Tindall Wildridge

Decoration from Tindall Wildridge's book

The cover

small book about dances of death, "The Dance of Death in painting and in print" — illustrated with 11 woodcuts. Published by Tindall Wildridge in 1887. The book can be seen in detail at The Wenceslaus Hollar Digital Collection (see link below), where the woodcuts are attributed to John Bewick.

It's a mistake to claim the blocks were cut by Bewick, because:

1. Wildridge nowhere makes the claim that the cuts were made by Bewick
2. John Bewick copies Holbein's woodcuts rather closely, whereas this unknown artists follows the deviations that were invented by Arnold Birckmann and later imitated by Wenceslaus Hollar and David Deuchar.
3. Wildridge mentions that Bewick's wood-blocks were destroyed by fire in 1825.(1) This would have made it a tad difficult to employ them in 1887.
4. Wildridge states clearly (p. 37) that the blocks »are a series found in a northern printing office many years ago« and that they »seem to be of considerable age«.

Has this unknown artist then copied Birckmann, Hollar or Deuchar? The answer is that the artist has copied the 1816-edition of Hollar, where the well-worn copperplates had been "rebitten". The plate where this is most apparent is the bishop because the artist, who refreshed Hollar's plates added faces on the sun and its mirror image.

Hollar: the sun mirrored in the lake	Deuchar copies Hollar (laterally inversed)	Hollar 1816 new and improved. The suns have faces	Unknown artist copies the "improved" images with faces

Another example is the queen. The heavy-handed "renovation" of Hollar's plates meant that the decoration on the pillars had disappeared:

Hollar: pillars with projections	Hollar 1816: pillars are starkly simplified	Unknown artist: The same simplified pillars.

A third example is the soldier. At the renovation in 1816 vertical lines were added at the top of the picture, and these are copied by the unknown artist:

Hollar: no vertical lines	Hollar 1816: vertical lines	Unknown artist: vertical lines

It is rather clear then, that the artist has copied the 1816-edition of Hollar. One might sense a little doubt when it comes to the preacher, because Death holds a small bone in his hand, just like with Deuchar. But this similarity is in fact caused by the artist copying the 1816 edition of Hollar. The letter-press for this edition was copied from Mechel's etchings, where Death has a large bone in his hand. That's why the description to this picture says »Death, who is behind him with a stole about his neck, holds over his head the bone of a dead body«. The unknown artist, Deuchar and Pseudo Bewick have all added a bone as demanded by the description, but all three of them place the hand and bone differently.

In contrast the hourglass shows us that the artist has copied Hollar: Hollar has rendered the hourglass so indistinctly that Deuchar has skipped it. In the 1816-edition, the hourglass has all but disappeared and looks more like some sort of buckle on the stole that Death is wearing. And verily, the unknown artist has copied this "buckle", which he couldn't have found by Deuchar.

Birckmann: Empty hands distinct hourglass	Hollar: Empty hands fairly distinct hourglass	Deuchar: A small bone no hourglass	Hollar 1816: Empty hands very indistinct hourglass	Unknown artist: A small bone indistinct hourglass	Pseudo Bewick: Large bone

Resources

• One of the 60 coloured copies is available at The Wenceslaus Hollar Digital Collection - look for »Bewick, 1887«.
• Another of the 60 copies - this one in more subdued colours - can be seen at Graphiksammlung "Mensch und Tod" at the University of Düsseldorf.
• One of the 400 plain copies is available from The Internet Archive: The Dance of Death in painting and in print (1887)

Decoration

The Pope

Emperor

Empress

Queen

Bishop

Abbess

Preacher

Nun

Physician

Count

Soldier

Other interpreters of Holbein's dance of death

• Hans Holbein (1538) - the original woodcuts
• Heinrich Aldegrever (1541)
• Heinrich Vogtherr (1544)
• Arnold Birckmann (1555)
• Scharffenberg (1576)
• Peter Paul Rubens (1600-1610)
• David Chytraeus (1590)
• Eberhard Kieser (1617)
• Wenceslaus Hollar (1651)
• De doodt vermaskert (1654)
• Johann Weichard von Valvasor (1682)
• Salomon van Rusting (1707)
• Christian de Mechel (1780)
• David Deuchar (1788)
• John Bewick (1789)
• Alexander Anderson (1810)
• Wenceslaus Hollar (1816)
• Pseudo-Bewick (1825)
• Ludwig Bechstein (1831)
• Joseph Schlotthauer (1832)
• Carl Helmuth (1836)
• Francis Douce (1833)

Footnotes: (1)

Dances of death Holbein Dance of death Tindall Wildridge