1522. This portrait was acquired from a private collection in England in

1906 for the Metropolitan Museum of New York (Pl. 24).[166] He is represented standing, facing the spectator, with his left hand resting on the pommel of his sword. He wears a black under-dress and a white shirt with an embroidered edge. His cloak or overcoat with wide upper sleeves is of crimson, trimmed with dark green bands, and lined with bright myrtle-green silk. His left hand is half hidden by the sleeve and the right arm hangs down, the hand not being shown. His cap is of black and scarlet velvet with gold tags, and a plain chain of gold links hangs from his neck. He wears six rings on his left hand, the one on his first finger being a signet ring with a coat of arms now almost illegible. The pommel of his sword is of gold and silver ornamented with a design in imitation of Cufic script in the fashion of Italian goldsmith’s work of the period. His bushy hair almost hides the ears, and his eyes are small and bright. The background, as in the Meyer portraits, is a study in perspective, for Holbein has placed him within the angle of a wall, along the two sides of which, over the sitter’s head, runs a stone frieze carved with a representation of a Roman triumph, crowded with small figures, in which the victor is seated in a chariot drawn by prancing horses, and in front of him, among the soldiers and trumpeters, a number of prisoners led captive. It has suffered rather severely from repainting. The design, an imitation of an antique bas-relief, was no doubt based upon Mantegna’s “Triumph,” which Holbein was at the same time adapting for the façade of the Hertenstein house. A somewhat similar design, though later in date, is to be seen on the drawing of a dagger sheath in the Basel Gallery (Vol. ii., Pl. 46 (2)).[167] The wall on the left is in shadow, and on it, immediately below the frieze, is inscribed: “DA · ICH · HET · DIE · GESTALT · WAS · ICH · 22 · JAR · ALT · 1517 · H · H · PINGEBAT.” This inscription is interesting as the only one in German to be found on any one of his portraits, with the exception of that of Fallen at Brunswick, and the addresses on the letters in some of the other Steelyard portraits. The picture is painted in oils on paper, and afterwards mounted on a panel, a method not infrequently employed by Holbein in his earlier practice. The technical skill displayed in it is already of a high order, though the draughtsmanship is still a little laboured, and lacking in that ease and certainty to which he afterwards attained, while the flesh tints are paler and flatter than in his later work. It shows, nevertheless, a distinct advance when compared with the Meyer portraits of the preceding year. The draughtsmanship is firmer, the colour tones softer, and the general effect produced is one of greater naturalness, though still far behind the “Bonifacius Amerbach,” painted two years later, in subtlety of line and harmony of colour. When the picture was purchased in 1906 the name of the sitter was unknown, and beyond the fact that at the beginning of the last century it was in the possession of the Burckhardt family, its history has not been traced; but by means of the coat of arms on the ring it was identified three years later as Benedikt von Hertenstein.[168] In 1826 Ulrich Hegner saw in Lucerne a portrait of his father, Jakob von Hertenstein, of the same date, 1517, still in the possession of one of his descendants, which he considered to be an original work by Holbein, which would indicate that the artist, in addition to including portraits of various members of the family in the wall-paintings in the interior of the house, was also commissioned to paint individual portraits of more than one of them. The portrait seen by Hegner has now disappeared, but others of Hertenstein still remain in the Town Hall and the Library of Lucerne. These, however, are not contemporary likenesses, but later copies, possibly after an original by Holbein now lost. [Sidenote: THE VISIT TO LOMBARDY] The great likelihood—indeed, the certainty—that Holbein, before these wall-paintings were finally completed, paid, during 1518, a short visit to Italy, is now generally acknowledged by most writers. It is true that Carel van Mander distinctly states that “Hans Holbein never travelled in Italy,” and the artist’s earliest biographer was, no doubt, correct, if his words are to be understood as meaning that Holbein never made any long sojourn in that country, or studied for a considerable period under some Italian painter. This statement, however, in no way precludes a visit of several months’ duration to Lombardy, of which Van Mander was ignorant. From Lucerne the journey to the foot of the Alps was only a matter of a few days, while traces of his presence in Altorf, which is on the route to the St. Gotthard Pass, still remain. From Altorf the Italian side of the mountains could be easily reached. The influence of both Mantegna and Leonardo and the Milanese school of painting is unmistakable in certain of his pictures, and though some of this may have been due to earlier influences in his Augsburg days, received through Hans Burgkmair and other German painters who had worked in Italy, and to the study of engravings, they are not strong enough to account satisfactorily for the very marked Italian influence to be seen in such pictures as the early “Last Supper,” or the “Venus” and “Lais Corinthiaca” of 1526. The indications of personal acquaintance with Italian painting and architecture are even more strongly marked in numerous designs for glass paintings, dealt with in a later chapter.[169] It is therefore assumed that he crossed the Alps and penetrated into the country at least as far as Milan and its neighbourhood. Indeed, the careful researches of Dr. Ganz have removed all doubts on the question. The “Last Supper” in the Basel Gallery (No. 316) (Pl. 25),[170] which must not be confounded with the still earlier version of the same subject on canvas already described,[171] although badly damaged, bears in its composition so striking a reminiscence of Leonardo’s celebrated fresco in the refectory of the church of Santa Maria delle Grazie in Milan, that it appears almost certain that Holbein must have seen it. This panel painting, apparently the central part of a triptych, when it came into the possession of Amerbach was already in a badly-damaged state, due, no doubt, to injuries received during the religious disturbances of 1529, which finally helped to drive Holbein for a second time from Basel. It had been cut in two, and then roughly joined together, while a piece was missing from either side, so that to-day only nine apostles remain, though the hands and feet and parts of the bodies of the others are still to be seen at the sides. It is described in the Amerbach inventory as “ein nachtmal vf holtz mit olfarb H. Holbein. Ist zerhöwen vnd wider zusammengeleimbt aber unfletig.” In 1750 it was again reset by Nikolaus Grooth, who repainted and restored it in a hard and crude fashion, so that it is now very difficult to form any adequate idea of the original scheme of colour, though the heads still retain something of their original vigour and expression. The scene is set in a loggia of plain Renaissance architecture, the blue sky seen through its arched openings, against which branches of fig or vine stand out, and a distant tower on the right. Christ, seated in the centre of the table, with hands spread out before him, is depicted at the moment when he exclaims, “One of you shall betray me.” This figure, both in the expressive gesture of the hands, the position of the body, and the type of features, follows closely the greater figure which evidently inspired it. The group of St. John, St. Peter, and Judas is also based on the corresponding group in Leonardo’s fresco. The youthful St. John, seated next to the Saviour, and turning round to listen to St. Peter, who stands behind him with his hand resting on St. John’s shoulder, is admirably conceived and full of character. Judas, seated in front on the left, rests his chin on his left hand, his strongly marked, almost grotesque, face, convulsed with conflicting passions, and his right hand pressed against the seat as though he were about to spring up and rush from the table. The picture, in spite of the damage it has received, shows a great advance upon the earlier “Last Supper,” both in power of expression and technical execution. In its style of painting it has considerable affinity with the “Noli Me Tangere” in Hampton Court, more particularly with the distant figures of St. John and St. Peter in the last-named picture, while the head of St. James, seen in profile, bears a close resemblance to that of the Risen Christ. The background, too, displays a decided Italian influence.[172] VOL. I., PLATE 25. [Illustration: THE LAST SUPPER Central Panel of a Triptych BASEL GALLERY ] [Sidenote: THE VISIT TO LOMBARDY] Still stronger evidence of this journey to Lombardy is to be found in Holbein’s numerous designs for painted glass,[173] which he produced during the next six or seven years, designs which, in most cases, are filled round the borders and in the backgrounds with rich and elaborate architecture based upon Renaissance models. It is difficult to understand how he could have produced so much work of this nature, so filled with the beauty and dignity of the style upon which it was founded, had he not had at least some personal acquaintance with the original examples upon the far side of the Alps, which these drawings of his so often suggest. A close comparison of certain of these studies with the architectural details of some of the splendid Renaissance buildings which he must have seen if this journey across the plains of Lombardy did in reality take place, makes it almost certain, although there are no documentary proofs, that he made drawings and sketches of some of the principal edifices of Milan, the façade and interior of the Certosa of Pavia, the monumental tombs of architectural design which are to be met with throughout Northern Italy, and such cathedral churches as those of Como and Lugano;[174] and that he must have studied also the use made by the Italian painters of similar architectural features in the backgrounds of their frescoes and paintings. It is difficult to believe that his intimate knowledge of the true principles of that style were gained merely by the study of a few engravings or isolated pictures. Here and there, too, in those glass designs in which the background is a landscape, there is more than one Alpine scene. In the one with the figure of a Pope or Bishop, in the Basel Gallery (No. 334),[175] there is a view of the old Devil’s Bridge on the Andermatt route, and the same bridge is to be seen in the “Table of Cebes” woodcut. There is a view of the Rigi in the background of the woodcut of “Jacob’s Ladder” in Thomas Wolff’s edition of the Pentateuch, 1523, and, again, a representation of Lucerne in the woodcut of the “New Jerusalem,” in the same publisher’s edition of the New Testament, 1523 (Pl. 70 (3)).[176] In the course of his journey to and from Lombardy he probably made short halts in more than one Swiss town. Hegner mentions pictures by him in Coutrai, Zürich, Altorf, and Berne, but the works he enumerates, with the exception of the painted table at Zürich, are not the work of Holbein. There are, however, indications that he spent some time in Altorf, in the canton Uri, from which district it has been suggested that his family originally came, for the Holbein arms are almost identical with those of that canton. In the church is a “Head of Christ,” which local tradition gives to Holbein, and in the Convent of the Capuchins still hangs a copy of the “Christ in the Tomb” of the Basel Gallery. The “Head of Christ” has suffered so severely that it is impossible to-day to say whether it is from his hand; the church archives, which are said to have contained proofs of its authenticity, were lost in a fire which occurred in 1799, and did a great amount of damage, destroying, among other things, an altar-piece of the “Crucifixion,” attributed to Holbein, painted on canvas, one of the chief treasures of the church. The version of the “Christ in the Tomb” in the monastery shows material differences from the original at Basel. The body of Christ is no longer rigid in death. He has conquered it, and the artist, whoever he may have been, has represented him as the giver of eternal life, by means of rays of light which emanate from the recumbent body. Above the figure is a medallion with the Burial, which bears little likeness to Holbein’s work. M. Pierre Gauthiez suggests that this Christ was painted by Holbein when under the immediate influence of certain Lombard painters, but that it became so badly damaged in course of time that it was restored and repainted by some not very skilful worker.[177] [Sidenote: DESIGNS FOR PAINTED GLASS] Wherever Holbein may have wandered in search of work, he was back again in Lucerne early in 1519. The town books contain records of payments made to him for the painting of certain banners and pennons in the spring of that year. It was a custom of the Lucernois to plant banners on the gables and summits of their street fountains, as a signal for assembly whenever there was question of war; and, in addition to this custom, small flags of painted cloth were usually to be seen hanging in such places.[178] On the 19th February 1519, Holbein was paid twelve schillings for two flags of this kind, which were hung near the cathedral, and on the 21st May of the same year he received one livre, one schilling, six heller for banners for the fountain near the convent of the Franciscans. It was round this fountain of the Cordeliers that the shoemakers and sellers of various merchandise had their stalls, and the neighbouring street was the quarter of the glass-painters. For these latter craftsmen Holbein made several designs. There is one of these in the Basel Gallery (No. 354), which, however, is not from Holbein’s own hand, but merely a good workshop copy. It represents the standing figure of the Virgin with the Child in her arms, under an arch with hanging garlands, supported by pillars and pilasters with Renaissance ornament in low relief, and appears to have been drawn in Lucerne, for the background consists of an admirable little landscape study with a view of the towers and roofs and the old covered bridge of that city, and cloud-capped mountains in the background.[179] It was, however, designed for some citizen of Basel, and may, therefore, have been done after he had left Lucerne, and the background sketched in from memory. It forms the left-hand half of a double window containing the patron saints of Basel, of which the right-hand half still exists in the original glass in the cloisters of Wettingen, representing the Emperor Heinrich II holding a model of the minster, and with a shield containing the arms of Basel at his feet. In its architectural details this window agrees with the “Virgin and Child” drawing in the Amerbach Collection, which is in pen and wash and lightly coloured. A second window design, also in the Amerbach Collection, dated 1518, and signed “H.H.,” represents the arms of State-councillor Holdermeier of Lucerne.[180] Under an open archway with pillars inlaid with marble stand three peasants with grotesque head-dresses, busily talking, conceived by the artist with considerable humour. One rests on his scythe, another carries a sack over his shoulder, while the one in the middle holds a basket of eggs. Over the centre of the arch is a small tablet with the date, and on either side of it, in the spandrils, peasants are shown at work in the fields, mowing and reaping. In the centre foreground is placed a shield with the Holdermeier arms. A third design for painted glass of this period with the arms of Hans Fleckenstein of Lucerne, and dated 1517, is in the Brunswick Gallery, and was lent to the Holbein Exhibition in Basel in 1897-8.[181] Two other existing designs appear to belong to Holbein’s Lucerne period. The first is the very beautiful drawing in the Basel Gallery of the Archangel Michael as the Weigher of Souls (Pl. 26).[182] It is evidently a drawing for a wooden statue. The Archangel Michael as the Soul Weigher was the patron saint of the cloisters of Beromünster, near Lucerne, and most probably, according to Dr. Ganz, this design was a commission from Holbein’s patrons, Peter and Jakob von Hertenstein. Jakob was feoffee of the cloisters, and Peter, canon of Basel, was from 1483 until his death in 1519 also canon of the minster. He had his own private chapel, to which he presented various works of art, including a window of painted glass with a representation of the Archangel, which is now in the Lucerne Museum.[183] The winged figure of the youthful saint stands erect upon a slight carved bracket, raising a great sword over his head with one hand, and with the other holding a large pair of scales just clear of the ground, in one of which is Satan, with wings and a long curled tail, and in the other a naked child with a nimbus, representing the soul. St. Michael, too, wears a nimbus above his masses of curled hair, and gazes down with a smile on the upturned face of the Evil One, whom he is about to strike with his sword. He is clad in clinging drapery, which leaves one leg bare, and a breastplate richly chased with a Renaissance flower-and-leaf design, a long cloak falling from his shoulders to the ground. The figure displays extraordinary grace and energy, and in the beauty of its conception and its draughtsmanship recalls the best work of the Italian painters, and was evidently accomplished immediately after his return from Lombardy, when the stimulus of that journey was still at its highest and strongest. The second drawing, in Indian ink, with pen and bistre outlines, in the British Museum (No. 14), is a round composition nearly nine inches in diameter, representing miners at work on the face of a mountain side (Pl. 27).[184] In the foreground is a rocky platform on which two men are driving wedges into the rock with hammers with long pliant handles. Others are working with smaller hammers, and one, with a lantern fastened to his cap, is mounting to the platform by a ladder. Above them another man is ascending in the same way to a higher part of the quarry, while from an opening on the right a miner is pushing a truck full of ore along a wooden bridge, and another, down below, is raking the stone into a tray. Various wooden huts are placed here and there on the ledges. According to Dr. E. His, this drawing was in Basel in the sixteenth century, and was then copied by an unknown artist as an illustration to a manuscript book on mining by Andreas Ryff. It was probably made by Holbein in the neighbourhood of the St. Gotthard Pass, on his way to or from Lombardy. VOL. I., PLATE 26. [Illustration: THE ARCHANGEL MICHAEL AS WEIGHER OF SOULS _Drawing in Indian ink_ BASEL GALLERY ] VOL. I., PLATE 27. [Illustration: MINERS AT WORK _Drawing in Indian ink, pen, and bistre_ BRITISH MUSEUM ] [Sidenote: SACRED PICTURES FORMERLY IN LUCERNE] Patin mentions five pictures painted by Holbein which in his day were in the church of the Augustines in Lucerne—a “Nativity,” the “Adoration of the Kings,” “Christ disputing with the Doctors,” a “Sancta Veronica,” and a “Taking down from the Cross,”[185] but Hegner could find no traces of them. They probably formed a triptych. M. Gauthiez suggests that these pictures were the result of his study of the paintings of the Lombard masters, the titles alone suggesting a list of works by Luini.[186] The last-named of these pictures, the “Taking down from the Cross”—in which, according to Patin’s description, Christ’s body was on the ground, the head resting on the Virgin’s lap, and surrounded by Mary Magdalene, Saint John, Nicodemus, and other persons, with the two thieves still on the Cross—was still in the church in the middle of the seventeenth century. Two sketches exist, with notes as to the colour, and an inscription stating that they were drawn in Lucerne from Holbein’s altar-piece in the church of the Augustines by C. Meyer in