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WFU
#43 |
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One of the most important patrons of art in the sixteenth century was the German emperor Maximilian I. He has been noted as the last great knight of Europe and the "patron of humanistic romanticism".1 His life is best known to us today because he had such an interest in the arts, mainly as a means of immortalizing his existence. The Theuerdank is one of three large books that Maximilian commissioned. The other two, Weisskunig and Freydal were to be the first and third installments, respectively, of a trilogy highlighting Maximilian's life. Only Theuerdank was published before his death. Theuerdank, literally meaning "The Knight of Adventurous Thoughts", is an allegory in the form of epic verse that retells the adventures of Maximilian as he traveled to woo his future wife, Mary of Burgundy. Although she died after only five years of marriage, Maximilian regarded the years of his courtship as the ideal romantic interlude and the epitome of a knightly adventure. Mary was indeed the daughter of his own knightly hero, Charles the Bold of Burgundy. The book is largely fictitious, characterizing Maximilian as a chivalric knight in the Arthurian sense.2 The text is supposedly written by Melchior Pfintzing, a friend of Maximilian, but Maximilian himself probably composed the majority of the work.3 The book was first published in 1517. It came out in a very elegant edition printed on vellum and was intended for private distribution, but because of its popularity, seven other editions came out in the sixteenth century. The design of the book, together with the woodcuts done by Hans Burgkmair, is an important example of the type of book being published after the years of Albrecht Dürer. Dürer created, through such books as the Apocalypse and the Life of the Virgin, a vehicle for the professional illustrator.4 These books, printed mainly in the centers of Nuremberg, Augsburg, Frankfurt and Basel, usually consisted of more cuts than text. The Theuerdank is one of these books. Burgkmair himself was one of the many artists working for the emperor, and only did 13 to 14 of the 118 large woodcuts throughout the book. Hans Schäufelein and Leonhard Beck did the majority of the rest. The son of a painter, Burgkmair received his early training from his father and then went to Colmar to study under Martin Schongauer.5 Augsburg was the city he worked in for most of his career. This German city was acutely influenced by the ideas of the Italian Renaissance, and Burgkmair, who spent at least part of 1507 in Italy studying, naturally shows an Italianate influence in his work. The page in the collection is a typical scene in the book. It illustrates a point in the text in which Theuerdank has defeated another knight, as others stand watching. The action is illustrated in a very convincing and forceful way. Like each one in the book, this cut is very large and elaborate, but equally impressive is the type itself. It was specially designed for the book by Jost Dienecker6 and was the first example of a type that would come to be called "Fraktur".7 This new type was accentuated with extra flourishes, as seen in this page of the collection. This signature mark is easily seen on the "n"s at the end of a line and on "h"s in the middle of the text. The elaborate type was even supposed by some to be written by hand, because it was such a novel development. 1. Joachimsen,
1972, 186.
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