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Seated winged female in flowing dress rests her chin in hand, bent elbow on knee, drafting compass in right hand.

A female figure looks up and out to the left. She’s surrounded by hanging scales, an hourglass, and bell above, building tools at the bottom, a blank globe in the lower left, polyhedron form in front of her. She’s wearing a laurel crown and has many keys hanging off her waist. A skinny dog curls up by her feet looking down, and a small clothed winged baby with bare feet sits on a stone wheel to her right, holding a book in its lap. An ocean horizon is in the background with rainbow and sunbeams.

Identification and Creation

Object Number
G1098
People
Albrecht Dürer, German (Nuremberg 1471 - 1528 Nuremberg)
Title
Melencolia I
Classification
Prints
Work Type
print
Date
1514
Culture
German
Persistent Link
https://hvrd.art/o/273681

Physical Descriptions

Medium
Engraving printed in black ink on white antique laid paper
Technique
Engraving
Dimensions
sheet: 23.9 x 18.5 cm (9 7/16 x 7 5/16 in.)
Inscriptions and Marks
  • inscription: title engravied on the outstretched wings of the bat at upper left: MELENCOLIA I
  • inscription: magic square engraved at upper right: [magic square with numbers adding up 34 in all directions, the date 1514 at center bottom]
  • inscription: at right, on the step on which the figure is seated, engraved artist's monogram and date printed in black ink: 1514 / AD
  • collector's mark: verso, purple stamp with accession number written within in brown ink: GRAY COLLECTION, / 1098 / HARVARD COLLEGE. [within an oval borderline (Lugt 4836)]
  • inscription: verso, graphite: 64

Provenance

Recorded Ownership History
Francis Calley Gray, bequest; to William Gray, his nephew, 1856, gift; to Harvard University, 1857

State, Edition, Standard Reference Number

State
Meder iia/iii
Standard Reference Number
Hollstein 75; Bartsch 74, Meder 75, Strauss 79

Acquisition and Rights

Credit Line
Harvard Art Museums/Fogg Museum, Gift of William Gray from the collection of Francis Calley Gray
Object Number
G1098
Division
European and American Art
Contact
am_europeanamerican@harvard.edu
Permissions

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Publication History

  • Sarah Vure, The John Witt Randall Collection: Seeking the True and the Beautiful, brochure, Harvard University Art Museums (Cambridge, MA, 1998), p. 3, fig. 2
  • Nicholas Baume, Getting Emotional, exh. cat., Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston (Boston, 2005), p. 22, repro.
  • Susan Dackerman, ed., Prints and the Pursuit of Knowledge in Early Modern Europe, exh. cat., Harvard Art Museums (Cambridge, MA, 2011), cat. 91 p.366-367, repr.
  • H. Harvard Arnason and Elizabeth Mansfield, History of Modern Art: Painting, Sculpture, Architecture, Photography, Pearson Education, Inc. (Upper Saddle River, NJ, 2013), repr. as fig. 2.47 on p.41

Exhibition History

Verification Level

This record has been reviewed by the curatorial staff but may be incomplete. Our records are frequently revised and enhanced. For more information please contact the Division of European and American Art at am_europeanamerican@harvard.edu