’s work, and is filled in with cerise-red satin, which makes a very beautiful colour contrast with the plain blue-green background, against which the head is so effectively placed. The arrangement of the fair hair, such of it as can be seen, is both unusual and attractive, being parted in the centre, while on either side bands, of slightly lighter colour than the rest, are brought forward over the ears, which are completely hidden. Individual golden hairs are indicated against the dark background, and both hair and head-dress have been rendered with all Holbein’s minute and loving care and dexterity of draughtsmanship.

The face is a most expressive one. Both the mouth and the grey, contemplative eyes are full of character, suggested in the most subtle manner and with unerring brushwork. The modelling of the flesh is of extraordinary delicacy. The lady, whoever she may be, though not perhaps strictly beautiful has considerable pretensions to good looks, and her whole personality, indeed, is one of great charm. The colour-scheme, too, is one of exceptional attraction. The contrast between the sombre-coloured garments with glinting lights upon them, and the pale and pearl-like face, standing out against the blue-green of the background, is most harmonious, and the band of red in the head-dress adds to and sets off the delicate blondness of her features. Another point to be noted is the skill with which the slight ripples in the plainly-cut bodice and upper sleeves have been indicated, as well as the little inequalities and furrows in the satin of the head-dress, where the material has slightly puckered at the edge by which it is fastened to the ornamental bands. The portrait, indeed, is one of the most beautiful and attractive ever produced by the painter.

Little or nothing is known of the history of this picture, and at present the identity of the sitter has not been established. The ancient family of Bodenham was settled at Rotherwas long before Henry VIII came to the throne. It was the recent death of Mr. Charles Bodenham, the last direct descendant of this family, which brought about the sale of the estate together with the family mansion and the whole of its contents. “The entire property,” says Mr. Brockwell, “seems to have been first purchased by a firm at a south coast watering-place, who being in no special way attracted by the æsthetic and financial value of the contents of the house, without much ado proceeded to pass them on to a well-known trading firm in Hereford. Fifty-three pictures and thirty-five engravings were disposed of at the end of February last by auction in London. Before that time, it is understood, a picture”—the picture now in question—“had been, for sentimental reasons, offered for £15 to distant connections of the Bodenham family, an offer that was not accepted, and it was ultimately put up for sale at Messrs. Puttick and Simpson’s.” The Tudor panelling of the house was sold for a great sum of money to an American collector.

Thomas Bodenham was one of the leading gentlemen of Herefordshire during Henry VIII’s reign. His name occurs frequently on lists of sheriffs, magistrates, gaol deliveries, and the like, in his own county, but otherwise there is no mention of him in the _Calendars of Letters and Papers_, and he does not appear to have been attached to the Court. It is not, therefore, very probable that the portrait represents his wife or daughter, though this would provide the most natural solution of the sitter’s identity. Most critics who have seen the picture are decidedly of the opinion that it was produced during Holbein’s first visit to England, in 1526-8, an opinion based largely on the painting of the hands, undoubtedly the least satisfactory part of the panel. They are hard and stiff in the modelling, and have none of the expressiveness which is so marked a characteristic of Holbein’s painting of hands during the last ten or twelve years of his life. In some other respects the picture shows qualities which would seem to place it some years later in the painter’s career, towards the beginning of his second and longer residence in this country. One feature which may possibly indicate a later date than 1527 is the dress, and more particularly the French hood. It is true that instances are known of the wearing of this head-dress in England as early as 1527, but at that time its use seems to have been confined to a few ladies of the highest aristocracy about the Court. The angular hood with its long black fall was then the almost universal headgear, and remained so for some years longer. The fashion of the latter, and the method of wearing it, can be well seen in Holbein’s costume study of a lady in the British Museum. (No. 11 in Mr. Binyon’s Catalogue. Not in Woltmann. Reproduced by Ganz in _Die Handzeichnungen von Hans Holbeins des Jüngeren_, x. 4.) This drawing consists of two whole-length studies on one sheet. In one of them the lady stands turned three-quarters to the left, her hands in front of her, holding a rosary; in the other she is seen more from the back, the left hand raised and pointing. It is in Indian ink and brush outline, partly washed with Indian ink, and the flesh tints in red. It is signed twice, “H. H.” and “H. H. B,” but these signatures are false. An excellent idea of the costume of the period and of the method by which the fall was attached to the hood can be gained from this effective drawing, which was formerly in the Malcolm and Lawrence collections.

The lady of the picture appears to be about twenty-two or twenty-three years of age, and it is, of course, quite impossible that she can be Margaret Tudor, whose features are well known, and who was nearly forty in 1527, while Mary, Queen of Scots, born in 1542, is still more impossible. The “French Queen,” Mary Tudor, the King’s second sister, was born in 1498, and so was twenty-nine in 1527; but here again several authentic portraits of her exist, and these bear little or no resemblance to Mr. Buttery’s lady. It must be remembered, too, that all evidence points to the fact that Holbein had no connection with the Court during his first visit to England. It is very probable that the luting figure on the medallion is intended to represent St. Cecilia, and that the sitter, as Mr. Brockwell points out, was named after her. This suggested to him that it might be a portrait of Sir Thomas More’s second daughter, Cecilia Heron, who was twenty years of age in 1527 when the More Family Group was painted; but this theory had to be abandoned, for there is little or no likeness between the lady of the picture and the head of Cecilia in the Windsor collection. It is probable that medallions with a figure of St. Cecilia were by no means uncommon at that time. Two of them are mentioned in lists of jewels belonging to the Crown at the period in question. These lists will be found in the _Calendars of Letters and Papers._ Among the entries in the first list, dated 1528 (_C. L. P._, vol. iv. pt. ii. 5114) are the following:—“A brooch with a gentlewoman luting, with a scripture above it,” and “a gentlewoman, holding a leyer in her hand, silver-gilt (delivered to Mr. Wyat).” In the second list, dated 1530 (_C. L. P._, vol. iv. pt. iii. 6789), which appears to be a copy of the first, the same entries occur with slight differences:—“A brooch with a gentlewoman luting, and a scripture about it,” and “_Images._ A gentlewoman, holding a layer in her hands, silver-gilt (Mr. Wyat).” There are not, however, sufficient grounds for suggesting that the lady in question is wearing one of these particular royal jewels, and that, therefore, she was closely connected with the King, or even a member of Sir Thomas Wyat’s family, though the richness and elaborateness of the dress and the exceptionally fine embroidery seem to indicate a personage of high quality. It is to be hoped that further researches will solve the mystery of this fair unknown. In the meanwhile, the portrait provides a very notable and welcome addition to the tale of the master’s work, and one not easily surpassed by any other among his portraits of ladies. Thanks to the great kindness of Mr. Buttery the picture is reproduced here.

END OF VOL. I.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

FOOTNOTES

-----

Footnote 1:

Anton Werner, _Der Sammler_, No. 143, 1907.

Footnote 2:

Anton Werner, _Der Sammler_, No. 143, 1907.

Footnote 3:

Entries in the Augsburg Bürgerbuch and Steuerbücher.

Footnote 4:

See Glaser, _Hans Holbein der Ältere_, p. 171.

Footnote 5:

_Katalog der Œffentlichen Kunstsammlung in Basel_, 1908, p. 66.

Footnote 6:

Woltmann, A. H., 20.

Footnote 7:

Woltmann, A. H., 25.

Footnote 8:

Woltmann, _Holbein und seine Zeit_, i. 67.

Footnote 9:

See Willy Hes, _Ambrosius Holbein_, p. 149.

Footnote 10:

Woltmann, 1-4. The first and third reproduced by Curt Glaser, _Hans
Holbein der Ältere_, Pl. ii.

Footnote 11:

The “Death of Mary” in the Basel Gallery, formerly part of the Afra
altar-piece in the chapel of the Kaisheimer-Hofes in Augsburg, bears
an almost illegible date, which the Basel catalogue gives as 1490, but
is more probably 1495. See Curt Glaser, _Hans Holbein der Ältere_, p.
23, and Pl. iii.

Footnote 12:

Woltmann, 5. Reproduced by Glaser, Pl. v.; Davies (central part), p.
4.

Footnote 13:

Or Rehlingen.

Footnote 14:

Woltmann, 6. See Glaser, p. 36.

Footnote 15:

Woltmann, i. 49. First cited by Hassler in _Verhandlungen des Vereins
für Kunst und Altertum in Ulm und Oberschwaben_, ix. and x., 1855, p.
79.

Footnote 16:

Woltmann, 207-210. Reproduced by Glaser, Pl. xii.

Footnote 17:

Three of them reproduced by Glaser, Pls. x. and xi.

Footnote 18:

Woltmann, 238-253. Ten of the panels reproduced by Glaser, Pls.
xiv.-xix.

Footnote 19:

Woltmann, 7. Reproduced by Glaser, Pl. xxii.

Footnote 20:

Woltmann, 8. Reproduced by Glaser, Pl. xxvi.; Davies (left-hand panel
only), p. 12.

Footnote 21:

Glaser, 230. Woltmann, 277. Reproduced by Glaser, Pl. i.

Footnote 22:

Glaser, 218 and 153. Woltmann, 160 and 170. The first reproduced by W.
Hes (_Ambrosius Holbein_), Pl. i. (2), and by Woltmann and Frisch in
_Hans Holbein des Ä. Silberstiftzeich. im Berlin_, Pl. 64; the second
by Glaser, Pl. xxxvii.; Davies, p. 1; Woltmann, vol. i., frontispiece;
and elsewhere.

Footnote 23:

Glaser, 233. Reproduced by Davies, p. 14.

Footnote 24:

Davies, p. 16.

Footnote 25:

For details of these payments, taken from the account books St.
Moritz, see Woltmann, ii. p. 30.

Footnote 26:

Woltmann, i. pp. 96-97, ii. 31. (Extracts from the Augsburger
Gerichtsbücher.)

Footnote 27:

The altar-piece of 1512 for the Convent of St. Catherine is referred
to in the next chapter. See pp. 23-5.

Footnote 28:

Woltmann, 254-258. Central panel and inner sides of shutters
reproduced by Glaser, Pls. xxx., xxxi.; the latter reproduced by
Davies, p. 22; outer sides of shutters by Woltmann, vol. i. pp. 88,
89.

Footnote 29:

Woltmann, i. 95.

Footnote 30:

Woltmann, vol. ii. p. 132, not numbered; reproduced by Glaser, Pls.
xxxii., xxxiii.; A. Seeman, in _Zeitschr. f. bild. Kunst_, xiv. p.
197, 1903 (in colour); Arundel Club, 1907, Pl. 4.

Footnote 31:

See note at end of this chapter.

Footnote 32:

Raczynski, _Les Arts en Portugal_, 1846, p. 295.

Footnote 33:

Glaser, p. 100; Reber, in _Kunstchronik_, xiv. p. 493, 1903.

Footnote 34:

Glaser, p. 105.

Footnote 35:

W., 41, 127-31, 279. G., 104-10.

Footnote 36:

W., 131-2, 226, 279-80. G., 109-14.

Footnote 37:

W., 109. G., 133.

Footnote 38:

W., 110. G., 134.

Footnote 39:

W., 117-18, 224. G., 137-9.

Footnote 40:

W., 119. G., 140.

Footnote 41:

W., 120. G., 141.

Footnote 42:

W., 121. G., 142.

Footnote 43:

W., 122. G., 143.

Footnote 44:

W., 149. G., 172.

Footnote 45:

W., 148. G., 169.

Footnote 46:

W., 143. G., 164.

Footnote 47:

W., 141-2. G., 165-6.

Footnote 48:

W., 111-12. G., 135-6.

Footnote 49:

W., 153-4. G., 156-7.

Footnote 50:

W., 231. G., 154.

Footnote 51:

W., 34. G., 170.

Footnote 52:

W., 145-6. G., 167-8.

Footnote 53:

W., 155-7. G., 209-11.

Footnote 54:

W., 159. G., 213.

Footnote 55:

W., 133-4. G., 115-17.

Footnote 56:

W., 124-5, 225. G., 100-2.

Footnote 57:

W., 126. G., 103.