  DÜRER AT VENICEIThere are several reasons which may possibly have led DÜrer to visit Venice in 1505. The Fondaco dei Tedeschi, or Exchange of the German Merchants at Venice, had been burned down the winter before, and they were in haste to complete a new one. DÜrer may have received assurance that the commission to paint the altar-piece for the new chapel would be his did he desire it. At any rate he seems to have set to work on such a picture almost as soon as he arrived there. It is strange to think that Giorgione and Titian probably began to paint the frescoes on the facade while he was still at work in the chapel, or soon after he left. The plague broke out in Nuremberg before he came away; but this is not likely to have been his principal motive for leaving home, as many richer men, such as his friend Pirkheimer, from whom he borrowed money for the journey, stayed where they were. Nor do DÜrer's letters reveal any alarm for his friend's, his mother's, his wife's, or his brother's safety. He took with him six small pictures, and probably a great number of prints, for Venice was a first-rate market. IIThe letters which follow are like a glimpse of a distant scene in a camera obscura, and, like life itself, they are full of repetitions and over-insistence on what is insignificant or of temporary interest. To-day they call for our patience and forbearance, and it will depend upon our imaginative activity in what degree they repay them; even as it depends upon our power of affectionate assimilation in what degree and kind every common day adds to our real possessions. I have made my citations as ample as possible, so as to give the reader a just idea of their character while making them centre as far as possible round points of special interest. To the honourable, wise Master Wilibald Pirkheimer, Burgher of NÜrberg, my kind Master. VENICE, January 6, 1506. I wish you and yours many good, happy New Years. My willing service, first of all, to you dear Master Pirkheimer! Know that I am in good health; I pray God far better things than that for you. As to those pearls and precious stones which you gave me commission to buy, you must know that I can find nothing good or even worth its price. Everything is snapped up by the Germans who hang about the Riva. They always want to get four times the value for anything, for they are the falsest knaves alive. No one need look for an honest service from any of them. Some good fellows have warned me to beware of them, they cheat man and beast. You can buy better things at a lower price at Frankfurt than at Venice. [Illustration: Wilibald Pirkheimer--Charcoal Drawing, Dumesnil Collection, Paris Face p. 80] About the books which I was to order for you, the Imhofs have already seen after them; but if there is anything else you want, let me know and I will attend to it for you with all zeal. Would to God I could do you a right good service! gladly would I accomplish it, seeing, as I do, how much you do for me. And I pray you be patient with my debt, for indeed I think much oftener of it than you do. When God helps me home I will honourably repay you with many thanks; for I have a panel to paint for the Germans for which they are to pay me a hundred and ten Rhenish florins--it will not cost me as much as five. I shall have scraped it and laid on the ground and made it ready within eight days; then I shall at once begin to paint and, if God will, it shall be in its place above the altar a month after Easter. VENICE, February 17, 1506. How I wish you were here at Venice! There are so many nice men among the Italians who seek my company more and more every day--which is very pleasing to one--men of sense and knowledge, good lute-players and pipers, judges of painting, men of much noble sentiment and 'honest virtue, and they show me much honour and friendship. On the other hand there are also amongst them some of the most false, lying, thievish rascals; I should never have believed that such were living in the world. If one did not know them, one would think them the nicest men the earth could show. For my own part I cannot help laughing at them whenever they talk to me. They know that their knavery is no secret but they don't mind. Amongst the Italians I have many good friends who warn me not to eat and drink with their painters. Many of them are my enemies and they copy my work in the churches and wherever they can find it; and then they revile it and say that the style is not antique and so not good. But Giovanni Bellini has highly praised me before many nobles. He wanted to have something of mine, and himself came to me and asked me to paint him something and he would pay well for it. And all men tell me what an upright man he is, so that I am really friendly with him. He is very old, but is still the best painter of them all. And that which so well pleased me eleven years ago pleases me no longer, if I had not seen it for myself I should not have believed any one who told me. You must know too that there are many better painters here than Master Jacob (Jacopo de' Barbari) is abroad (wider darvsen Meister J.), yet Anton Kolb would swear an oath that no better painter lives than Jacob. Others sneer at him, saying if he were good he would stay here, and so forth. I have only to-day begun to sketch in my picture, for my hands were so scabby (grindig) that I could do no work with them, but I have got them cured. Now be lenient with me and don't get in a passion so easily, but be gentle like me. I don't know why you will not learn from me. My friend! I should like to know if any one of your loves is dead--that one close by the water for instance, or the one called [Illustration] or [Illustration] or a [Illustration] so that you might supply her place by another. ALBRECHT DÜRER. VENICE, February 28, 1506. I wish you had occasion to come here, I know you would not find time hang on your hands, for there are so many nice men in this country, right good artists. I have such a throng of Italians about me that at times I have to shut myself up. The nobles all wish me well, but few of the painters. VENICE, April 2, 1506. The painters here, let me tell you, are very unfriendly to me. They have summoned me three times before the magistrates, and I have had to pay four florins to their school. You must also know that I might have gained a great deal of money if I had not undertaken to paint the German picture. There is much work in it and I cannot get it quite finished before Whitsuntide. Yet they only pay me eighty-five ducats for it. Now you know how much it costs to live, and then I have bought some things and sent some money away, so that I have not much before me now. But don't misunderstand me, I am firmly purposed not to go away hence till God enables me to repay you with thanks and to have a hundred florins over besides. I should easily earn this if I had not got the German picture to paint, for all men except the painters wish me well. Tell my mother to speak to Wolgemut about my brother, and to ask him whether he can make use of him and give him work till I come, or whether he can put him with some one else. I should gladly have brought him with me to Venice, and that would have been useful both to me and him, and he would have learnt the language, but my mother was afraid that the sky would fall on him. Pray keep an eye on him yourself, the women are no use for that. Tell the lad, as you so well can, to be studious and honest till I come, and not to be a trouble to his mother; if I cannot arrange everything I will at all events do all that I can. Alone I certainly should not starve, but to support many is too hard for me, for no one throws his gold away. Now I commend myself to you. Tell my mother to be ready to sell at the Crown-fair (Heiligthumsfest). I am arranging for my wife to have come home by then; I have written to her too about everything. I will not take any steps about buying the diamond ornament till I get your next letter. I don't think I shall be able to come home before next autumn, when what I earned for the picture, which was to have been ready by Whitsuntide, will be quite used up in living expenses, purchases, and payments; what, however, I gain afterwards I hope to save. If you see fit don't speak of this further, and I will keep putting off my leaving from day to day and writing as though I was just coming. I am indeed very uncertain what to do next. Write to me again soon. Given on Thursday before Palm Sunday in the year 1506. ALBRECHT DÜRER, Your Servant. VENICE, August 18, 1506. To the first, greatest man in the world. Your servant and slave Albrecht DÜrer sends salutation to his Magnificent master Wilibald Pirkheimer. My truth! I hear gladly and with great satisfaction of your health and great honours. I wonder how it is possible for a man like you to stand against so many wisest princes, swaggerers and soldiers; it must be by some special grace of God. When I read your letter about this terrible grimace, it gave me a great fright and I thought it was a most important thing, For one thing I return you my thanks, namely, for explaining my position in the best way to my wife; but I know that there is no lack of wisdom in you. If only you had my meekness you would have all virtues. Thank you also for all the good you have done me, if only you would not bother me about the rings! If they don't please you, break their heads off and pitch them out on to the dunghill as Peter Weisweber says. What do you mean by setting me to such dirty work? I have become a gentleman at Venice. I have also heard that you can make lovely rhymes; you would be a find for our fiddlers here; they fiddle so beautifully that they can't help weeping over it themselves. Would God our Rechenmeister girl could hear them, she would cry too. At your bidding I will again lay aside my anger and bear myself even more bravely than usual. Now let me commend myself to you; give my willing service to our Prior for me; tell him to pray God for me that I may be protected, and especially from the French sickness; I know of nothing that I now dread more than that, for well nigh every one has got it. Many men are quite eaten up and die of it. VENICE, September 8, 1506. Most learned, approved, wise, knower of many languages, sharp to detect all encountered lies and quick to recognise plain truth! Honourable much-regarded Herr Wilibald Pirkheimer. Your humble servant Albrecht DÜrer wishes you all hail, great and worthy honour in the devil's name, so much for the twaddle of which you are so fond. I wager that for this I have taken all manner of trouble about the carpets but cannot find any broad ones; they are all narrow and long. However I still look about every day for them and so does Anton Kolb. I have given Bernhard Hirschvogel your greeting and he sent you his service. He is full of sorrow for the death of his Son, the nicest lad I ever saw. I can get none of your foolish featherlets. Oh, if only you were here! how you would like these fine Italian soldiers! How often I think of you! Would to God that you and Kunz Kamerer could see them! They have great scythe-lances with 278 points, if they only touch a man with them he dies, for they are all poisoned. Hey! I can do it well, I'll be an Italian soldier. The Venetians as well as the Pope and the King of France are collecting many men; what will come of it I don't know, but people ridicule our King very much. Wish Stephan Paumgartner much happiness from me. I don't wonder at his having taken a wife. Give my greeting to Borsch, Herr Lorenz, and our fair friends, as well as to your Rechenmeister girl, and thank that head-chamber of yours alone for remembering her greeting; tell her she's a nasty one. [Illustration] I sent you olive-wood from Venice to Augsburg, where I directed it to be left, a full ten hundredweight. She says she would not wait for it; whence the stink. My picture, you must know, says it would give a ducat for you to see it, it is well painted and beautifully coloured. I have earned much praise but little profit by it. In the time it took to paint I could easily have earned 220 ducats, and now I have declined much work, in order that I may come home. I have stopped the mouths of all the painters who used to say that I was good at engraving but, as to painting. I did not know how to handle my colours. Now every one says that better colouring they have never seen. My French mantle greets you and my Italian coat also. It strikes me that there is an odour of gallantry about you; I can scent it out even at this distance; and they tell me here that when you go a-courting you pretend not to be more than twenty-five years old--oh, yes! double that and I'll believe it. My friend, there are so many Italians here who look exactly like you; I don't know how it happens! The Doge and the Patriarch have also seen my picture. Herewith let me commend myself to you as your servant. I must really go to sleep as it is striking the seventh hour of the night, and I have already written to the Prior of the Augustines, to my father-in-law, to Mistress Dietrich, and to my wife, and they are all downright whole sheets full. So I have had to hurry over this letter, read it according to the sense. You would doubtless do better if you were writing to a lot of Princes. Many good nights and days too. Given at Venice on our Lady's day in September. You need not lend my wife and mother anything; they have got money enough, ALBRECHT DÜRER. VENICE, September 23, 1506. Your letter telling me of the praise that you get to overflowing from Princes and nobles gave me great delight. You must be altogether altered to have become so gentle; I shall hardly know you when I meet you again. You must know that my picture is finished as well as another Quadro But in order to come home as soon as possible, I have, since my picture was finished, refused work that would have yielded me more than 2000 ducats. This all men know who live about me here. Bernhard Holzbeck has told me great things of you, though I think he does so because you have become his brother-in-law. But nothing makes me more angry than when any one says that you are good-looking; if that were so I should become really ugly. That could make me mad. I have found a grey hair on myself, it is the result of so much excitement. And I fear that while I play such pranks with myself there are still bad days before me, &c. My French mantle, my doublet, and my brown coat send you a hearty greeting, I should be glad to see what great thing your head-piece can produce that you hold yourself so high. VENICE, about October 13, 1506. Knowing that you are aware of my devotion to your service there is no need for me to write to you about it; but so much the more necessary is it for me to tell you of the great pleasure it gives me to hear of the high honour and fame which your manly wisdom and learned skill have brought you. This is the more to be wondered at, for seldom or never in a young body can the like be found. It comes to you, however, as to me, by a special grace of God. How pleased we both are when we fancy ourselves worth somewhat--I with my painting, and you with your wisdom. When any one praises us, we hold up our heads and believe him. Yet perhaps he is only some false flatterer who is scorning us all the time. So don't credit any one who praises you, for you've no notion how utterly and entirely unmannerly you are. I can quite see you standing before the Margrave and speaking so pleasantly--behaving exactly as if you were flirting with Mistress Rosentaler, cringing as you do. It did not escape me that, when you wrote your last letter, you were quite full of amorous thoughts. You ought to be ashamed of yourself, an old fellow like you pretending to be so good-looking. Flirting pleases you in the same way that a shaggy old dog likes a game with a kitten. If you were only as fine and gentle a man as I, I could understand it. If I become burgomaster I will serve you with the Luginsland. People enquire more after me than you, for you yourself write that both girls and honourable wives ask after me--that is a sign of my virtue. When, however, God helps me home I don't know how I shall any longer stand you with your great wisdom; but for your virtue and good temper I am glad, and your dogs will be the better for it, for you will no longer strike them lame. Now however that you are thought so much of at home, you won't dare to talk to a poor painter in the street any more; to be seen with the painter varlet would be a great disgrace for you. O, dear Herr Pirkheimer, just now while I was writing to you, the alarm of fire was raised and six houses over by Pietro Venier are burnt, and a woollen cloth of mine, for which only yesterday I paid eight ducats, is burnt, so I too am in trouble. There is much excitement here about the fire. As to your summons to me to come home soon, I shall come as soon as ever I can, but I must first gain money for my expenses. I have paid away about 100 ducats for colours and other things. I have ordered you two carpets for which I shall pay to-morrow, but I could not get them cheap. I will pack them in with my linen. And as to your threat that, unless I come home soon, you will make love to my wife, don't attempt it--a ponderous fellow like you would be the death of her. I must tell you that I set to work to learn dancing and went twice to the school, for which I had to pay the master a ducat. No one could get me to go there again. To learn dancing I should have had to pay away all that I have earned, and at the end I should have known nothing about it. [Illustration: HANS BURGKMAIR--Black chalk drawing on yellowish prepared ground. The lights and background in watercolor may possibly have been added later At Oxford] In reply to your question when I shall come home, I tell you, so that my lords may also make their arrangements, that I shall have finished here in ten days; after that I should like to ride to Bologna to learn the secrets of the art of perspective, which a man is willing to teach me. I should stay there eight or ten days and then return to Venice. After that I shall come with the next messenger. How I shall freeze after this sun! Here I am a gentleman, at home only a parasite. IIISir Martin Conway writes: He (DÜrer) enjoyed Venice; he liked the Italians; he was oppressed with orders for work; the climate suited him, and the warm sun was a pleasant contrast to the snows and frost of a Franconian winter. But DÜrer's German heart was true; its truth was the secret of his success.... The syren voice of Italy charmed to their destruction most Germans who listened to it. Brought face to face with the Italian Ideal of Grace, they one after another abandoned for it the Ideal of Strength peculiarly their own. We do not resort to these arguments to approve Holbein or Van Dyck for their long residence in England. I am not sure how much false sentiment inspired Thausing when he first praised DÜrer in this strain; but I must confess I suspect it was no little. I incline to think that the best country for an artist is not always the one he was born in, but often that one where his art finds the best conditions to foster it. We do not honour DÜrer by supposing that he would have been among that majority of Dutch and German artists who, weaker than Roger van der Weyden and Burgkmair, returned from Italy injured and enfeebled; even if he had passed the greater portion of his life with her syren voice in his ears. DÜrer could not bring himself to undergo for art's sake what Michael Angelo endured; years of exile from a beloved native city, and, still worse, years of exile from the most congenial spiritual atmosphere. Nevertheless, we must remember that the difference of language would have made life in Venice for DÜrer a much more complete exile than life in Verona was for Dante, or life in Rome for Michael Angelo. So he did not share the patronage and generous recognition which gave Titian such a splendid opportunity. He ceased for a time at least to be a gentleman to become a hanger-on, a parasite once more. At Antwerp he once more was met by the same generosity and recognition only to refuse again to accept it as a gift for life and return to his beloved Nuremberg, where it is true his position continually improved, though it never equalled what had been offered at Venice and Antwerp. IVThe tone of some of the pleasantries in these letters may rather astonish good people who, having accepted the fact that DÜrer was a religious man, have at once given him the tone and address of a meeting of churchwardens, if they have not conjured up a vision of him in a frock coat. "Things are what they are," said Bishop Butler, and so are women; boys will be boys. The distinctive functions of the two sexes were in those days kept more in view if not more in mind than is the case to-day. The fashions in dress and in deportment were particularly frank upon this point, especially for the young. One may allow as much as is desired for the corruption of manners produced by the civil and religious mercenaries, soldiers of fortune, and friars. There will always remain a certain truth and propriety, a certain grace and charm in those costumes and that deportment, as also in the freedom of jest which characterises even the most modest of Shakespeare's heroines; and under the influence of their spell we shall feel that all has not been gain in the change that has gradually been operated. No doubt virtue is a victory over nature, and chastity a refinement; but among conquerors some are easy and good-natured, others tactless, awkward, insulting; and among the chaste some are fearless and enjoy the freedom which courage and clear conscience give, others timid and suffer the oppression of their fears. Even among sinners some make the best of weaknesses and redeem them a great deal more than half, while others magnify smaller faults by lack of self-possession till they are an insupportable nuisance. We may well admit that from the successes of those days, those who succeed to our delight to-day may glean additional attractions. VWe know that DÜrer stopped on at Venice into the year 1507, by a note which he made in a copy of Euclid, now in the library at WolfenbÜttel. "This book have I bought at Venice for a ducat in the year 1507. Albrecht DÜrer"; and by another stray note we learn the state of his worldly affairs on his return. The following is my property, which I have with difficulty acquired by the labour of my hand, for I have had no opportunity of great gain. I have moreover suffered much loss by lending what was not repaid me, and by apprentices who never paid their fees, and one died at Rome whereby I lost my wares. In the thirteenth year of my wedlock (Le., 1507-8) I have paid great debts with what I earned at Venice. I possess fairly good household furniture, good clothes, chests, some good pewter vessels, good materials for my work, bedding and cupboards, and good colours worth 100 florins Rhenish. The wares that DÜrer lost in Rome were doubtless chiefly woodcuts and engravings which his prentice had taken to sell during his wanderjahre, as DÜrer himself during his own had very likely sold prints for Wolgemut. One of the reasons which had taken him to Venice may have been to summon Marc Antonio before the Signoria, for having copied not only his engravings, but the monogram with which he signed them; in any case he obtained a decree defending him against such artistic forgery. DÜrer's most steady resource seems to have been the sale of prints; it is these that his wife had sold in his absence, and in the diary of his journey to the Netherlands there is constant mention of such sales. Nuremberg was very much behind Antwerp or Venice in the price paid for works of art; and the possibilities of such a market as Rome had very likely tempted DÜrer to trust his prentice with an unusual quantity of prints. His worldly affairs were neither brilliant nor secure; yet we shall find him tempted on receiving an important commission to spend so much in time and material as to make it impossible for him to realise a profit. We are accustomed to think that these trials were spared to artists in the past by the munificence of patrons: but apart from the fact that patrons often paid only with promises or by granting credit, at Nuremberg there were few magnificent patrons, and its burghers were in no way so generous or so extravagant as those of Venice or Antwerp. In fact, DÜrer's position was very similar to that of the modern artist, who finds little and insufficient patronage, and can make more if he is lucky by the reproduction of his creations for the great public. But DÜrer still had one advantage over his fellow-sufferers of to-day--that of being his own publisher. Doubtless portraits were as popular then as nowadays; but if the public taste had not been prostituted by a seductive commercialism to the degree that at present obtains, on the other hand, at Nuremberg at least, the fashion seems to have been very little developed; and most of DÜrer's important portraits seem to have been the result of his sojourns away from home. FOOTNOTES:
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