Fabio Glissenti (1596)
Frontispiece of the 1609 edition.
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Glissenti's book was published in Venice. This print shows Death as a gondoler.
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ot much is known about Glissenti.
He was apparently a physician and philosopher, and he published a number of books in Venice.
In 1596 he published "Discorsi Morali […] contra il dispiacer del morire"
i.e. "Moral discourses against the displeasure of dying".
These "Moral Discourses" are quite voluminous:
Over 1,200 pages with over 100 woodcuts that are repeated again and again.
These woodcuts can be divided into three groups:
26(1)
woodcuts are taken from the editions of "Imagines Mortis"
that were published by
Vincenzo Valgrisi between 1545 and 1551.
This also means that all the motives are among the 41
that were included in the first editions of Holbein.
The woodcuts seems to be very well done (Valgrisi himself claimed
they were better than Holbein's originals),
but unfortunately they are worn down and crabbedly printed.
Two of Valgrisi's woodcuts have been censored:
The two devils have been removed from the pope
(it's easy to see the circular plug in the top, left corner), and
the same thing goes for the devil at the senator's
ear.
Death, also known as "the last enemy", administers the last enema.
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5 are copies of Holbein, namely
king,
astrologer,
knight,
noble lady and
child.
There's not much to say about them — except that they are nicely printed.
Finally come a large number of original woodcuts,
which naturally is a mixed bag.
The book was printed in Venice and several of the scenes take place along the canal (top, right corner).
One of the more bizarre motives is seen to the right, where Death is about to administer
a clyster with a gigantic syringe.
Death as beggar
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Death lying on the ground
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any of the woodcuts portray a person who is reminiscent of
Holbein's image of the duke with crown and ermine-cloak.
On the image to the left, the duke (or "doge") rejects a couple of ragged beggars
without realizing that one of them is Death
— just as on Holbein's woodcut of the duke.
On the image to the right, Death is lying on the ground lifting an hourglass
— just as on Holbein's image of the senator.
In 1608 Glissenti published the
allegorical five-act play "La Morte Innamorata" ("Death in Love").
The book contained Death's escutcheon
and a few of the non-Holbeinian woodcuts.
From: The physician of the dance of death by Aldred Scott Warthin
[p. 64] […] In a very curious Italian work
entitled "Discorsi Morali dell' eccell.
Sig. Fabio Glissenti contra il dispiacer
del morire. Delto athanatophilia. In
Venetia, appresso Bartolameo de gli
Alberti. MDCIX," twenty-four(1) of Vaugris'
reproductions of Holbein's
woodcuts are introduced with five
others taken from the Simolachre
together with many new subjects
imitated in the Holbein manner, over
300 in all. These woodcuts all bear
[p. 65]
upon the subject of death, which
the author discusses from every possible angle. It is a sort of tragedy of
human life.
The work consists of five
dialogues and a brevissimo trattato.
Each of these is preceded by a portrait
of the author. These portraits, as all
of the other plates, are decorated
with funeral emblems. The cuts, all
of which contain a skeletonized or
mummified figure, are repeated over
and over again, most of them in each
section of the work. Some of the Holbein subjects are very poorly imitated.
The devils are omitted from the cut
of the Pope. The prints bearing upon
medical subjects are especially interesting to us, as Glissenti is said to
have been a physician himself. At
any rate his writings proclaim him a
highly religious man, philosophical
rather than scientific. Holbein's cut
of the Physician is repeated several
times, always with a companion picture of Death in the act of preparing
to administer a clyster to a patient
who has risen from his bed and
kneels upon the floor (see Fig. 36).
In another print an anatomist is in
the midst of an autopsy, while Death
addresses forcibly the foremost of a
group of young medical students
crowding in to view the anatomizing
of the body of a young woman. From
the text we gather that this is the
anatomical theater at Padua (see
Fig. 37). The body is that of a celebrated beauty. Death points out the
[p. 66]
repulsive features of the dead body.
Behind the lips so beautiful are
decayed teeth and a foul odor issues
from the mouth. The parts of the
body formed for love in life are in
the dead body horrible and repulsive
through putrefaction. Death is attempting to so horrify and disgust the
young student that he will no longer
desire to live, but will give himself
to death. The end of this tale is that
the student decided to abandon the
practice of medicine and to live upon
the income left him by his parents.
One would like to know what the
author had in his mind as to many
of these cuts; but the mass of text
is too formidable for one to make the
attempt at translation, particularly
as it appears on the surface to consist
chiefly of arid religious moralizations
and philosophizing. So it is more
profitable to take the pictures at
their face value. They are interesting
and curious enough to repay a careful
examination.
Many of the Glissenti
woodcuts are reproduced in Venetian
works published in 1670 and 1677.
This edition of 1609 is apparently the
second one, for in the Sears' catalogue
(1889), a first edition is described as
having been printed by Dom. Ferri,
in Venice, in 1596. It was said to be
extremely rare, as is also the 1609
edition.
In the bottom, right corner is the date, 1600.
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Warthin is mistaken in assuming that the 1609 edition was the second one, because there was also a 1600-edition.
There is not much to be said about this 1600-edition. The date was was changed from M.D.X CVI.
to 1600 on the first title page, but the date remained unchanged, 1596,
on the title pages of all the sub-sections.
Resources
Gondol
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Clyster
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Glissenti
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Glissenti
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Glissenti, 1609
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Glissenti, 1600
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Other interpreters of Holbein's dance of death
Footnotes:
(1)
24 / 26.
Douce (p. 112) and Warthin (p. 64) say twenty-four, but as this page shows, there are in fact 26.
Douce and Warthin both refer to the 1609-edition,
and maybe this explains the discrepancy.
I haven't bothered to count this edition.
Dances of death
Holbein's great dance of death
Glissenti
