The ''Martyrdom of the Ten Thousand'' is an

oil painting Oil painting is the process of painting with pigments with a medium of drying oil as the binder. It has been the most common technique for artistic painting on wood panel or canvas for several centuries, spreading from Europe to the rest of ...

Albrecht Dürer Albrecht Dürer (; ; hu, Ajtósi Adalbert; 21 May 1471 – 6 April 1528),Müller, Peter O. (1993) ''Substantiv-Derivation in Den Schriften Albrecht Dürers'', Walter de Gruyter. . sometimes spelled in English as Durer (without an umlaut) or Due ...

, dating to 1508 and now at the

Kunsthistorisches Museum The Kunsthistorisches Museum ( "Museum of Art History", often referred to as the "Museum of Fine Arts") is an art museum in Vienna, Austria. Housed in its festive palatial building on the Vienna Ring Road, it is crowned with an octagonal do ...

Vienna en, Viennese , iso_code = AT-9 , registration_plate = W , postal_code_type = Postal code , postal_code = , timezone = CET , utc_offset = +1 , timezone_DST ...

Austria Austria, , bar, Östareich officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, one of which is the capital, Vienna, the most populous ...

. It is signed on a

cartouche In Egyptian hieroglyphs, a cartouche is an oval with a line at one end tangent to it, indicating that the text enclosed is a royal name. The first examples of the cartouche are associated with pharaohs at the end of the Third Dynasty, but the fea ...

which hangs from the artist's self-portrait in the center, saying ''Iste faciebat Ano Domini 1508 Albertus Dürer Aleman''.

History

The painting was commissioned by

Frederick III, Elector of Saxony Frederick III (17 January 1463 – 5 May 1525), also known as Frederick the Wise (German ''Friedrich der Weise''), was Elector of Saxony from 1486 to 1525, who is mostly remembered for the worldly protection of his subject Martin Luther. Freder ...

for the

All Saints' Church, Wittenberg All Saints' Church, commonly referred to as ''Schlosskirche'' (Castle Church) to distinguish it from the '' Stadtkirche'' (Town Church) of St. Mary's – and sometimes known as the Reformation Memorial Church – is a Lutheran church in Wittenberg, ...

. Frederick had been Dürer's patron since 1496. He himself chose the subject, as his collection of relics included some of the

Ten thousand martyrs Ten thousand martyrs may refer to the ten thousand martyred Fathers of the deserts and caves of Scete by Theophilus of Alexandria or to the ten thousand martyrs of Mount Ararat who were, according to a medieval legend, Roman soldiers who, led by S ...

. Dürer had used the same subject for a

woodcut Woodcut is a relief printing technique in printmaking. An artist carves an image into the surface of a block of wood—typically with gouges—leaving the printing parts level with the surface while removing the non-printing parts. Areas that ...

of some ten years before, but in the new work he eliminated some macabre details such as the torture of the bishop Acacius, having his eyes stripped through a drill. This scene was replaced by a crucifixion on the right and by the presence of the bishop in chains behind it. The work was repeatedly mentioned in the correspondence between the artist and

Jakob Heller Jakob Heller (c. 1460 — 28 January 1522) was a German patrician, politician, and merchant. He was born and died in Frankfurt am Main, and served as Senior Bürgermeister of the Free City of Frankfurt in 1501 and 1513. Heller is best remembered ...

Frankfurt Frankfurt, officially Frankfurt am Main (; Hessian: , "Frank ford on the Main"), is the most populous city in the German state of Hesse. Its 791,000 inhabitants as of 2022 make it the fifth-most populous city in Germany. Located on its na ...

. Dürer received 280

florin The Florentine florin was a gold coin struck from 1252 to 1533 with no significant change in its design or metal content standard during that time. It had 54 grains (3.499 grams, 0.113 troy ounce) of nominally pure or 'fine' gold with a purcha ...

s for it.

Description

The painting illustrates the legendary martyrdom of ten thousand Christian soldiers perpetrated on

Mount Ararat Mount Ararat or , ''Ararat''; or is a snow-capped and dormant compound volcano in the extreme east of Turkey. It consists of two major volcanic cones: Greater Ararat and Little Ararat. Greater Ararat is the highest peak in Turkey and th ...

by the King of Persia,

Shapur I Shapur I (also spelled Shabuhr I; pal, 𐭱𐭧𐭯𐭥𐭧𐭥𐭩, Šābuhr ) was the second Sasanian King of Kings of Iran. The dating of his reign is disputed, but it is generally agreed that he ruled from 240 to 270, with his father Ardas ...

, by the order of the Roman emperor

Hadrian Hadrian (; la, Caesar Trâiānus Hadriānus ; 24 January 76 – 10 July 138) was Roman emperor from 117 to 138. He was born in Italica (close to modern Santiponce in Spain), a Roman ''municipium'' founded by Italic settlers in Hispania B ...

Antoninus Pius Antoninus Pius (Latin: ''Titus Aelius Hadrianus Antoninus Pius''; 19 September 86 – 7 March 161) was Roman emperor from 138 to 161. He was the fourth of the Five Good Emperors from the Nerva–Antonine dynasty. Born into a senatoria ...

, or, according to other sources,

Diocletian Diocletian (; la, Gaius Aurelius Valerius Diocletianus, grc, Διοκλητιανός, Diokletianós; c. 242/245 – 311/312), nicknamed ''Iovius'', was Roman emperor from 284 until his abdication in 305. He was born Gaius Valerius Diocles ...

. Dürer painted numerous different martyrdom scenes within a forest with clearings and cliffs. In the foreground are crucifixions, decapitations, crushing with a hammer. The Persian King is portrayed as an Ottoman sultan, riding a horse on the right. The executioners also wear gaudy Ottoman dress. In the background are prisoners walking through to a cliff from where they are thrown down against rocks and thorny bushes, as well as scenes of fighting, stoning and hitting with huge clubs. At the center of the crowded scene, dressed in black, are two characters who walk placidly, apparently unaware of the horrors around them: one is Dürer's self-portrait (holding his signature), the other his friend and humanist

Conrad Celtes Conrad Celtes (german: Konrad Celtes; la, Conradus Celtis (Protucius); 1 February 1459 – 4 February 1508) was a German Renaissance humanist scholar and poet of the German Renaissance born in Franconia (nowadays part of Bavaria). He led the ...

, who had died a few months before the execution of the painting.

References

Sources

External links

Page at the museum's website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Martyrdom of the Ten Thousand Paintings by Albrecht Dürer 1508 paintings Paintings in the Kunsthistorisches Museum Self-portraits Religious paintings Paintings about death Christian art about death Dogs in art Horses in art category:Paintings of Saint Maurice Mount Ararat

History

Description

See also

References

Sources

External links