By Emily Burkhart
January 29, 2024
Albrecht Dürer (German, Nuremberg 1471-1528 Nuremberg), Melencolia I, 1514. Copper engraving, plate 9 3/8 x 7 5/16 in. Minneapolis Institute of Arts, Minneapolis, Minnesota. Image courtesy of the Minneapolis Institute of Arts.
Deep depression, intense sadness, melancholy, whatever name used, it takes many forms–psychological, intellectual, artistic. Since Classical times, melancholia has often referred to the latter, the lack of a muse with said muse personified by a goddess (originating from the nine Muses, daughters of Zeus, in Greek mythology) or, more recently, that of a female model for inspiration. So with a “melancholic” mind, I have decided to switch gears and my focus on women artists to write about the personification of melancholy in one of my favorite works of art, the allegorical engraving, Melencolia I (1514) in which the great German Renaissance painter and printmaker Albrecht Dürer portrayed melancholy.
Albrecht Dürer (1471-1528), Self-portrait at 26, 1498. Museo del Prado, Madrid, Spain. Oil on wood panel, 20 in. x 16 in. Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
Context
Melencolia I is one of the three small engravings known collectively as Dürer’s Meisterstiche (master prints). The other two are Knight, Death, and the Devil (1513) and Saint Gerome in His Study (1514). While the three are not a series, they correspond to the three kinds of virtue in medieval scholasticism–moral, theological, and intellectual–and embody the complexity of Durer’s thought and that of his age. Melencolia I thus represents the melancholy of the creative artist and is often considered autobiographical.
Background
From the time of the ancient Greeks through the Middle Ages, every individual was thought to be dominated by one of four bodily humors–blood, yellow bile, black bile, and phlegm. These four humors were understood to define physical and mental health, and determine personality, as well. Carried by the bloodstream, it was believed that the four humors bred the passions of anger, grief, hope, and fear. Black bile, also known as melancholy, was the least desirable of the four humors. Alleged to suffer from an excess of black bile, melancholics were thought to be especially prone to insanity. However, Renaissance thought also linked melancholy with creative genius, a trait exclusive to male artists, thus changing the status of this humor and making the artist aware that his gift came with a price.
Albrecht Dürer (German, Nuremberg 1471-1528 Nuremberg), Melencolia I, 1514. Copper engraving, plate 9 3/8 x 7 5/16 in. Minneapolis Institute of Arts, Minneapolis, Minnesota. Image courtesy of the Minneapolis Institute of Arts.
Iconography
Melencolia I has been linked by scholars to alchemy, astrology, geometry, mythology, numerology, philosophy, and theology to name some of the disciplines (and pseudosciences) associated with this densely laden work. A winged female figure wearing a leafy wreath and assumed to represent Melancholy sits on a ledge abutting the wall of a building. She stares pensively. Her pose–head resting on her left hand–is a common visual depiction of the mental state of melancholy. In her right hand on top of a book on her lap, she holds a caliper, an instrument resembling a compass used to measure the distance between two opposite sides of an object. As a measuring device, a caliper is an architect’s tool and symbolizes God as the architect of the universe. Used to draw circles, the caliper also represents eternity or the realm of the spiritual.
Melancholy is surrounded by other tools associated with geometry, one of the seven liberal arts that underlie artistic creation and the one through which Dürer hoped to achieve perfection in his own work. A set of keys dangle from a belt at her waist symbolizing knowledge and success. Below those, a heavy coin purse rests against her voluminous skirt, a symbol of fortune, prosperity, and luck. Toward the center of the image, a putto (a young boy also with wings) sits atop a millstone, which represents difficult work or tasks. His eyes focused downward, his brow furrowed in concentration, he writes upon a tablet. In some interpretations, he is characterized as sleeping, imbued with innocence, beauty, and peace. A scrawny hound lies curled up on the ground between a sphere and truncated polyhedron, or, perhaps, rhombohedron (there are various analyses of the implied shape) under which is a claw hammer. In spiritual contexts, dogs are symbols of loyalty, faithfulness, and protection.
In front of the sphere is a molder’s form, hand plane, and a set of pincers at Melancholy’s feet. Various other carpentry tools in the form of nails, a saw, and straight edge are also strewn on the ground. These are implements of creation symbolizing judgment and discernment. On the left side of the dog is a censer, or portable inkwell, with a pen holder attachment, items associated with knowledge, authority, and creativity in art. In the bottom right-hand corner by the nails, is a tool that has been interpreted as either the nozzle of a bellows or syringe. Above these and below the ledge upon which Melancholy sits, Dürer signed the work with his architecturally stylized AD monogram and the date, 1514.
In the background, behind the dog, are further implements of creation–a brazier with a goldsmith’s crucible and a pair of tongs. A tall ladder leans against the side of the building. Nearby a nail supports a balance, another a half-full hourglass (at once a symbol of death and the passage of time, and, when turned over, of rebirth and new beginnings). A bell, also symbolic of beginnings and endings, hangs close by, its pull rope extending out of the frame. Both the ladder and building also continue out of the frame and also may symbolize the connection between heaven and earth, beginnings and endings.
Beneath the bell a “magic square” is inscribed on the wall. This is a larger square subdivided into smaller ones. The smaller squares each contain a number so that each vertical, horizontal, and diagonal row adds up to the same total. Here, the rows add up to 34 which is one of the numbers associated with Jupiter in Western Occult Tradition. It signifies new beginnings, balance, and abundance as well as the optimism of planet Jupiter warding off the melancholy of Saturn. The darkness of Saturn as the furthest planet visible to the naked eye in our solar system links it to black in black bile and hence, melancholia.
At the upper left of the engraving, a body of water can be seen in the distance. Barely visible between the rungs of the ladder are buildings on the shore. Above the water, light radiates from a comet, planet, or shooting star (there is no agreement) framed by a rainbow. Day and night seem to merge. A flying batlike creature with a long, undulating tail holds a banner labeled Melencolia I announcing both the subject of the engraving and providing its name.
De Occulta Philosophia, Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa von Nettesheim (1533)
Theodor de Bry, Portrait of Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa, (1486-1535), 1598 engraving. Wellcome Images, United Kingdom. Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
It is believed that the explanation for the number “I” in the title comes from an influential 1533 treatise, called De Occulta Philosophia, containing three volumes of occult philosophy, by Dürer’s contemporary, the German polymath and physician Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa von Nettesheim (1486-1535). Popular in Renaissance humanist circles, Agrippa classified melancholic inspiration into three ascending levels: imagination, reason, and intellect. He posited that creativity in the arts was the realm of the imagination, considered the first and lowest in the hierarchy of the three categories of genius. The next was the realm of reason and the highest the realm of spirit. Agrippa linked imagination to artistic genius, the first and lowest level, which may explain the brooding state of the central winged figure of Melancholy.
Conclusion
Little was written about Melencolia I until after Dürer’s death in 1528 at the age of 56. In 1568, the pioneering Italian art historian, painter, and architect Giorgio Vasari (1511-1574) included Dürer in his Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects. Of Dürer, he wrote:
Then, having grown both in power and courage, as he saw that his works were prized, Albrecht executed some copper engravings that astonished the world. He also set himself to making an engraving, for printing on a half sheet of paper, of a figure of Melancholy, with all the instruments that reduce those who use them, or rather, all mankind, to a melancholy humor; and in this he succeeded so well that it would not be possible to do more delicate engraving with the burin [the tool used for engraving].
Melencolia I touches on the themes of the role of the artist as creator, the relationships among the physical, intellectual, and spiritual realm; the study of the natural world; mathematics; esoteric knowledge; and self-awareness. These were all humanist topics of interest to Dürer and his contemporaries. Since Dürer’s death, Melencolia I has become one of the most frequently discussed images in the history of art and a staple of Western art history courses. Yet, because of its dependence on historical and cultural context, the full meaning of Dürer’s engraving remains an enigma, making the exquisite details of the work difficult to explicate with certainty. A degree of irony attaches to the image as we do not know if Dürer rues or celebrates the muse–or both. In any case, Melencolia I rewards close observation.