CHAPTER IV

WORK IN LUCERNE AND THE VISIT TO LOMBARDY Holbein leaves Basel for Lucerne—Ambrosius Holbein—The known facts of his short life—His pictures, designs, and woodcuts—Records of Hans in Lucerne—His decoration of the Hertenstein house—Description of the wall-paintings—Portrait of Benedikt von Hertenstein—Holbein’s visit to North Italy—“The Last Supper” at Basel, and Leonardo’s influence—Evidences of his Italian journey in his designs for painted glass—Possible visit to Altorf—Return to Lucerne—Drawings of the “Archangel Michael” and of “Miners at Work”—Pictures painted for the Church of the Augustines in Lucerne. IN 1517 Holbein left Basel, and was absent for nearly two years. For the greater part of the time he was in Lucerne, but traces of him are to be found in other parts of Switzerland, and it is practically certain that he also paid a short visit to Lombardy. It is possible, too, that during this time he may have returned to Basel more than once for a few weeks in connection with his work for Froben and other publishers. Whether he left Basel in the first place because he found that it gave him less employment than he had expected, or from a spirit of pure adventure, or, again, on account of the offer of some definite commission, such as the decoration of the Hertenstein house, is not known; but the last-named reason is the most probable one, for it cannot be said that his talents had been unrecognised in Basel. Although there is no record of any earlier wall-paintings than those he was now to complete in Lucerne, it is quite possible that the two brothers had already carried out work of this nature, and that Jakob von Hertenstein had seen it and had admired it, and so decided to employ one or both of the young men to decorate in like fashion the new mansion he had just completed. Even if this were not the case, Lucerne at that time offered nearly as many inducements to a young artist as Basel itself. The two towns were closely allied, and artists and learned scholars constantly passed backwards and forwards between them; and Holbein had at least one acquaintance in Lucerne, Oswald Molitor, who had recently returned from Basel to his native city, and was practising there as a schoolmaster. There is an old legend in Lucerne that at this period the elder Holbein was living in the town with his two sons, but it does not appear to have any foundation in fact.[133] There is much more probability that Ambrosius accompanied Hans, or followed him shortly afterwards, and remained for some time at work with his brother on the Hertenstein house; though here again there is no actual record of such an absence from Basel. There is, however, a fine drawing by him in the Basel Gallery (No. 297), a half-length figure of a young man of the Von Rüdiswiler family,[134] which is thought to afford some proof that Ambrosius was in Lucerne at the time, for the Rüdiswiler family was one of the most important in the district, their chief seat being at Rüdiswil. Members of this house were settled both in Lucerne and Solothurn, and it is supposed that Ambrosius drew the portrait of this youth of patrician birth in the former town during 1517. The sitter is shown in profile, in a heavy brown cloak, wearing his cap on the side of his head. His fair straight hair covers his ears, and he holds a large red heart in his hand. The drawing has at some time been cut out round the outline and mounted on parchment, and the inscription in secret cipher, below the coat of arms, had been copied at the same time from the one which existed on the original drawing before the cutting out took place. Ambrosius, however, must have been back again in Basel by the summer of 1518, for in that year, on June 6, he purchased his right of citizenship. The first mention of him in the town books is on September 26, 1516, when “Ambrosy Holbein von augspurg, ein maler,” appeared in court as a witness in a libel action brought by Bastian Lepzelter, the sculptor, against a tailor, Andreas Huber, for insulting remarks made on the previous 25th of July, when the plaintiff, Ambrosius, and another friend, were enjoying themselves in the house of Hans Herbster.[135] Ambrosius may perhaps have been working as a journeyman under Herbster at the time. He joined the Painters’ Guild “zum Himmel,” to which bakers, saddlers, and barber-surgeons also belonged, on St. Matthias’ Day, February 24, 1517. The entry in the book of the guild runs as follows: “Item es hatt entpfangen die zunfft vff sant Mattistag ambross Holbein maler von augspurg In dem xvii Jor.” According to an order of the Basel Council issued in 1487, any one entering a guild was obliged to take oath to purchase the freedom of the city within a month. This Ambrosius did not do until the following year, which possibly indicates that he left the town shortly after joining the guild, early in 1517, without fulfilling his obligations. It may be that he had not sufficient money for the payment of the fees, for when, on June 6, 1518, he became a burgher, he was only able to find one gulden out of the four which were required, Jörg Schweiger, the goldsmith, whose portrait, now in the Basel Gallery (No. 296),[136] he painted about this time, standing surety for the remainder. The portrait may have been taken as some return for the kindness shown on this occasion. It should be noted, however, that this portrait is not attributed to Ambrosius by all critics, and differs to some extent from his accustomed style. [Sidenote: AMBROSIUS HOLBEIN] The entry in the archives runs as follows: “Item do hat burckrecht kufft Ambrosy Holbein der moler uff Sundag nach corporis Xpi Im xviij jor umb iiij glden und hat bar gen j glden und sol al fronfasten j ort bitz zu bezallung dofür ist bürg und schuldner meister Jerg schweiger der goldschmit.” VOL. I., PLATE 18. [Illustration] [Illustration: PORTRAITS OF TWO BROTHERS AMBROSIUS HOLBEIN BASEL GALLERY ] [Sidenote: AMBROSIUS HOLBEIN] This is the last reference to the elder brother so far discovered in the official archives, and as no work by him of a date later than 1518 is known, it is supposed that he died in that year or early in 1519. Apparently the last work upon which he was engaged was a series of woodcut illustrations for the _Geuchmatt_ of Thomas Murner, which was published by Adam Petri in Basel in April 1519. The first four only of the illustrations to this book[137] were designed by Ambrosius, which would seem to indicate that he died before he had completed the commission. The only other supposition, and a most improbable one, is that he suddenly left Basel at about this time in search of better fortune elsewhere, though no traces of such removal have so far been discovered. Almost all the few works which can be attributed to him with any certainty are now in the Basel Gallery. In addition to those already mentioned, there are two charming half-length portraits of small boys in a Renaissance framework (Nos. 294-5) (Pl. 18),[138] for one of which, the boy turned to the left, the silver-point drawing is in the Albertina, Vienna,[139] while a similar study for the other, recently published for the first time by Dr. Willy Hes, is in the Rodriguez Collection, Paris.[140] A half-length portrait of a little girl, in a similar framework, also published for the first time by Dr. Hes, is in the Ambraser Collection, Vienna, but not exhibited.[141] The strong likeness to the two lads proves almost conclusively that she was their sister. On the medallion which hangs from a chain round her neck are the initials H. V. So far, no preliminary drawing for this portrait has been discovered. In the Basel Gallery there are also “The Saviour as the Man of Sorrows” (No. 292),[142] an oil-painting adapted from the title-page to Dürer’s “Great Passion” series; and a study of two death’s heads behind a trellised window (No. 299).[143] Both pictures form part of the Amerbach Collection, but the latter is not regarded as the work of Ambrosius by Dr. Hes. A somewhat similar picture, attributed to Hans, was in the Arundel Collection, and was entered in the 1655 inventory as “Testa de Morte con osse.” The portrait of Hans Herbster, also at Basel (No. 293),[144] which has been already mentioned, was at one time regarded as a work by Hans the Younger, but since its purchase for the Basel Gallery it has been given, more correctly, to the elder brother. Dr. Hes, however, considers that it is not his work, but rather a portrait of Herbster painted by himself.[145] It is a bust portrait, turned to the right, representing a middle-aged man with long brown hair and a large bushy beard, wearing a dark dress and a red cap over his right ear. He is placed under an archway of Renaissance architecture, his head standing out against the blue sky seen through the opening. From the top of the pillars which support the arch hang two festoons of fruit and leaves held by small amorini. Above the heads of these boys two small tablets are suspended, one containing the date, “1516,” and the other the now illegible remains of the painter’s monogram. Across the bottom is the inscription, “IOANNES HERBSTER PICTOR OPORINI PATER,” the last words referring to his son, the well-known scholar of Basel, who afterwards turned printer, and Latinised his name to Oporinus. Herbster himself, like the Burgomaster Meyer, had taken his part in the Italian wars, and was in the battle of Pavia in 1512. In addition to several drawings already described, the Basel Gallery also possesses a charming study in silver-point and red chalk of a young girl, inscribed “ANNE,” and dated 1518, in which a very tender, delicate feeling for the beauty of childhood is shown (Pl. 19);[146] the head of a young woman in a hood in profile to the left;[147] a very fine drawing of the head of a young man turned slightly to the left, wearing a black cap on the side of his head, signed and dated 1517;[148] and a design for painted glass, representing the foundation of the city of Basel (Pl. 20),[149] a pen drawing lightly touched with colour, which was formerly attributed to Hans. In the centre are the arms of Basel, supported by basilisks, under an archway in course of building, which is decorated with a series of empty shields for coats of arms. In the landscape background on either side are men engaged in erecting buildings on the river bank, and in the foreground is a boat filled with soldiers. The commander of this troop, the legendary founder of the town, has the name “Basilius” engraved upon his breastplate. One of the most important of the few paintings by him which have been so far traced, is the portrait of an unknown young man in the Royal Hermitage Gallery in St. Petersburg (Pl. 21).[150] The sitter is turned three-quarters to the left, under a Renaissance arcading, and is wearing a green dress and white shirt ornamented with lace. On his black hat are the initials “F. G.” or “C. I. E.” (?). His right hand rests on the iron pommel of his sword. In the distance is a mountainous landscape with a palace or large building of elaborate Renaissance architecture, and on a column hangs a tablet with the inscription, “ETATIS. SVE. XX. M.D. XVIII.” From the arch above his head is suspended a garland of leaves bound round with ribbon, to which is attached a small cartouche with the monogram AHB, of which the H is the most distinct letter.[151] The drawing, mentioned above, signed and dated “1517 AH,” was considered by Woltmann to be a study for this portrait, and there is certainly a strong likeness between the two. The arrangement of the foreground architectural setting, and the position of the garland supporting the cartouche, of which only the left-hand loop is shown, prove that the picture formed one of a pair, the missing half in all probability containing a portrait of the young man’s wife. VOL. I., PLATE 19. [Illustration: PORTRAIT OF A YOUNG GIRL, “ANNE,” 1518 _Silver-point and red chalk drawing_ AMBROSIUS HOLBEIN BASEL GALLERY ] VOL. I., PLATE 20. [Illustration: THE FOUNDING OF BASEL Design for Painted Glass AMBROSIUS HOLBEIN BASEL GALLERY ] VOL. I., PLATE 21. [Illustration: PORTRAIT OF AN UNKNOWN YOUNG MAN 1518 AMBROSIUS HOLBEIN ROYAL HERMITAGE GALLERY, ST. PETERSBURG ] VOL. I., PLATE 22. [Illustration: ILLUSTRATION TO SIR THOMAS MORE’S “UTOPIA” AMBROSIUS HOLBEIN _From a woodcut in the British Museum_ ] [Sidenote: AMBROSIUS HOLBEIN] In addition to works of this nature, Ambrosius produced, during the few years he was in Basel, a considerable number of designs for title-pages, initial letters, and other decorations for books, issued by Froben, Cratander, Adam Petri, Thomas Wolff, and Pamphilus Gegenbach. One of the best known is the “Calumny of Apelles,”[152] the painting described by Lucian, which bears the monogram of Ambrosius and the date 1517. It was first used in Erasmus’ version of the New Testament, published by Froben in 1519. He had a share, too, in the numerous illustrations and ornaments which Froben provided for the first edition of Sir Thomas More’s _Utopia_, upon which work his brother, Urs Graf, and others, were also engaged. Ambrosius was the designer of the charming little picture representing the scene in the garden of Petrus Ægidius in Antwerp in which Raphael Hythlodæus, the traveller, is describing to his host and Sir Thomas his adventures in the island of Utopia.[153] A larger woodcut, with a bird’s-eye view of the island, on which the chief places are marked as given in the text, with Hythlodæus in the foreground pointing out its features to Ægidius and More, is also his work (Pl. 22).[154] It is difficult in every case to separate the designs of the two brothers in this field of art, more particularly as in many instances they have been so badly cut that much of the beauty of the original line has been lost. In book-illustration the art of the two young men had much in common, though Ambrosius was never as powerful or varied in conception as Hans, nor possessed of as great a mastery of technical execution. His woodcuts are not so thoroughly imbued with the true spirit of the Italian Renaissance, nor had he the same gift of producing the effect of largeness of design within an inch or two of space. His figures, too, are often too short, with the head out of proportion to the body. Yet much of his decorative work has considerable charm, and fulfils its purpose admirably. Some forty woodcuts after his designs, including a number of initial letters, are known, of which it is impossible to attempt any description here.[155] His skill as a designer for glass-painting has been already noted; and among his few drawings are two small roundels, in the Karlsruhe Gallery, of “Pyramus and Thisbe,” and “Hercules and Antæus,”[156] which are very pleasing, and in their delicate and somewhat “pretty” handling have great resemblance to a number of the marginal drawings to the _Praise of Folly_ which are now given to him. In painting he was overshadowed by his younger brother. Like Hans, he had inherited a considerable gift for portraiture from his father, as the few works of this nature which remain show very clearly. In his studies for portraits the draughtsmanship is looser and more free than in the corresponding work of the younger Hans in his earlier Basel period, and there is less searching after exact truth of line. His portraits, nevertheless, display an original talent of no mean order, which, had he lived, would have gained for him a place of some distinction among the leading German painters of his day. Such a drawing as the “Anne” is filled with a very tender feeling, and a sympathetic expression of the wistful charm of childhood; and much of the same appreciation of youthful character is to be seen in the portraits of the two small boys in the Basel Gallery, while there is a careful and realistic drawing of the head and body of a baby, supported by the mother’s hand, in the British Museum, evidently a study for a Madonna and Child, which is very attractive. It is inscribed “Hans Holbein, 1522,” by some later hand, over some earlier signature, now obliterated. According to Dr. Hes, however, it is not by Ambrosius.[157] The records of Hans Holbein’s residence in Lucerne are scanty ones, but such as they are, they extend from 1517 to 1519. Shortly after his arrival he joined the painters’ guild, the Brotherhood of St. Luke, which had been formed in 1506. In the book of the confraternity his name is entered as having paid one gulden for admission: “Meister Hanns Holbein hat j gulden gen.” Unfortunately the year-date is not given. The original book has disappeared, but a copy exists which was made by Zacharias Bletz, the town registrar, in 1541, but in transcribing it he has omitted the dates which would fix the exact details of Holbein’s membership. His first recorded commission was a badly-paid one. On the Sunday before the feast of Saints Simon and Jude (October 28), 1517, he received one florin nine shillings for a design for a glass window. In the same year, on December 10, an entry in the town records shows him engaged in less reputable occupation. He and a certain Caspar, a goldsmith, were each fined five livres for fighting in the streets. “Item Caspar goldschmid vnnd der Holbein soll jeder 5 ll. buss als sy vber ein andern zuckt hand.” This same Caspar, one learns from the town books, was by nature a brawler, for he was in trouble of the same kind on more than one occasion. The punishment in this particular case was heavy, so that the disturbance must have been a serious one, and it has been suggested that on account of it Holbein left Lucerne for a time, in order that the affair might blow over, and that he took the opportunity of paying a visit to Lombardy. It is not likely, however, that he crossed the Alps in the winter. [Sidenote: PAINTINGS OF HERTENSTEIN HOUSE] In one of the rooms of the Hertenstein house, at the time of its demolition early in the last century, there still remained the date 1517 on one of the wall decorations, which suggests that his work in the interior of the mansion was well advanced, if not completed, during that year. The outer walls were still unfinished when Holbein left Lucerne, for what reason is not known, but it does not seem probable that he would have abandoned an important commission for several months merely on account of some small trouble with the town authorities. The visit to Italy, it seems certain, took place in the spring or early summer of 1518, after the decorations of the Hertenstein house had been well advanced. These decorations, as far as can be judged from the few existing remains, show a certain Italian influence, but for the greater part not so strongly that it cannot be accounted for by the teaching of his father, the study of prints and engravings, and other second-hand sources. There is, however, a drawing in the Basel Gallery, described below, a preliminary study of architectural decoration for the lower part of the façade of the house, which, as Dr. Ganz points out, must have been made after Holbein’s return from Italy, for in it this new influence can be seen much more clearly and strongly, just as it can in similar work undertaken by him in Basel a year or two later, after a visit to Lombardy had brought him into personal contact with the works of some of the leading Italian masters in painting and architecture. It is clear, therefore, that the journey over the Alps formed an interlude of some duration between two sojourns in Lucerne, each extending over several months, and that during the second period he completed the Hertenstein wall-paintings. Lucerne was one of the first towns in Switzerland to feel the influence of the Italian Renaissance, and the fashion, copied from the southern country, of decorating the fronts of its houses with wall-paintings, had been adopted before Holbein worked there. As early as 1435 the Frey family owned a house which was covered with such paintings; a second house with sixteenth-century decorations was demolished in 1871, while others of the same period retained traces of wall-paintings until comparatively modern times. Certain fragments of this early wall-painting still exist, and there has been a revival of the art in Lucerne in recent years. Augsburg was probably the first town outside Italy to adopt this method of house decoration, to which the painters who practised it owed so much of the freedom of their style; but many of the towns immediately to the north of the Alps followed suit in course of time, and modified the architecture of their buildings in order to meet the requirements of the new fashion, abandoning to a certain extent the structural Gothic decorative forms to which they were accustomed, in order to make room for the provision of large flat wall surfaces, broken only by plain rectangular windows and doors, upon which the painters would have free scope for their work. It became the habit, too, among the wealthier of the citizens, to decorate the inner walls of their mansions in the same way. Jakob von Hertenstein, who, when he gave the commission to Holbein for the painting of his new house, was the chief magistrate of Lucerne, was a member of one of the oldest families in Switzerland. His father, Caspar von Hertenstein, held many important civic and military offices, and led the Swiss rearguard at the battle of Murten. His son inherited many of his dignities, and was also a notable soldier, and in 1515, in which year he was mayor, commanded the men of Lucerne at the battle of Marignano. His ancestral castle stood on a steep rock on the shore of the lake of Lucerne, near Weggis, and from it the family took its name. Jakob was married four times, in each instance to a lady of a patrician Swiss family, and in the decoration of the façade of his new dwelling, Holbein introduced the coats of arms of all four of them. In 1511 he purchased of Hans Wolf an old wooden house which stood on the Kappelplatz at the corner of a small street leading to the Sternen Platz, near the Corn Market, and in the heart of the city. This house he pulled down, and erected in its place a fine stone mansion, which was finished, and ready for its decorations, by 1517. It has been suggested that Holbein obtained this commission through the good services of Oswald Molitor, who was a friend of one of Hertenstein’s sons; but, however it may have been gained, it was one of great importance to so young an artist, and he made the most of his opportunities. The house was one of four storeys, and the whole of its frontage he covered with paintings. It was still standing in 1824, with its decorations for the greater part well preserved; but it was then pulled down, and all that remains of its painted glories is comprised in a number of very inadequate copies of certain portions, a single fragment of one of the original paintings, together with a small study for one of the pictures, and the architectural design already mentioned for part of the ground floor decoration, both from Holbein’s own pencil. It is thus to-day almost impossible to obtain any adequate impression of the actual effect of the painter’s earliest undertaking of importance, as it was in the days of its first freshness and beauty. [Sidenote: PAINTINGS OF HERTENSTEIN HOUSE] The ground floor was left undecorated, with the exception of the painting of certain architectural details, and on the floor above, which had numerous windows of varying sizes, and little wall space, Holbein’s work was confined to three single female figures, one at each corner, and one between the windows in the middle. Immediately over the windows on the left, which were irregular in arrangement, the decoration consisted of ornaments and figures adapted to fit the window crowns; and on the right, where the windows were considerably higher and stood in a straight line, a long frieze of fighting children was introduced. All these decorations were painted in grisaille, but between the two groups was a larger picture in colours, the upper part of which extended to the floor above. This picture was so arranged that its framework had the appearance of a large projecting bay, semicircular in shape, with an arched opening supported by pillars, through which a view was obtained of what appeared to be a large inner chamber of the house. Within this room Holbein depicted a story from the _Gesta Romanorum_, the one which tells of the old king who tested the love of his three sons and their right to succeed him by offering his dead body as a target to their arrows. This picture was still in a fairly good condition at the time of the destruction of the house, so that from the copy then made it is possible to gain an idea of the artist’s conception of the scene. He represented the white-haired monarch, death-pale in face, still seated upright on his throne, though his heart has ceased to beat. Two of the sons have shot their arrows, and one points to the cruel wound he has made, and claims the crown; but the third, rather than aim at such a target, breaks his bow in indignation, and is acclaimed the victor by the assembled courtiers. On the third storey, between the windows, were placed the coats of arms of Hertenstein and his four wives, within arched openings with hanging wreaths. Between the windows of the third storey and those of the floor above it, there ran a long triumphal procession from right to left, broken up into groups by pilasters placed at intervals, giving the effect of an open arcading through which the passing show was seen. This design was borrowed in its main details and arrangement from Andrea Mantegna’s engraved “Triumph of Caesar.” In this he followed his original so closely as to clothe the figures in antique costumes, whereas in the pictures drawn from classical sources painted on other parts of the building, he made use of the costumes of his own day. On the topmost storey five pictures were placed between the windows reaching up to the cornice of the roof. These, too, were chosen from classical literature, apparently for the purpose of providing moral lessons, not only for the members of Hertenstein’s own family, but for all the citizens of Lucerne who paused to admire their mayor’s new residence. They included the stories of the treacherous schoolmaster who attempted to betray the town of Falerii to Camillus, Tarquin and Lucretia, the self-sacrifice of Marcus Curtius, Mucius Scævola before Porsenna, and Leæna, who bit off her tongue rather than betray her lover Aristogiton to the judges after the murder of Hipparchus. The only original study for these painted stories now remaining is the one for the last-named subject, which is preserved in the Basel Gallery (Pl. 23 (1)).[158] It is a washed monochrome drawing, in which Leæna, in the costume of Holbein’s own day, stands before her two judges, her hand lifted to her tongue in sign of her determination to keep silence. The story is told with the aid of but few figures. A gaoler stands near Leæna, and behind the two judges are two other seated men. The scene takes place in a vaulted hall with open archways at the back, and has been cleverly arranged to fill in the irregular spaces between the brackets supporting the cornice. This study is of great interest, as it marks a great advance in Holbein’s power of drawing the human figure when compared with the schoolmaster’s sign-board of the previous year, and shows much greater freedom of draughtsmanship. The heads of one or two of the figures still retain something of the grotesqueness of type which characterises those of the early Passion series of pictures, but the figure of Leæna is a graceful one, and the judge in the centre, in a furred robe and cap, with one finger lifted in admonition and a rod of justice or sword grasped in his left hand, is natural and dignified. The only fragment of the actual wall-painting itself which now remains is a small portion of the Tarquin and Lucretia fresco,[159] showing the latter’s hand grasping the dagger, the figure of her husband before whom she is about to kill herself, the right arm of a woman attendant who stands behind her, and part of the architectural background. This fragment was built into the wall of the house which replaced the older one, and can still be seen on the upper floor of the façade. It is insignificant enough in itself, and has greatly darkened with age and exposure, but it is of value as the only actual evidence of the broad and vigorous manner in which the whole façade was painted.[160] VOL. I., PLATE 23. [Illustration] [Illustration: DESIGNS FOR THE WALL-PAINTINGS OF THE HERTENSTEIN HOUSE