''Witches' Sabbath'' ( es, El Aquelarre)
Aquelarre
' in the Diccionario de la Real Academia Española. is a 1798 oil on canvas by the

Spanish Spanish might refer to: * Items from or related to Spain: **Spaniards are a nation and ethnic group indigenous to Spain **Spanish language, spoken in Spain and many Latin American countries **Spanish cuisine Other places * Spanish, Ontario, Can ...

artist

Francisco Goya Francisco José de Goya y Lucientes (; ; 30 March 174616 April 1828) was a Spanish Romanticism, romantic painter and Printmaking, printmaker. He is considered the most important Spanish artist of the late 18th and early 19th centuries. His p ...

. Today it is held in the

Museo Lázaro Galdiano Museo may refer to: * Museo, 2018 Mexican drama heist film *Museo (Naples Metro) Museo is a station on line 1 of the Naples Metro. It was opened on 5 April 2001 as the eastern terminus of the section of the line between Vanvitelli and Museo. O ...

Madrid Madrid ( , ) is the capital and most populous city of Spain. The city has almost 3.4 million inhabitants and a metropolitan area population of approximately 6.7 million. It is the second-largest city in the European Union (EU), and ...

. It was purchased in 1798 along with five other paintings related to

witchcraft Witchcraft traditionally means the use of magic or supernatural powers to harm others. A practitioner is a witch. In medieval and early modern Europe, where the term originated, accused witches were usually women who were believed to have ...

by the

Duke Duke is a male title either of a monarch ruling over a duchy, or of a member of royalty, or nobility. As rulers, dukes are ranked below emperors, kings, grand princes, grand dukes, and sovereign princes. As royalty or nobility, they are r ...

and Duchess of Osuna. The acquisition of the witchcraft paintings is attributed to the duchess rather than her husband, but it is not known whether they were commissioned or bought after completion. In the twentieth century the painting was purchased by the financier José Lázaro Galdiano and donated to the Spanish state upon his death. Witches Flight Goya

Description

''Witches' Sabbath'' shows Baphomet, surrounded by a

coven A coven () is a group or gathering of witches. The word "coven" (from Anglo-Norman ''covent, cuvent'', from Old French ''covent'', from Latin ''conventum'' = convention) remained largely unused in English until 1921 when Margaret Murray promot ...

of young and aged witches in a moonlit barren landscape. The goat possesses large horns and is crowned by a wreath of oak leaves. On the right, an old

crone In folklore, a crone is an old woman who may be characterized as disagreeable, malicious, or sinister in manner, often with magical or supernatural associations that can make her either helpful or obstructive. The Crone is also an archetypal fig ...

can be seen holding an extremely starved looking, but apparently still living, infant in her hands, while a younger witch to her right does the same with a healthier looking child, implying they will follow the same fate. The Devil seems to be acting as a sort of priest at an initiation ceremony for the children, although popular superstition at the time believed the Devil often fed on children and human

fetus A fetus or foetus (; plural fetuses, feti, foetuses, or foeti) is the unborn offspring that develops from an animal embryo. Following embryonic development the fetal stage of development takes place. In human prenatal development, fetal dev ...

es. The dead body of an infant can be seen discarded to the left, whereas the legs of another can be seen held down with force to the ground by a presumably younger witch in the center foreground. More witches, young and old, can be seen in the background, as well as three dead infants hanging from the neck on a stake to the left. Typical of the imagery of

, many of the symbols used are inverted. The goat extends his left rather than right hoof toward the child, while the quarter moon faces out of the canvas at the top left corner. In the middle high-ground, a number of bats can be seen flying overhead, their flocking motion echoing the curve of the crescent moon.

Link with the ''Witch In The Air''

Goya used the imagery of

covens A coven () is a group or gathering of witches. The word "coven" (from Anglo-Norman ''covent, cuvent'', from Old French ''covent'', from Latin ''conventum'' = convention) remained largely unused in English until 1921 when Margaret Murray promoted ...

of witches in a number of works, most notably in one of his ''

Black Paintings The ''Black Paintings'' (Spanish: ''Pinturas negras'') is the name given to a group of 14 paintings by Francisco Goya from the later years of his life, likely between 1819 and 1823. They portray intense, haunting themes, reflective of both his ...

'', '' Witches' Sabbath or The Great He-Goat'' (1821–1823). His paintings have been seen as a protest against those who upheld and enforced the values of the

Spanish Inquisition The Tribunal of the Holy Office of the Inquisition ( es, Tribunal del Santo Oficio de la Inquisición), commonly known as the Spanish Inquisition ( es, Inquisición española), was established in 1478 by the Catholic Monarchs, King Ferdinand ...

, which had been active in

Witch hunting A witch-hunt, or a witch purge, is a search for people who have been labeled witches or a search for evidence of witchcraft. The classical period of witch-hunts in Early Modern Europe and Colonial America took place in the Early Modern perio ...

during the seventeenth-century Basque witch trials. Critics in the 20th century surmise that the ''Witches Sabbath'' was painted in 1798 as a bitter struggle raged between liberals and those in favour of a church and a

royalist A royalist supports a particular monarch as head of state for a particular kingdom, or of a particular dynastic claim. In the abstract, this position is royalism. It is distinct from monarchism, which advocates a monarchical system of gov ...

-led state, which culminated in the so-called

Ominous Decade The Ominous Decade (Castilian: ''Década Ominosa'') is a liberal term for the last ten years of the reign of King Ferdinand VII of Spain, dating from the abolition of the Spanish Constitution of 1812, on 1 October 1823, to his death on 29 Septem ...

(1823–1833)."Dark Knight". ''New York Magazine'', Volume 22, No. 2, 1989. 111. Both paintings can be seen as an attack on the superstitious beliefs rife in Spain during a period when tales of midnight gatherings of witches and the appearance of the devil were commonplace among the rural populace. They reflect Goya's disdain for the popular tendency towards superstition and the church-led return to medieval fears. Goya's depictions of such scenes in a painting commissioned by landed aristocrats somehow in one critic's words mocked what he saw as medieval fears exploited by the established order for political and capital gain.Boime, 262

Notes

Bibliography

* Boime, Albert. ''Art in an age of counterrevolution, 1815–1848''. Chicago University Press, 2004. * Connell, Evan S. ''Francisco Goya: A Life''. New York: Counterpoint, 2004. * Hagen, Rose-Marie & Hagen, Rainer. ''Francisco Goya, 1746–1828''.

Taschen Taschen is a luxury art book publisher founded in 1980 by Benedikt Taschen in Cologne, Germany. As of January 2017, Taschen is co-managed by Benedikt and his eldest daughter, Marlene Taschen. History The company began as Taschen Comics, ...

, 2003. * Hughes, Robert. ''Goya''. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2004. * ''Francisco Goya''. Kent: Grange Books, 2004.

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Witches' Sabbath (1798) 1798 paintings Paintings by Francisco Goya Paintings in the collection of the Lázaro Galdiano Museum Witches in art Goats in art Moon in art Death in art