the shrine of st. sebald
“in the church of sainted sebald sleeps enshrined his holy dust,
and in bronze the twelve apostles guard from age to age their trust.”—longfellow.
the magdeburg monument, whilst it bears obvious traces of the influence of his father hermann, of the school of wolgemut, and of adam krafft upon the art of peter vischer, is an eloquent testimony also to the rapid development which was taking place in the mind and ideas of this eager craftsman. we have now reached the period when the ideals and the lessons of the renaissance begin to master his imagination and to permeate his art to such a degree and with such success that the work which was next commissioned from him proves to be the first and greatest of renaissance works in germany. the shrine of st. sebald reflects the history of the artist’s mind. upon a gothic base and foundation the spirit of renaissance detail has overwhelmingly impressed itself. before we consider this work more closely it will be as well to state the sources whence our nuremberg 37craftsman drew his new inspirations. how did he learn his lessons in italian art?
in the first place it would seem probable that jacopo de’ barbari lived for some time in nuremberg during the last years of the fifteenth century. it is at any rate certain that the influence exerted by his drawings upon the nuremberg artists was strong and lasting. further, it was only natural that nuremberg, lying as it did on the direct trade route from east to north, should be in close communication with venice and the great towns of northern italy. venetians came to nuremberg; nuremberg traders and artists, like dürer, in their wanderjahre, went to venice and returned laden with the fruits of their italian studies, and copies of the works of italian masters. the patrician youths of nuremberg, also, would naturally sojourn at the italian universities at padua, bologna, and elsewhere, and they would bring home with them italian books and wood-cuts, examples of the copper-plates of jacopo de’ barbari and of the works of andrea sansovino.
but we seek for a more direct and personal source of contact to explain the intimate enthusiasm for italian art displayed by peter vischer. and the secret of this source, which had remained hitherto undiscovered, has recently been made public by the elaborate researches of dr. georg seeger.[3]
3. “peter vischer der jüngere.” leipzig, 1897.
38peter vischer’s second son and namesake, he reminds us, is mentioned pointedly by the chroniclers in one passage[4] as having done the greater part of the work on the sebaldusgrab, “for he excelled his father and brother in art”; and in another[5] as having “taken his pleasure in reading the poets and historians, whence he then, with the aid of pancratz schwenter, extracted many beautiful poems and illuminated them. he was in all things not less accomplished and skilful than his aforesaid brother hermann, and he too died in his prime.” now this young craftsman, it would appear, when the period of his “wandering” was at hand, turned his feet, like his fellow-townsman dürer before him, towards lombardy, “the paradise of all arts.” his imagination, doubtless, had already been fired by what he had seen of the north italian renaissance in the treasures brought to nuremberg by merchants, travellers and artists. but the expenses of an italian tour were beyond the resources of the vischer household. fortune and his father’s friends were kind to him; he was entrusted, probably through the influence of sebald schreyer, the historian and patron of art, with the task of “travelling” the famous schedel-weltchronik, which had been published in 1492, with illustrations by wolgemut and pleydenwurff. booksellers’ accounts enable us to trace the journey of the young craftsman. he passed through 39como, where the fa?ade of the cathedral, at that time in course of construction, had many a lesson in the early renaissance style to teach him, and he came to milan, the metropolis of northern italy. there he sold one hundred and ninety-one copies of the book, and in the intervals of business he occupied himself with the study of the drawings of leonardo da vinci, from which, like many another artist since, he learnt his first lessons in anatomy and proportion. there also he may have acquired the art of medallion and plaquette work, for it was about this time that he produced the first medallion which comes from the hand of a german craftsman—the portrait of his brother hermann, dated 1507. from milan he went south. he visited the certosa of pavia, and he filled his sketch book with drawings from the fa?ade of that luxuriant example of the early north italian renaissance. he studied with especial care the figure of his patron saint, and afterwards he reproduced it in the st. peter of the sebaldusgrab. thence he passed to genoa, where he sold more books and studied, perhaps, the marble madonna of andrea sansovino. and so home, in 1508, by way of verona and venice. inspired by what he had seen, he brought new life and inspiration to the workshop at nuremberg. the result of his journey was that he passed completely under the influence of italian art; he was filled with that untrammelled revelling in existence and that unalloyed worship of the beautiful which is the keynote 40of the renaissance. he had learnt the value of the study of the nude, and he had seen, as every artist must see, the superiority of the italian over the bavarian model. hereafter the tendency to discard the short and sturdy types of the school of krafft, and to substitute more slender and more beautiful figures for the apostles is marked. the results of this italian journey of his are clearly discernible not only in the sebaldusgrab, but also in his own particular works, in the two medallions of his brother hermann, executed in 1507 and 1511; and in that of himself in 1509; in the beautiful plaquettes, “orpheus and eurydice”; in the two inkstands and the ornamentation of the tomb of frederick the wise in wittenberg, with which we shall presently deal.
4. kunz r?sner. ms. 933 b. library, nuremberg.
5. neud?rffer.
remembering that picture of the father spending his holidays in drawing with his friends lindenast and krafft, it is easy to imagine that the old man, ever young, enthusiastic, humble and eager to learn, readily appreciated and welcomed the revelations contained in the son’s sketch books. he was already at work upon a gothic shrine for st. sebald’s remains, but he soon modified his original plan, improving and enriching it by the light of this new learning.
ere the fires of that inspiration had yet begun to grow cold, and before the sebaldusgrab was more than half finished, another member of the family took yet another journey. hermann, the eldest son, had married ursula mag in november 41of the year 1513. “when his wife left him in death,” neud?rffer tells us, “he went for art’s sake and at his own cost to rome, and brought back with him much artistic material which he had sketched there, and which greatly pleased his father and served as good practice for his brothers.” hermann himself died shortly after his return, in the year 1516. he was run over by a sleigh in st. gilgen-strasse one night as he was returning to his home in the kornmarkt from the house of his friend wolfgang traut, the painter, and thus “perished in his prime, in sad and piteous wise.” but that journey of his had not been taken in vain. his drawings revealed to the old burgher at home the further developments of art and some of the wonders of the full florentine-roman renaissance. the result can be traced in some of the figures on the sebaldusgrab, and, later, in that complete acceptance of the revival of the antique which is expressed in the rathaus railing.
the idea of a shrine to contain the relics of st. sebald had long been in contemplation, as is proved by the existence of vischer’s early model. but funds lacked, and it was not till a robbery was committed in the church in 1506, that a society of patricians and of the most important men in the town was formed to consider and provide for the carrying out of the long delayed plan. men of wealth and learning, piety and taste, like sebald schreyer, the devoted sacristan of the church, anton tucher, peter imhof and 42lazarus holzschuher formed a committee and took an active part in subscribing and collecting money for the purpose. a spirit of generous rivalry with those of the saint laurence quarter, whose church, thanks to the piety of hans imhof, had been adorned by the beautiful pyx wrought by adam krafft, stimulated their zeal. they subscribed and collected with such success that in the same year (1507) the commission was given to peter vischer. two thousand gulden was the proposed cost, and twenty gulden were allowed the meister for every hundred-weight of completed work, “as in the case of the monuments in the cathedral at bamberg.” a payment of 100 gulden was made to him on june 5, 1507. his darling plan was, then, at last to be realized. vischer threw himself into his work with an enthusiasm only equalled by his energy. for twelve years he with his five sons laboured, though their labour was often interrupted by want of funds. private subscriptions failed to supply the cost even of the 157 cwt. of metal used. at last, when, in 1519, anton tucher in moving words had told the citizens that they ought to subscribe the 800 gulden still needed “for the glory of god and his holy saint,” the money was forthcoming. the monument was completed and the final payment for it made to vischer three years later. elsewhere i have thus described it.
stein photo.] [st. sebald’s church, nürnberg
7. the shrine of st. sebald
“on the base of the shrine the master inscribed in his favourite gothic characters the following 44legend:—‘peter vischer bürger in nürnberg machet dieses werk, mit seinen s?hnen, ward volbracht im jahr, 1519. ist allein gott dem allm?chtigen zu lob und st. sebald dem himmelsfürsten zu ehren, mit hülf and?chtiger leut von dem almosen bezahlt.’
“that is the keynote of this wonderful structure. through years of difficulty and distress the pious artist had toiled and struggled on with the help of pious persons, paid by their voluntary contributions, to complete a work “to the praise of god almighty alone and the honour of st. sebald.” no word, one feels, can add to the simple dignity and faith of that inscription. it supplies us with the motive of the work, and it supplies us also with the true interpretation of the various groups and figures which form the shrine. to the glory of god,—we are shown how all the world, all nature and her products, all paganism with its heroic deeds and natural virtues, the old dispensation with its prophets and lawgivers, and the new, with its apostles and saints, pay homage to the infant christ, the guardian genius bringing salvation, who, enthroned on the summit of the central cupola, holds in his hands the terrestrial globe. to the honour of st. sebald,—the miniature gothic chapel enshrines beneath its richly fretted canopy, fifteen feet high, the oaken coffer encased in beaten plates of gold and silver in which lie the bones of st. sebald; and below this sarcophagus, which dates from 1397, are admirable 45bas-reliefs representing scenes and miracles from the life of the saint.
stein photo.] [st. sebald’s church, nürnberg
8. st. peter
“around the substructure of the tomb rise eight slender piers, bearing eight foliated arches, which, in turn, support three perforated cupolas enriched with pillared and arched buttresses. in the centre of these arches are placed richly ornamented candlesticks, with candles of bronze, and these also serve as supports and run out into leafy chalices on which graceful children play and swing. the bases of the eight slender pillars are formed by all sorts of strange figures and creatures suggestive of the world of pagan mythology, gods of the forest and of the sea, nymphs of the water and the wood. between them are some lions couchant which recall to the memory wolgemut’s peringsd?rffer altarpiece. at the four corners are real candlesticks held by the most graceful and seductive winged mermaids, with fish-tails and taloned feet, about whom serpents twine. but the most famous and the most beautiful figures are those of the twelve apostles, which stand, each about two feet high, under delicate canopies, on shafts of the piers already mentioned. clad in graceful, flowing robes, their expression and whole attitude eloquent both of vigour and of tranquil dignity, these statues are wholly admirable. what sculpture or painting could convey to a higher degree the sense of the intellectual and moral beauty and strength which centred in these first followers of christ? this 46characteristic pervades them all, but the unity of suggestion is conveyed through a variety of individualities and of pose. each apostle stands forth distinct in the vigour of his own inspired personality. (ill. 8 and 9.)
“above the apostles are set the fathers of the church, or it may be, the twelve minor prophets. beneath them, on the western end of the substructure is a noble statue of st. sebald, who holds in his hand a model of the church called after his name, and at the corresponding place on the other end that statue of peter vischer himself, to which we have already referred. here, in large latin characters we find the inscription ‘ein anfang durch mich’ (a beginning by me) ‘peter vischer, 1508,’ and under st. sebald the record of the completion of the base: ‘gemacht von peter vischer, 1509.’
47
stein photo.] [st. sebald’s church, nürnberg
9. st. sebald
“on the base, at the foot of the four corner pillars, are the nude figures of nimrod with his bow and quiver, of samson with the slaughtered 48lion and the jawbone of an ass, perseus with sword and shield and in company of a mouse, hercules with a club. between these heroes, in the centre of either side, are female figures emblematic of the four cardinal virtues of mankind—strength in a coat of mail with a lion, temperance with a bowl and globe. wisdom with mirror and book, and justice with sword and scales. in all, besides the apostles and prophets, there are seventy-two figures, in the presentation of which amidst flowers and foliage the joyful, exuberant fancy of the artist and his helpers has run riot. but there is, as i have suggested, a well-conceived plan and unity throughout; an intimate correspondence, in spite of the variety of groups, between the parts and the whole. everything is subordinated to the two central ideas which animate the whole, and everything executed with a delicacy of feeling and a fineness of finish little short of marvellous. the whole fabric rests upon twelve large snails, with four dolphins at the corners.”
the bronze is, apparently, just as it left the mould. it has not been filed and chiselled and smoothed and polished after the modern fashion, and it has therefore lost nothing of the vigour and character of the lines as they were originally shaped by the craftsmen’s hands. the very roughnesses are commendable.
when peter vischer received the commission to produce this great memorial of the municipal saint the lines on which it should be wrought were 49marked out for him by the traditions of his house and of his art. the sarcophagus should be placed, according to his old design, upon a base adorned with reliefs illustrating the miracles of the saint; figures of apostles should guard the coffin, and above it should rise a canopy of lofty fretted gothic pinnacles. now this original design was for a shrine intended to be over forty feet high, and something after the manner of adam krafft’s pyx. on this, or rather on some slight modification of it, he began to work, and, as he went on, introduced very important alterations under the influence of his sons’ new knowledge. it is due to this process of modification probably that we have to pass the criticism on the sebaldusgrab that the parts are greater than the whole, though the beauty and finish of the details are so great that, once we are within range of their charm, we forget and forgive any fault in the proportionment of the complete structure. beginning with the base, most likely at that end where the statue of himself in his leather apron is to be seen, and where the inscription “beginning by me, 1508,” may be read, vischer made such good progress with the work that by 1512 cocleus could write of it in his cosmographia with amiable exaggeration;—“quis vero solertior petro fischer in celandis fundendisque metallis? vidi ego totum sacellum ab eo in aes fusum imaginibusque celatum, in quo multi sane mortales stare missamque audire poterunt.” (what more skilful founder is there than peter vischer? i myself 50have seen a whole chapel cast by him in bronze and covered with statues, wherein indeed many people will be able to stand and hear mass.) the chapel then and many of the figures were completed or nearly completed by that date.
the alteration of the design to that of this single separate chapel containing the sarcophagus was doubtless due to the journey of peter vischer the younger and the examples of italian tombs, which he had observed, for instance, in the certosa and in the cathedral of pavia. in every part we notice how the gothic skeleton has been modified or has been clothed with all kinds of decoration in the renaissance style. the gothic pillars, indeed, are retained, and the pilasters; but these are richly ornamented. cupolas, too, have taken the place of the fretted gothic pinnacles, but yet in the details of their construction, in their flying buttresses and arched openings, the original gothic design has clearly been used and fused with the new renaissance models, yielding that architectural effect of mixed romanesque and gothic styles, of which cologne and mainz afford, among many, the most obvious examples.
the figures of beasts and children found in the original are retained but changed. they are executed in the full spirit of the renaissance, looking back to mythology. we have cupids now and genii, tritons and sirens, and in place of the gothic crab the renaissance dolphin. the ornamentation of the candlesticks is completely italianate. 51the slender, graceful columns which hold the candelabra are decorated now with a continually varying luxuriance of ornament, recalling in form a hundred details at como, at bergamo and at the certosa of pavia. in the case of the mythological figures there is no caricature; there are none of the monstrosities in which german art usually revelled when dealing with such subjects. the artist has gone straight to italy, to the source of the new springs of knowledge and of the new-born delight in the gods of old days. there is, too, an inexhaustible fecundity of pose. scarce one beast or child is the same. you might almost suppose that the artist had aimed at giving us an encyclop?dia of nature, showing that all-embracing enthusiasm which rendered so many of the great minds of the renaissance eager to excel in every department of knowledge. each minutest figure also displays a masterly grip of anatomy, proportion and perspective, and here we clearly recognize the student of leonardo da vinci’s drawings. the figures of the four heroes and of the lute-player are of the school of leonardo in pose, in modelling and in drapery, whilst the marsyas may be traced, as seeger thinks, to a woodcut in a venetian edition of ovid’s metamorphoses (1497).
the soft, transparent handling of the drapery is, generally speaking, wholly un-german. for, until the epoch roughly marked for us by the great adam and eve of albert dürer, the study 52of the nude played but a small part in the labours of the german artists, and they did not trust themselves to use drapery as a means of revealing the form beneath. their study of anatomy had so far been concentrated upon heads and hands and feet, and they treated drapery with exceeding care both as an aim and object in itself, and, more than a little, as a useful screen for defective bodies. but they were beginning to appreciate now the endeavours of a jacopo de’ barbari to reveal the nude form through the drapery of his figures. and to achieve this end vischer, like dürer, had realised that a study of anatomy and the careful drawing of the contours of the body are necessary. in some cases the drapery of the female figures, as, for instance, of those in the relief which illustrates the miracle of the “icicles,” directly suggests the manner of barbari, but in the miracle of the “healing of the blind man” the artist has modelled his work on the antique. thus he has taken the further step of the italians who, after struggling to reproduce the perfections of the human body, and recognizing how far short of classic art they fell, had turned to regenerate the antique, and so gave rise to the true renaissance which is the new birth of the old.
between one pair of the four reliefs dealing with the miracles of st. sebald and the other there is so marked a difference in manner and style that i do not think we can be far wrong if we attribute, with seeger, that of the “icicles” 53and the “healing of the blind man” to peter vischer the younger, and the others, especially and certainly that of the “punishment of the unbeliever” to his father. the particular point which strikes one as most admirable, and which is in greater or less degree common to all of them, is the simplicity of the grouping and the avoidance of that sin of overcrowding which beset so many artists of the day. (ill. 10 and 11.)
the miracles of st. sebald which were chosen as subjects for these reliefs are, briefly, the following. st. sebald was the son of a danish king who had renounced the things of this world in favour of the chaste and solitary life of a hermit. he afterwards made his way to rome and was sent forth thence by pope gregory the second to preach the gospel in germany. on his way he abode for a while at vicenza, and there one day he received a visitor for whom he ordered his disciple dionis to bring the pitcher of wine. dionis hesitated, for he had allowed himself to partake of the wine the night before, and he feared detection. but when the order was repeated he went to fetch the pitcher, and behold, he found it filled again to the brim.
the fame of the hermit spread abroad. from far and near, even from milan and pavia, people flocked to hear from his lips the wonderful works of god. but amongst those who came, came also an unbeliever, who scoffed and blasphemed at the prophet and his message. then sebald 54prayed to god that a sign might be given to prove his doctrine true, and immediately, in the sight of all, the earth opened and the scoffer sank up to his neck. then the hermit prayed with a loud voice and interceded for him, so that he was delivered, and he and many of the unbelievers embraced the true faith. (ill. 10.)
sebald now left italy and came at last to nuremberg. he settled there in the forest in the heart of the franconian people, teaching them the word of god and working miracles. on one occasion we are told he sought shelter in the hut of a poor and churlish waggoner. it was winter: the snow lay on the ground and the wind howled over the frozen marshes of the pegnitz. but the signs of charity did not shine brightly in the host. sebald called upon the man’s wife to bring more wood for the fire so that he might warm his body, for he was chilled to the bone. but though he repeated his request the niggard host forbade his wife to obey. at length the saint cried out to her to bring the cluster of icicles which hung from the roof and to put them on the fire if she could not or would not bring the faggots.
the woman, pitying him, obeyed, and, in answer to the prayer of sebald, a flame shot up from the ice as from a firebrand and the whole bundle was quickly ablaze.
stein photo.][relief from the sebaldusgrab, st. sebald’s church, nürnberg
10. st. sebald punishes an unbeliever
when he saw this miracle the chilly host gave the hermit a warmer welcome, and, to make amends 56for his former lack of hospitality, he sallied forth to buy some fish in the market, contrary to the regulations of the authorities. being caught he was blinded, but the holy hermit quickly restored to him the light of his eyes. (ill. 11.)
so potent was the saint on whose shrine peter vischer was now at work—that shrine to which, says eobanus hessus in his poem on nuremberg, no words can do justice and with which not even the greatest artists of antiquity could have found fault;
“musa nec ulla queat tanto satis esse labori
nec verbis ?quare opus immortale futurum;
quod neque praxiteles, nec myron nec polycletus,
nemo cares, nemo scopas reprehendere posset.”
stein photo.] [relief from sebaldusgrab, st. sebald’s church, nürnberg
11. st. sebald healing the blind man
now in the style of the reliefs which record the miracles we have related, there is a marked divergence. even the figure of the saint is not uniformly conceived. we may conclude that we have on the one hand in the “punishment of the unbeliever” undoubtedly the work of peter vischer, the father. the craftsman was still clearly under the influence of adam krafft and his school. for the personages of the little drama which he wished to depict are presented to us as simple nurembergers of every day, and they are portrayed in a spirit of very homely realism. similar in style is the treatment of the miracle of the “wine in the bowl,” where, equally with the above, the handling of the drapery is thoroughly in the manner of the old founder. on the other hand, the relief which represents 58the “miracle of the icicles” is probably by peter vischer the younger. for the modelling of the female figures there distinctly reminds us, in drapery and in pose of the head and body, of the eurydice in his “orpheus and eurydice,” of the vita in his inkstands, and of the flute-player in the sebaldusgrab. and by him, also, is the “healing of the blind man,” which is by far the finest of the four reliefs. there is a movement in the whole and a unity in the composition quite admirable, whilst the cautious, tentative gait of the suddenly blinded man, not yet accustomed to the eternal darkness which has come upon him, is indicated with a delicacy and sureness of touch which proclaim a truly great and original artist. in the treatment of the drapery on the moving figures we read the result of his study of the antique. it is used to indicate and to explain the movement that is taking place. and very noticeable is the seizing of the dramatic moment, which is a conspicuous characteristic of the artist of “orpheus and eurydice.”
in the portrayal of the apostles on the sebaldusgrab vischer and his sons have attained the perfect expression of the ideal after which the father had vainly striven in the monument at magdeburg.
stein photo.] [st. sebald’s church, nürnberg
12. st. paul
in every way the advance made by the artist since he wrought that early masterpiece is noticeable. the apostles here, unlike those in the original design, and unlike, also, those on the tomb 60of archbishop ernst, are not standing gazing straight in front of them in holy, unconscious calm, but a certain relation has been established between some of the pairs. that relation has not been established indeed with mathematical precision, but with an art that succeeds in producing the effect of nature. take, for instance, the figures of paul and philip, which are represented in the act of earnest conversation, or those of thomas and james the less, which suggest men who are busy with their own thoughts, but are composed so as to be in complete harmony with those of the neighbouring apostles. the figures are skilfully arranged also so as to produce a harmonious contrast with the twelve patriarchs above them.
we noticed in the apostles of the magdeburg monument a distinct lack of variety in pose, especially of arms and hands. the figures there were stiff and lacking in grace, but these are full of fire and movement. the figures there were over short. they were the types of adam krafft and the nuremberg school. but these, in greater or less degree, are renaissance types of comparative litheness, and inspired with life and intelligence.
in breaking away from the traditions of veit stoss and adam krafft the artist has advanced to a notable extent beyond them, and even beyond dürer in most cases, in the quality of spirituality which he has learnt to impress upon his work.
stein photo.] [st. sebald’s church, nürnberg
13. st. bartholomew
a similar development is noticeable in the drapery. 62the apostles at magdeburg are clad in the heavy, wooden garments of the old school, whilst those of the sebaldusgrab are draped in fine folds which fall in soft curves over bodies anatomically correct.
we cannot, perhaps, determine with certainty which of the vischer family is responsible for each figure. but where we find one recalling in pose and drapery the motives of the magdeburg tomb we may safely attribute it to the father. he was fond of horizontal folds and much affected that motive of a mantle which consists in its being thrown over and falling from the right arm and resting on the left shoulder. his handling of hair is also distinctive. he preferred to provide his statues with masses of luxuriant hair and beard and moustaches. his noblest achievement is the figure of the apostle andrew.
to peter vischer the younger we may attribute the representation of his patron saint. this, as dr. seeger has pointed out, is based on a recollection or a drawing of the figure of that apostle on the fa?ade of the certosa di pavia, modified by the individuality of the present artist and adapted to the exigencies of this shrine. it is an absolutely different type from that on the magdeburg tomb, which had more in common with the st. peter of old hermann on the font at wittenberg. there the head, to take one point, is larger and adorned with a heavy mass of luxuriant curling hair and beard. but the head of this apostle is small and 63fine; the eyes deep set, the neck sinewy. the loose and admirable fall of the drapery is in the new manner. and with that nervous grasp of the key, that searching gaze, those wrinkled and contracted brows, the youthful craftsman has nobly represented his patron saint, peter the bald, intellectual keeper of the gates of heaven.
completely different again in type and treatment is the figure of the apostle bartholomew. (ill. 13.) it smacks of rome, and roman too is simon. these, we should naturally hazard, were the work of hermann the eldest son, after his return from his rom-reise in 1516. and in this theory we are confirmed by a passage in a manuscript in the nuremberg town library, which tells us that “hermann vischer alone made the apostle bartholomew and several tabernacles,” as, for instance, without doubt that roman triumphal arch above the statue of st. paul.
